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The Fiancé | Einstein | Portrait Test | Three Light set up

sscarmack

sscarmack

Been spending a lot of time on here!
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As most of my photos have a dark feel to it, I actually have been working on my 'beauty' lighting and better portrait light.

Here I used a three light set up. Main, fill, rim

I used a Silver Reflective Umbrella as my background, I kind of like the result, may be a tad bit too bright, but I liked the result.

I did not have a fan to get the 'blown hair' look, so I just used my reflector and it didn't go so well haha.

Einstein 640 (main)
Large Octabox, Manfrotto Boom
Overhead, slightly to camera right

Promaster 300c (rim)
Silver Umbrella
Rear

Promaster 160a (Fill)
White shoot through, Cheap Boom
Low left, angled up


Not fully edited but you get the idea.

Nikon D4
1/250 f11 iso100
24-70 2.8 @ 70mm

Edit (lightly)
$20140724-042-Edit_zps6fbe57a8.webp

SOOC
$20140724-042_zps27232519.webp

Set up shot
View attachment 80448
 
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Well, I guess I'll go first. No, I do not 'get' this shot at all. First off, it looks very soft and low-res...it's just not sharp at all, but very fuzzy. Second, there are a number of details that seem perplexing. The reflector background's central whatever it is, shows above her head. She's in a white T-shirt, and her shoulders fill 7/8 of the width of the entire frame, which makes her look very big and wide. The lighting is not flattering to her face shape. Her entire face, not just the mask of the face, is lighted up reallllly brightly, and yet her eyes lack sparkle...and the main light's high placement creates bags under her eyes.

The big wisp of hair across the forehead is not appealing, and her forehead is the brightest thing because it's so close to the main light. The fill light placement down by the floor is very odd. Her neck, at the V- of the V-neck shirt, is very light in color. Her neck is lighted up as brightly as her face is. I'll come right out and say it...this is a mess. She's really attractive, and you're engaged to marry her, so maybe you're seeing the lovely woman you see every day, but this is not a good photograph of such a pretty lady. Her beauty is just not being translated well by the photo technique and lighting and posing and framing choices you made.

Like--the fill light. What are you trying to do by placing it almost on the ground, and aimed sideways that way? All it is doing is creating a second main light, for her neck area...
 
I use photo bucket for my 'random' shots, and it has to be some compression or something? I'm not sure though. I need to look into somewhere better. I try to keep my flickr clean thats why I don't just upload everything to it.

I'm extremely new to 'beauty' work as you can tell, and strobes in general. I usually just stick to available light and try and work some magic.

I appreciate the critique.

Heres another shot, where I rotated her body, bc I felt the first one was too big in the frame, I just wasn't a fan of the head being so tilted. And after so many shots, she was getting tired of her picture being taken and me waving a reflector in her face haha.

The reason for the fill light, I figured it would help soften of some shadows caused from the main light? Maybe I don't need as much fill light, since I now have that large octabox. I'll have to try something.

Another photo (Clipped the top :/)

SOOC
Wow, does this look terrible (Soft, almost OFF. Its not that bad in lightroom, extremely sharp)
$20140724-056_zpsb7ce5283.webp
 
Yeah, this does look way soft, but there is that tell-tale look that it was IN-FOCUS. Definitely, we have seen that mushy soft look here on TPF before, and on FB and other places....they are crushing your shots. I can tell that things have been resolved by the lens, but that the image is being brutally smeared by the host site. In this shot, you now can see she has a nice chin. In the first shot, her face looks squareish...this shot shows a definite chin shape, and cheek contours, and her hair looks prettier.

Looking at the behind the scenes shot, I think you have the octabox positioned awfully close to the camera/lens axis. in this shot, her body is turned away from the main light, which gives her an under-chin shadow, which is a good thing!!! her NECK is darker than her face--a good thing! You're following an old studio lighting tip: turn the body away from the light, then turn the FACE back toward the light. You have also made her slimmer; in the first shot she was 7/8 of the frame width; in this shot, she is about 40% of the width of the frame. Which...is a horizontal frame, for no apparent reason...

I think the fill light needs to be moved UP, to camera height. She still has bags under her eyes; in this shot they are becoming darker circles. For photography, extra under-eye concealer is useful for her or any woman's makeup.

