I rarely shoot models in the studio, it is mostly business portraits, of ordinary people with little or no experience of standing in front of the camera (and some of them start by saying that they would rather go to the dentist, huh?).
Niouscha, a Swedish model I worked with when we went through every garment ever made by Fräulein von Hast (read the step-by-step on clothing photography here) wanted new photos for her portfolio, and I saw the opportunity to work with a pro. A classic TFP, my first actually.
[Read the full post here…]
This is just a closer headshot from the beauty portrait post I wrote about earlier. The setup is the same, I just moved a little closer to the model (or former model to be correct, she now works at an ad agency.
You can find the lighting diagram together with everything else here:
2-light beauty portrait setup
Shot on medium grey background paper, using two Profoto lights, one with a white Softlight reflector on a boom stand (the top catchlight), and the other in a 5 foot Softbox Octa behind me (the smaller catchlight below). And a reflector below.
Developed in Lightroom 3 and retouch was made in Photoshop, mostly skin retouch and some minor contrast adjustments.
Usually I take portraits of people with no or very little experience in front of the camera, the times I have a “real” model in the studio are easily counted. Very very.
This time I was asked to photograph a woman with a lot of experience in modeling in her earlier career as a model, now she works at an ad agency. She and her business partner wanted promotional photos and came to my studio for some portraits and group shots.
Click for studio lighting setup and examples…
Setting the lights and doing headshots in the studio is easy compared to a group shot, there are so many more variables that you have to account for, not to mention the number of eyes that has to be open at the same time. And everything else.
I don’t do group shots that often, but this time there were three Swedish comedians that needed a couple of publicity photos for their new show. Who can say no to a comedian? Or three?
Instead of trying some complex lighting I took the easy way and kept it as simple as possible. One main light straight on from above and a little fill from below, all on the same axis as the camera.
Click for more behind the scenes and the results
Recently I was asked to photograph a lot of garment for Swedish fashion designer and brand Fräulein von Hast, she was planning to start a web shop and needed photos of every skirt, blouse, jacket and dress she had available.
For every item she needed at least three, but more often four different angles so the customers can view the front, back and sides of the skirt or jacket they might be interested in.
This is how I set the light, planned the day and shot 325 photos.
[Read the full post here…]
