Help recreating a photo of the lovely Zooey Deschanel?

[thenewdancecraze]

Hello!
So, I'm an amateur photographer.
I know the basics and am pretty craft with Photoshop Elements 8.
However, my next project I want to be perfect.
And I don't know how to disassemble one picture and recreate a similar affect in another.
For example, I have been told for the past few years that I look like Zooey Deschanel (Not to be cocky here, I do slightly resemble her but I think she is much more gorgeous than I am).
Therefore my boyfriend, also obsessed with Zooey, would love to see a picture of me that mirrors this picture of Zooey:

I can see the basics effects, such as lighting from underneath and a focus on her face and blur around her.

However, I'm not entirely sure how to DO this myself. Like how should I take the picture? With what settings? And then what editing in photoshop would allow me to acheive that warm golden/copper tone that is in this photo?

If anyone could take apart this photo and give me instructions how to recreate it with a different subject (i.e. me!) I would greatly appreciate it!

I'm a huge fan of Zooey and I love her to death <3
Therefore I would love to emulate her in my own way!

 

[Derrel]

The lighting is primarily from a single umbrella light placed above her eye level and angled down at her face. See the shadow under her nose????? See how it is just a teensy-tiny bit off-center, that shadow? You need to have a smallish umbrella, like a 30 to 32 incher, palced right in front of you. Only about half of the umbrella is reflecting in her eyeball,at the tops of the eyes.

Under her chin and just out of camera view are two smallish reflectors--they appear to be roughly 12x18 inch pieces of card. MUCH of the light that is raining down from above from the umbrella is bouncing back off of the reflectors, lighting the area under her chin.

The depth of field is very shallow--her bangs are out of focus, and so is the hair as close as her ears. it looks like this might have been shot with a MF camera with a 150 or 250mm lens, so on APS-C a 180 to 200mm lens length at f/3.5 would be about right. The background is well blown out. One could use a shorter focal length, like 85 to 105mm at f/2.5 to f/2.8 from close range to get a similar effect. Then post process it to get that weird color effect.

 

[thenewdancecraze]

This is exactly the kind of stuff I'm unable to decipher!
perfect!
thanks

 

[Big Mike]

It looks like Derrel is right on the money. You can clearly see where light is coming from, by the reflections/catchlights in her eyes and the shadow under her nose.

As with any portrait, it's mostly about lighting....not camera settings and Photoshop.

There is a very shallow Depth of Field (DOF) which is controlled with camera settings (focal length and aperture) but not every camera/lens can achieve a DOF this thin.

There does look to be some post processing to get the color & tones like they are. There also appears to be a grain to the image. It could be an added effect, it might be digital noise or it might be film grain or noise from the scanning process (if it was shot on film).

 

[KmH]

This is exactly the kind of stuff I'm unable to decipher!
perfect!
thanks

Just imagine what it was like for those who learned this stuff BEFORE there were personal computers and an Internet.

 

[Big Mike]

Just imagine what it was like for those who learned this stuff BEFORE there were personal computers and an Internet.

And before digital...when you had to wait for your film/prints to come back from the lab before you could see your results.

 

[inTempus]

Yeah, it's a very shallow depth of field. Here's a shot I took of my buddy screwing around with a similar concept (lighting is totally different though).

I used an 85mm prime set to f/1.6 for this shot. It gives you that extremely shallow depth of field similar to the picture you've linked to. I also had him lean forward a bit to increase the effect.

 

[Shelly1204]

Since the OP got her answer, I hope she doesn't mind me hijacking her thread, but..

I noticed there's not a lot of "deconstructing photo" type threads on this forum. I assume it's because the moderators have a problem with reposting other people's photos, even if it's for educational purposes? Or is starting a "help deconstruct this photo" type thread with a pic permissible?

 

[inTempus]

Since the OP got her answer, I hope she doesn't mind me hijacking her thread, but..

I noticed there's not a lot of "deconstructing photo" type threads on this forum. I assume it's because the moderators have a problem with reposting other people's photos, even if it's for educational purposes? Or is starting a "help deconstruct this photo" type thread with a pic permissible?

As a general rule of the board you can't post pictures you don't own or have the rights to. You can post links to those pictures though.

 

[Big Mike]

We do have a rule that we are not allowed to directly post photos that we don't own (that we didn't take ourselves).

It's perfectly OK to post a link to an image though.

As for why we don't have more 'deconstruction' threads...I don't know. My guess is because that is a fairly advanced thing to do, and the majority of members on the forum are closer to the beginner level.

I wouldn't mind seen more of them. I think they are a great learning tool.

 

[SoonerBJJ]

I find these "deconstruct the photos" very enlightening (no pun intended).

 

[SoonerBJJ]

I don't mean to hijack either but I think the OP's question has been answered very well.

InTempus, would you mind detailing your lighting for that portrait? I've got my suspicions but I can't see the catchlights in enough detail on my monitor to tell.

I think these are excellent exercises.

 

[Shelly1204]

We do have a rule that we are not allowed to directly post photos that we don't own (that we didn't take ourselves).

It's perfectly OK to post a link to an image though.

As for why we don't have more 'deconstruction' threads...I don't know. My guess is because that is a fairly advanced thing to do, and the majority of members on the forum are closer to the beginner level.

I wouldn't mind seen more of them. I think they are a great learning tool.

Yeah, the problem is though, that most of the images cannot be directly linked to. That's too bad. Guess you could throw it on your own host or something, but to me that seems a lot more "wrong" than just posting it directly. Oh well.

 

[Big Mike]

Yeah, the problem is though, that most of the images cannot be directly linked to.

Or a link to where it can be found...whatever works.

Just keep in mind that if it's too hard to find, most people won't bother.

 

[inTempus]

InTempus, would you mind detailing your lighting for that portrait? I've got my suspicions but I can't see the catchlights in enough detail on my monitor to tell.

I think these are excellent exercises.

For that shot I used two large softboxes (36x40") on B800 lights. I had the modeling lights turned up to max output. I put the softboxes next to each other at slight angles. I also used a B400 camera right just for grins. You can see the light on the right side of his face/hair.

I shot it with an 85mm lens at f/1.6 and ISO 800.

The setup looked something like this: