A tip for printing
A tip for this morning about printing….
A lot of people struggle with getting a good print from their images, so a few pointers you have to be aware off.
Tag Archive for: tip
Shoots with impact
Often people ask me “Frank, how do I create a shot with more impact?”
My answer is often incredibly simple “Shoot something with impact”
Sound obvious right?
Well it actually is to be honest, it’s an answer that is used so many times by the great photographers in the world, “if you think your images are not interesting enough, make sure you shoot something that interesting”. For model photography that means I love to work with strong colors, and my personal preference…..well red.
So today some images “with impact” shot during a session with Nadine.
Now the real fun starts when you add a little bit of motion.
The BIG white one
I’ve talked about this technique before on the blog, but today a few more images shot with this technique (just because it’s a cool technique).
How to set it up?
The setup is really simple and everyone can do it at home or in their studio.
Find a large white wall (and if you want to shoot full body you also need a white floor, for example white seamless), add two (or one) strobe aimed towards the background and make sure the model is not hit by the light from these strobes.
Start on full power and meter towards the front of the model, in this case probably towards the camera.
The value you see on your light meter is the value you put into your camera and the base is there, the image you will get will often be nice but if you add maybe between 1-2 stops extra (open up the aperture) you are into the creative zone 😀
The next images are shot with 1 stop extra (metering for example F8 and shooting on F5.6).
BTW there are a lot of questions about “where to aim the light meter”, normally you will hear me tell you to meter towards the light source, and don’t worry that’s still true of course. However you have to realize the way the meter works. It will actually meter the light hitting the subject on the area you want correct. In this case that’s the front of the model, so we point the meter forward. In most setups in the studio you will place your light in such a position that it hits the part of the model you want to be rendered correctly so you point towards the light source. So don’t worry, I’m not telling you to meter towards the camera all of a sudden 😀
One simple light
Often I get the compliment that I only work with one light and get some “pretty cool images”, of course it’s nice to get compliments but…. well it’s not 100% true.
Let me put it differently.
I strongly believe that if you can pull something off with only one light… why use more?
It has nothing to do with the fact that there is only one sun, I never really supported that case, well ok I agree there is only one sun for us earthlings but if we look at the light around us there is much more than one light source, look at reflections, the ambient light etc. etc. actually we life in a world filled with light.
No the real reason I often only use one light is the simple fact that it just does the trick, I love the more darker looking images sometimes and let’s be honest when you use one light with for example a grid you are already half way there. The other reason is also a bit “because it’s easy” you don’t have to drag around a lot of lights, setups are very fast and the results are always great without the chance of double shadows etc. However… and I really want to make this clear, I’m not a 1 light kind of guy, on the contrary I love using multiple light sources to really add mood to a location, pin point the model with one and add the rest with a second (or third), add some accents where I want them, add a splash of color and sometimes…. well I bought a lot of lights and Annewiek wants me to use them at least sometimes (Ok that was a joke…. or was it).
Now most people somehow struggle with the use of one light, so today a small sample about how you can learn to master your one light.
For this setup I used one striplight with a grid (shot during the workshops in Eersel for Studio76 with Nadine as my model).
