Lighting advice required please

[RobNZ]

So as most know I haven't done much in the way portraiture, so when shooting outdoors I am usually shooting with whatever natural light I have available and working with that the best I can.

That neeeds to change for me to improve the final result.

So I have a few pics as examples of some scenarios and some questions that hopefully I can answer myself and have somebody confirm or correct me.

1. So the first shot is how not to do it, shot on purpose. My model (my daughter with a tolerance of about 5 seconds) is looking back into the sun, squinting etc.

2. 2nd shot is with the sun at her back, but now requires fill light from the camera side.

3. Shot 3 has an off camera strobe (bare) at 45/45, but now requires some fill for the shadows on the left? I had a reflector but not the patience or anything handy to set it up. My shoot through umbrella self destructed when the stand it was on gently fell over in the slightest breeze, and then got destroyed when I attacked it for being so flimsy and it bit back cutting my thumb. So a bit of bounce back fill by an assitant holding a reflector (model left) would have worked well here to fill in the shadows a little?

4. Bare off camera strobe to my right ( I think?), to my eye this doesnt look too bad?

These are all test shots I took to prepare for a shoot with an 8 month old tomorrow evening, sand and a very young child will work out real well......:er:

So these are up for discussion on the lighting, not compostion or PP as they are untouched from RAW and only resized and cropped slightly.

Am I on the right track with my analysis, am I missing anything obvious?

Any help/advice appreciated.

Cheers

Rob

 

[Derrel]

#4 looks good....looks "summerish"..."beachy"

 

[GeorgieGirl]

My eye says you nailed it with #4.

 

[fokker]

Yep, #4 is a winner. I assume you're not experiencing the same shadowing problems as #3 because of the way she is positioned (shadow side is covered). The reflector set up properly in #3 would have definitely helped. I'd guess you would want to reflect natural light with it rather than strobed light?

 

[Village Idiot]

Grab a diffuser for your strobe and you can soften the shadows giving. That will make your photos look a lot less like they were shot under high noon sun.

 

[RobNZ]

Thanks for the confirmations, off to do it for real in a few hours......, I told my wife I feel like I should have a couple of nerve settlers beforehand (I was joking), got the look and that was the end of that conversation, lol.