I think the main light is positioned too high and is not being aimed/angled optimally. Why? lack of eye sparkle, eye bags, and the shadow being cast by her upper lip. The octabox is angled not quite right. i think it is "raining down" too much, and needs to be aimed more at her face, and also lowered a bit too, to soften that shadow her top lip is casting on her gumline. This is the difficulty of working alone, and with new equipment; it's hard to actually, literally move the light and se what it does when it;'s high up and on a boom like the way it is shown in your BTS shot. There is a LOT of light fall-off between her forehead, and her chin...the light is not aimed quite right to maximize her beauty. We need more eye sparkle,a nd a slightly different shadow pattern on the lip. The main light needs to be brought lower, and aimed with the face of the box a nit more angled noon and six pm...you have the light "raining down" too much, so the eyes are not sparkly, the forehead is too hot, the chin too dark, and the upper lip is casting a shadow.See how very little of the main light is forming the catchlight on her eyeballs? The main is way too high!

The thing is this: I learned to shoot 20+ years ago in a studio with 50 degree parabolic 20-ich reflectors, which are EASY to AIM. You can SEE the catchlights and see the shadows easily, so you can literally stand there and grab the light and move it through an arc, and place it right as far as height goes, and angle, and so on; with the octa, which is a big, clunky light on a boom, you cannot easily do the same, and you have this massive swath of light that really hurts your aiming it EXACTLY as it will best flatter a person;s face and pose. I don't wanna be tearing your down, I am trying to help. You need to be able to GRAB the light and literally move it through an arc, and a height adjustment, to get the RIGHT, the exact right placement and height and aim of the light. My suggestion is to work with a smaller light source, so you can get a better feel for exactly how critical the height and angle and tilt of the main light is. When the subject is tired or bored, they are not helping much either.

I think if you look at the first shot, and the second shot, and read my C&C you'll see what I mean about her face shape, and so on.
 
Derrel, that's awesome. Your write ups are do precise and extremely helpful. I do not feel put down one bit.

Because honestly, I am new to this and I do need to learn how to properly pose and light for a specific shot.

I'm actually on my phone now so it makes it difficult to type out long paragraphs.

But I will try shooting again with her and taking into account everything you said.

Thank you for being honest. That's the only way I can get better.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
I'm not really a fan of using the reflector as the bg. Also she seems underexposed and there are dark circles under her eyes.
 
I appreciate your attitude about my C&C on this, Sean. I know you're new to this, and have new gear and a new monolight and are obviously using and trying out the new stuff,and are working on improving your technique. A little bit more about the whole small light versus octabank issue that I mentioned above. When the light is physically small, like say a 16 to 22-inch parabolic reflector or even a beauty dish, or a small umbrella like say a 32-incher, you can actually grab the light, and move it around, and watch the catchlight and the shadows move. You can raise the light, and watch the catchlights disappear, and lower it and watch the catchlights appear, and then shift place as the light is moved. With a smaller light source, you can more-easily literally SEE what the heck the light is doing, and how exactly it is aimed, and you can get a sense, a feeling, of the beam of light, and where the center of it is, and where the edges are, and how fast it feathers off, and so on.

On a BIG modifier used at close distance, like say your octabank, the effect is harder to notice; it's much more of a big, soft swath of quite diffused light, a big, soft, mushy beam of light, a wall of light. It's not so easy to see what the light is doing on the subject either, because if you are standing behind such a big light, it's hard to continuously evaluate the light's effect as you move it through height adjustments and through an arc on the floor, or re-aim or re-direct the beam.

********
It was nice talking to you on the phone. I see a lot of improvement in your photo skills over the last few months. I know you've really been working at it, and it shows!
 
Your images look really soft which I suspect may a result of two things: improper sharpening and image resizing. When I'm ready to export my images, I sharpen twice. The first time is when I resize the image for web viewing. I sharpen after I resize and then export the image into whichever folder I'm using. Then I "undo" the resize/sharpen portion and sharpen for the high res export. So, basically when you go into my image folders on my computer, you'll see two of the same images. One with the ending of ".ws" for web size and another with the ending of ".hr" for high res. Lastly, if you're having compression issues when uploading, try resizing to 800pix on the long side and then sharpening.
 
I typically use 1200 on the long side.

But I believe these issues right here are from using photobucket?

When I use flickr, I never have issues with compression or soft images.

I just don't like to overflow my flickr with random photos.

Are there any better host sites just for sharing?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
I use Flickr as well...and i think they do a pretty good job for web viewing.
I really like the pose in that last shot. simply beautiful.
buuuuut....not digging the background choice. get some muslin or seamless paper.
heck, tack up a white sheet and blow it out, or a black sheet and darken it up.

beautiful model you got there, so you have every reason to keep practicing on her.
 
Hey Pix, I agree. Flickr is awesome. The bg was just an idea I had. I have a white seamless, and want to acquire a nice charcoal one.

And thank you, I'm lucky to have her. She treats me good and puts up with me and my photography haha


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Last edited:

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