Classic One Light Portraiture with Monohead and Ripstop Nylon Diffusion Panel

The image above, is one of my first jobs in St. Louis after relocating from Seattle. The Clayton School District needed to update the images of the ViBravo String Ensemble sectional coaches for their new website. For this shoot, I decided to use a dark background to compliment the formal concert wardrobe. Scheduling all four sectional coaches to be available the same day added to the pressure I had a little more than one hour to setup, shoot 4 people, and pack before the room would be used for another rehearsal. To top it off, the final images had to be ready the next day for the web designer as the ViBravo String Ensemble would begin touring in Chicago two days later.

Using the panels now for 20 years, I am still pleasantly surprised each time of how good the light quality looks. I did a quick lightmeter reading on the subject and background…shot an image…and I was ready to go. My initial concern was that I might have a large glaring white reflection on the viola from the diffusion panel, fortunately this did not occur, just a nice and clean highlight on the edges of the viola. The RAW file has plenty of room in the shadow and highlight details…just perfect dynamic range

One Light Portrait Setup and Diagram for Monolights and Speedlights

The monolight is about 4 feet from the Ripstop Nylon Panel, just filing the 5 foot width of the frame. The Ripstop Nylon Panel is about 8 feet from the subject for an even lighting pattern…head to waist on subject. This is one of the many reasons to use a light meter, the meter is accurate to 1/10th of a stop and will let you know exactly where the light fall-off is. The same thing applies to the background brightness. By metering the light falling on the black fabric I knew that I had a bit of separation between the subjects dark concert formal dress and the background. There is nothing worse than having a head and hands floating in black space!

Try the one light portrait setup for your next portrait shoot. The lighting gear cost is minimal and works very well for the Strobist Speedlight photographer. I would suggest using one of the more powerful Nikon SB800/900 or Canon’s equivalent. Or use two smaller speedlights in sync. For monolights, I recommend something in the 200 – 400 w/s range at minimum. My exposure data is F/8 @ 1/250 sec although F/5.6 would have been more than enough depth-of-field. I don’t want the background fabric texture in focus, just the subject!!

My camera gear consisted of a Nikon D7ooo with a fast FX (full-frame) 50mm prime lens which is a perfect 75mm portrait lens on Nikon’s DX format bodies.

One Light Portrait Lighting Diagram for Monolights and Speedlights w/Ripstop Nylon Panel

Zeroplusplus Photography Tutorials - Photography Techniques and Tutorials for the Photographer

Pay close attention to how Emily uses diffused lighting ratios and depth-of-field and focuses the lens on the subject, while blurring out the foreground and background. Try this technique for your next senior portrait or outdoor editorial portrait session….it is not just for fashion anymore!

This time we see Emily using a Mola Softlight Dish instead of a beauty dish for overpowering Sunlight with diffused flash. And from what I can tell, Emily is still using an Alien Bee monolight and Vagabond battery pack. While a beauty dish can offer a similar diffused flash light quality, the wavy curves and distinctive shape of the Mola dish lends a softer light quality. For those photographers already using a beauty dish, I suggest diffusing your dish further with a sheet of ripstop nylon. Just drape it over your beauty dish and secure it with a few $.49 clamps from the local HomeDepot. You may find white ripstop nylon at your local fabric store for about $8 per sq/yd…it’s very inexpensive folks!

Overpowering Sunlight with diffused flash video example below.

I used one of my large 5′ x 8′ white ripstop nylon panels to further diffuse the 22′ beauty dish. The diffused flash to daylight lighting ratio is about 1:2, the Sunlight is about 1 stop brighter than the diffused flash exposure. No retouching for lighting at all!

I would like to point out that Emily’s success is not just about overpowering Sunlight with diffused flash and great lighting ratios. Obviously there is much more going on in her images such as styling and posing and location research. Emily has a concept and theme for each fashion story she shoots. She uses camera technique and composes her images to tell a story and photographs the wardrobe well. Fashion shoots include wardrobe and makeup/hair stylists and models. When I shoot fashion, the entire shoot theme is discussed beforehand so everyone is on the same page. In each case I email location scouting images and/or Google Maps links to the entire crew and models.

For Strobist portrait lighting using speedlights I have a different suggestion for overpowering Sunlight with diffused flash lighting ratios. The easiest and least expensive solution for creating a soft diffused flash light quality is by constructing a 3′ x 3′ PVC frame and attaching a white 3′ x 3′ ripstop nylon fabric to the PVC panel. I prefer the heavier 1 3/4 inch PVC over the 3/4 inch PVC as the heavier PVC does not flex in a mild breeze. PVC is about $3 for 10 feet and the corner joints run about $1.50 each.

