Brooke

Recently I had a nice shoot at the studio with Brooke, Mua was Jilke Juliens!
The studio is absolutely not my favorite place, i've said it before and i'll keep repeating it, sorry guys but for some very controlled portraits or catalog fashion works it is the right place, i admit.

Working in the studio can be really easy or very difficult, but as a photographer you can choose which path you choose, not always so on location..

For this first shot i would like to point out the use of the color temperature as a creative tool, if you're not already convinced that working with the RAW format for your photographs is the right choice let me tell you it is (out of cam JPEG sucks, yes it does, i'm sure of it)

The two following pictures are in fact 1 and the same image, i just started from a different color temperature to finish each of them, we talked about correct exposure in my previous post, now think about correct color temperature....

 

 -I like flexible models -

Elena!

- ELENA -

Let's begin with a behind the scenes "BTS" shot, the importance of good Make-up, hair and styling is often underestimated!

Elena is much younger than the girls or woman i usually get in front of my lens and these teens ask for a different approach, coaching is on another level, it has to be more playful without turning yourself in a total moron, because once your status changes from cool to annoying your dead :-p

MUA: Sandra de Moor

Light the eyes, i can't repeat it enough, put some light into those eyes to make them "pop", having a really sharp lens and getting them in perfect focus helps finish the look (Nikkor Af-D 85mm 1.8)

Okay here is some lighting | strobist info:

I wanted a fresh, commercial look, so i lit it in a commercial way! On camera left high in the sky the sun, much closer to the camera a California Sunbounce Pro with -2/3 stop diffusion screen (bit like a Sunswatter) on a light-stand. The diffusion screen actually changes the harsh contrasty sunlight into soft and diffused light, just like a softbox with a continuous light source.

Problem: The Diffusion screen takes away 2/3 of a stop which is almost a full stop less than what the background is lit.

Solution: Add 1 stop of light again on the model and she is in balance with the ambient.

So i added an SB-900 with my flashzebra TTL cable to enable manual shooting but retaining the high speed synchro advantages.

How to set ISO, aperture, shutter speed?

Easy solution: start at "sunny 16" and decide at which aperture you want to work

Sunny 16 states: your shutter speed equals your ISO at f:16 for a correct exposure on sunlit environments!
And i'd like to work at f:4 ISO 200

From f:16 to f:4 is 4 stops less (more*), so your shutter speed will have to 4 stops faster
1/250 + 4 stops is 1/4000th

But this is just a bit dull, so i choose to work about 2 stops under (above*) correct exposure to get a lot of highlights in the background ISO 200, f:4, 1/800 tot 1/1250th

The SB-900 was set between 1/4 and 1/2 M power with the high speed synchro enabled...

Makes you think about "correct exposure" not?

(*) made some edits after a comment from FreMan, less was more ... indeed!