Shooting portraits in a snowy environment -- tips?

JonA_CT

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So I have a portrait session scheduled for Sunday, and the plan is to do it all outdoors, even if we do get a few inches of snow tomorrow.

I was ready to show up with some speed light gear, but I was mostly planning on using human-powered reflector.

Snow reflects everything. Anyone have any tips or suggestions? What should I be thinking about to make sure I get a good file and good lighting?
 
Spot meter faces and/or incident readings done by blocking reflected light on the subject's face with a hand under the incident dome. Above all, be ready to add exposure to any meter reading.
 
I like snow cause that tends to mean overcast, so you don't have to compete with the sun, which means you can bring the exposure on the BG down, and the light can fill the subjects well -- even with wide apertures and faster shutter speed.
 
I have a few similar shoots planned for the near future so I've been researching the same problems. I last tried this a few years ago and struggled with it pretty hard. Things I've found so far:

- Be careful not to blow out the snow. It's very easy to blow it out without realizing it so watch your highlights/histogram.

- Because the snow is so bright, fill light on your subject is critical. It's nearly impossible to expose for the subject without blowing out the snow unless you're using some sort of fill light.

I'm interested to see what the more experiences members have to say.
 
yeah I like purposefully underexposing the environment by a good stop, then adding fill.

these were shot at f/3.5 and 1/800sec: Belle in Snow Wild Virgina Snow Leopard


These were shot in the middle of a bright day -- but overcast. used the SS to knock down the exposure with the f/stop I wanted to use, then added fill to match the real exposure (1 stop above environment) 7" reflector.


no idea how well it'll work on humans :p
 
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Anyone have any tips or suggestions? What should I be thinking about

Wear warm clothes. Hard to get a good shot if you're shivering LOL
 
I recommend those hand warmers for your pockets and for your clients. Also, don’t take too long - no one looks good with red runny noses.
 
I recommend those hand warmers for your pockets and for your clients. Also, don’t take too long - no one looks good with red runny noses.

Hey @SquarePeg, got an even better idea for that one. Get you some athletic wrist bands and put those hand warmers on palm side of the wrist and hold them in place with the wrist bands. That is where the blood flows through and it actually keeps the hands pretty warm. (I use this for shooting football at the end of the season and sometimes for soccer in the spring.)
 
Move everyone indoors.
 
Move everyone indoors.

What??? a snowbear suggesting to go inside out of the snow??? lol
But I'm not the one shooting . . . advise for everyone else (except, maybe @limr)

One of the things I found with shooting snow, is, if it dominates a scene, you have to overexpose by a stop or so to keep it from being grey.
 
@JonA_CT Something I noticed today while shooting in the snow. The light was changing so fast that I finally shifted over to P mode, locked the ISO, and still I was having to go from a low of -2.5 to a hight of +2.5 EC. The other thing I noticed is that the during the snow fall/overcast period, the colors (as seen by the naked eye and the camera) were very desaturated, requiring significant adjustment in post to bring them back. I'm wondering if the extreme "gray overcast" conditions, might have been the cause of that?
 
@JonA_CT Something I noticed today while shooting in the snow. The light was changing so fast that I finally shifted over to P mode, locked the ISO, and still I was having to go from a low of -2.5 to a hight of +2.5 EC. The other thing I noticed is that the during the snow fall/overcast period, the colors (as seen by the naked eye and the camera) were very desaturated, requiring significant adjustment in post to bring them back. I'm wondering if the extreme "gray overcast" conditions, might have been the cause of that?

Absolutely. The camera is trying to make everything 18% gray so your colors and exposure will be way off if you have any auto controls enabled.
 

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