I use 2″ elastic cloth bands in the corners to quickly secure the fabric to the panel. A sewing machine is required to sew the elastic fabric bands to the ripstop nylon. Don’t have a sewing machine?…….use Craigslist to find an affordable seamstress….simple as that.

ADDITIONAL TIP: The Strobist speedlight photographer may need to use 2 speedlights for diffused flash lighting ratios when overpowering Sunlight with the white ripstop nylon fabric. This applies to a fill flash lighting ratio….and may not completely overpower the Sunlight. It really depends on the brightness of the Sunlight, your flash power,  AND whether you are photographing full length or just 3/4. My experience from Brooks Institute photo school 20 years ago, the Vivitar 285 did have enough power for a 3/4 headshot using a 3′ x 3′ ripstop nylon panel with a panel distance of 4 feet to subject. As I recall, this worked quite well with my 4×5 film camera and ISO 100 sheet film with an F/stop probably around F/5.6 or F/8…..which is plenty for headshots and portraits on a digital camera with full-frame or DX sensors.

The diffusion panels can be attached side-by-side and used as massive softboxes. Below is a series of images I created with 3 panels and one 600w/s monolight. While I own 4 monolights, I primarily shoot with 1-2 lights 90% of the time.

One may certainly purchase pre-made diffusion frames/panels from Larson Lighting for several hundred dollars each…..or you can build your own for about $30 and a few hours of your time. There are many ways to construct the diffusion panels on the internet and there are just as many different suggestions for diffusion fabric. Walmart shower curtain material for $1.99 just looks like &#$% and may even cause you to have very ugly highlights in the eyes as several photographers have noticed. Spend $5 more and you get the real thing that lighting companies use.

Overpowering Sunlight with Diffused Flash is an easy technique to master with a bit of practice. I suggest that the photographer create a test of different lighting ratios. I might begin withe a 1:1, 1:2, and 1:3 ratio of daylight to diffused flash. One of the lighting ratios will look just right to your eyes. Now you have a lighting formula that you can repeat over and over again.

20 years ago I made 5 panels that are 5′ x 8′ each, complete with fabric for about $200 and one Saturday afternoon. The first set of diffusion panels I later sold to a very well known portrait photographer, Timothy Greenfield-Sanders, after assisting him one day. He just loved the diffused light quality and decided to use the fabric in his NYC studio.

I still have and use the diffusion panels for many of my commercial shoots today. Many…..many… professional fashion and portrait studios still use fabric panels because of the fantastic natural light quality they produce. Just because we don’t always see diffusion panels in YouTube lighting videos does not mean panels do not exist. I learned real lighting secrets by assisting great Los Angeles fashion photographers….and got paid to learn and see how they light and shoot ad campaigns.

Overpowering Sunlight with Diffused Flash is an excellent technique for giving your portfolio a fresh new look. The lighting tools are not very expensive and in most cases, we already own this lighting gear. Your only real homework is to test out the different lighting ratios and find one that works best for your shooting and visual style.

RELATED POSTS

Location Fashion Shoot Tutorial with Lighting Diagrams

One Light Low Key Editorial Fashion Lighting

One Light Lookbook Lighting Tutorial

Heffner Models Fashion Shoot with Satin Panel Lighting

Zeroplusplus Photography Tutorials - Photography Techniques and Tutorials for the Photographer

Overpowering the Sun by 1 stop

The tools required are a 160w/s or better monolight and a portable battery pack. If you subject is close to the flash, 160w/s is enough. However, when the Sun is very bright or at “high noon” or the flash is far away, then I would recommend a 320w/s flash unit. I can recall at least one instance where I used a 1000w/s monolight because the Sun was extremely bright at the beach…and the beauty dish was 12ft away from the model.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzqfB564-Cg

Why is so much power from a flash? The problem or issue really lies in the slow flash sync shutter speed of our DSLR’s. In most cases, the DSLR has a top flash sync of 1/250th or maybe just 1/160th of a second. If we set our f/stop for proper exposure outdoors at 1/250th shutter speed, our f/stop will fall around f/11 or even f/16 on sunny days. Overcast days and early morning or sunset this f/stop will change to f/5.6 or f/8. At sunrise and sunset 160w/s is just fine, but for “high noon” and bright sunny days, I recommend at least 320w/s. Experiment with how much you overpower the Sun. I prefer to use one of three different lighting ratios…. 1:1, 1:2, and 1:3 usually provide the most flattering and optimal results. Simple lighting and great composition, it really is just that easy!

