Ed has suggested I work more on getting more light and sparkle in people’s eyes. I had a chance to shoot a company picnic and brought some lights with just in case. It turns out it was a good thing, because there was a face painter, and her designs gave me a good reason to play with some lighting. Unedited photos of a child with paint on her face. I really like how the umbrella wound up reflecting a near star shape in her eyes. That part was a happy accident. 60 inch umbrella on camera right with a 12 inch circular modifier on camera left shot mid afternoon. The shot of the facepainter was the same afternoon with just the 60 inch umbrella. Color grade in Capture One.

(Download)


(Download)

My last trip with my beloved X100T - now replaced with a new to me XPro-1.

Thank you 🙏

Ed,

Thanks as always for the feed back!! I am making it a required rule that all house guests get in front of the lens, I’m in a rather tight space constraint, but work with what you have, right? 😄 The next time I have someone that can sit for more than a few minutes I’ll work on adding fill lighting as you suggested to me previously. I suspect this will pull some of the harsher contrast out. As for the tighter composition, I see what you mean in terms of straightforward portraiture, but I do like how the negative space can look when printing.

I think yours is a good idea as well. I tend to shoot with strobes, but working to get people comfortable in front of the camera is a public setting is also good practice.

With some good suggestions from Ed and others I went back to work on shooting people. Instead of thinking too hard on the technical aspects of lighting (those can come later) I have started shootings guests for various social events we have hosted this month. I am slowly understanding how to “loosen” people up in front of the camera, though I could use a good reference to some basic posing tips.

Jules,

I don’t catch that you had one!

Good luck with the shoot!! Ed gave me some great advice a few weeks ago (of course, after I discovered this section)

I have one suggestion which is to rent a 24-70 2.8 (or equivalent) for the shoot. I think having something that shoots a little wider would be helpful for improvised shots. I am not sure what you have in your arsenal for light modifiers but something to soften the light on the chance that you wind up shooting inside or after dark might. E helpful as well.


Zak

It’s funny, The open jacket/shirt didn’t bother me at all, until you two mentioned it. I am still happy with how it turned out, and yes, both of them are ecstatic about it, which in the end is most important.
They would like me to come in a do portraits of their office staff. I think I will work in a more controlled environment which means I can set the lighting more or less once, and concentrate more on the psychological aspect of the work.

I am sure I will have plenty of questions before and after the shoot, and I am so happy that I have such great resources!!

Final version!

Ed,

I didn’t dare to go too far in editing last night, but I did crop and add some vignetting as suggested. As I am sure you already would know, I am very please with the results.

Thank you again. I wish you were In Minneapolis so I could take a workshop with you. 🙂


Zak

(Download)

Ed,

Thank you for all the suggestions. I have to submit the final shot to the agency that is doing the page layout tonight. I will try and incorporate some of your suggestions and will share them when I am done. We are lucky that we have a 2/3 page space to work with, so the photo will be good size. There were some other photos from the shoot that I preferred more in terms of aesthetic, but they looked more like a fashion editorial.


I know I have to learn about lighting two people (and much more about even lighting one person) but as much as I could, I tried to make sure she had the better light 😆.

As a quick aside, this was the photo from the last magazine ad they used, while my work will never be “perfect” I think I got them more relaxed, and as you said, approachable looking than their old one.

I was also smart enough to have a bottle of wine handy!


Thanks so much yet again.

Thank you Simon. I have just starting posting images to UHH, so it’s nice to get good feedback!

Thank you SueScott

Three generations. My mother, with my niece, and her mother. Baby V is such a sweet little child to shoot! I don’t see her as often as I should, so whenever I do, I make sure to shoot for a while and print some of the best.