Glamour Clammer: C&C

Errr... Yeah. First try at clamshell lighting and glamour style headshots that seem to be popular in fashion magazines as of late. Critiques and comments please.

Strobist Info:
Photoflex Starflash 300 above camera, through softbox, 1/4 power.
Reflector below the camera

 

looks nice and even to me.
nice shot!

light above, reflector below...is that what makes it "clamshell"?

the results are great. :thumbup:

 

Yeah usually the catch lights are clam shaped but my reflectors don't work well enough to create a catch light on the bottom

 

Yes Biscuit that is correct. This is some good flash work. Only nitpicky thing for me is the little shadows on the corners which I gather are her arm pits. Personally I would either have included more of the shoulders or have done a tighter headshot. Great work! I can't wait to get started with flash.

 

Wow, you've come so,so far in your lighting control and the quality of light that you're able to create. The light on the very center of her forehead looks a tad bit too bright about one inch above her eyebrows. It's hard to see much to pick at at such a small size, but overall I'm so impressed with how far you've come and how diligently you have worked at getting better and better results with your off-camera lighting!

 

Large is here: decluttr | Your Flickr images on white.

Thanks Derrel

 

Love how much the red lips stand out

 

I like it. It's just a tad bit too bright for me.

 

great results, no hard shadows and light is soft. Great photo!

 

I would crop from the bottom. The boob shadows in the bottom corners are too much. The hair also needs some work. Put some product, or even water in it. You missed a few spots in your skin editing- in between the eyebrows and to the right of the bridge of her nose. There's no reason to blow out the skin detail for the sake of smoothing. I actually think this is a much more striking shot if you bring the light down and show some skin detail. It makes her cheek bones much more pronounced and gives her face a lot more shape overall.

Other than that, great work. I don't mean that sarcastically.

Edit: By the way, this is not glamour. It's beauty. Glamour is about sex.

 

It's nice indeed.
The red lips really fit well.

What I would maybe do is use a smaller aperture. To get more in focus. To get it "crisp & sharp".
Cause IMO it's a little bit soft. Not the in focus areas, but I would love to see the whole head in focus.

 

First of all, awesome photo!

The following are extreme nitpicks. I haven't shot these (so I can't give experienced critique), but I'm interested in doing it so I've looked into it quite a bit. I feel she's a bit bright (and I mean just a bit), but I'm not on a calibrated monitor so take that with a grain of salt.

Another thing that I didn't notice at first is the top of the photo is not completely white (I assume you were going for a blown-out BG). I feel like if you pointed the background lights a bit up, it would blow the BG to white at the top. The power of the BG flashes seems great to me. You have just a bit of the wrap-around on her jawlines, which I love.

What did you use for the white background?

Really nice job!