I found two videos by Southern California fashion photographer Emily Soto. I really enjoy her photographic style and simple approach to lighting. Pay especially close attention to her composition. Notice how she uses the foreground and places it out of focus for adding depth and emotion to the images. Later we see her assistant holding flowers in front of the lens for an interesting compositional image revealed later in the final images (the model holding a huge flower).

In the following videos, we see a Alien Bee monolight, a Vagabond II Portable Power System, as well as a 48″ Octabox w/Grid and also a Mola Dish. I prefer to use either a 22″ Beauty Dish or the 48″ Octabox w/Grid because of the round catchlights (like the sun) that both modifiers produce. A softbox will naturally work just fine, but you will have square catchlights. Use a grid on either your octabox or softbox to control the light spill on the foreground. Angle the lighting modifier so that it only lights your subject….not the entire grass field in front of your subject!

Zeroplusplus Photography Tutorials - Photography Techniques and Tutorials for the Photographer

The panels when used as we did in the video below, offer a very soft light quality for elderly subjects. Or, we may use the same panel setup for beauty lighting.

For the creative senior portrait, I might suggest the octabox ring light modification. This ring light modification looks great for fashion, musicians and editorial portraits as well.

One of the difficulties of photographing outdoors in Seattle, the weather is unpredictable. For commercial photography, Tim and I modify the light quality…on the fly… as the weather conditions change.

Perhaps you are photographing a senior portrait or engagement photo or even a formal wedding portrait on a cloudy day. Try the “bare octabox” as a backlight, maybe add an orange gel. Now you have completely changed the overall look and you are offering your clients options.

We have clients that may only be available on a certain day and time, and they need that sunny look on a cloudy day? Now we have a solution and get the job.

Creative lighting options make us more valuable as photographers. Give your client a reason for choosing you over the 20+ other photographers down the street. Having the lowest price on the block is a no win situation…and we do not always get a job based on fee.

As an art director once said to me, ” we hire photographers that give us images we couldn’t shoot ourselves”. Well…there you have it….

Zeroplusplus Photography Tutorials - Photography Techniques and Tutorials for the Photographer

We can use a octabox for fashion, glamour, or portraits. We are lighting with the same modifier and simply changing the wardrobe, the makeup/hair styling, and how we pose the subject. A lighting modifier does not determine what kind of image we shoot. Read on and see the images below for a better explanation.

I have stated this several times before, so let me say it again. When I have a shoot, whether it is fashion, glamour or portrait, I light them all the same. It is not like I wake up one morning and say, “today we do fashion lighting”.

Allow me go into more detail and explain myself. It amuses me when folks on photography forums ask what fashion, glamour, or portrait lighting is. Maybe they are asking us “What is great lighting” instead, so I will give them the benefit of the doubt. What determines the image genre is not the lighting, it is the pose, the wardrobe, and the makeup/hair styling.

If we could categorize lighting into a specific style, then we are putting photographers out of work. Lets take a look at Greg Kadel and Norman Jean Roy, two of my absolute favorite photographers. These guys can shoot any subject to perfection and they also use minimal lights…hint hint, many images are just one light. Take a look at their different portfolios, they just style and pose differently when they shoot fashion or portraits.

Over Memorial Day, Sunday, I shot with two models Amberlee and Melissa. I used the exact same lighting on both models, just tailored the wardrobe and poses to what I had in mind for each of them. Keep in mind that when I say, “I photographed them” it was really just a lighting test and I warmed up the models for the two other photographers that were shooting the real work. I shot these images in 2-4 minutes, lol.

Lighting is a single 48″ Octabox w/Grid, which I further modified with black cloth and Rosco Tough Frost.

Portrait image or senior portrait style

Fashion images with the same lighting as above, just a different pose and styling for Melissa.

 

For the next two images I set up a V-bank to my right, and placed it about 15 feet away. Same lighting, just two very different makeup/hair/wardrobe styling methods.

Glamour pose and styling

Fashion pose and styling

The lighting I used for the video images will work exceptionally well on senior portraits, editorial portraits, fashion, glamour, formal engagement portraits, and formal wedding portraits. Yes, I will admit that my lighting requires extra effort and an assistant, but what it produces is a very polished lighting quality that will dramatically lessen your post processing in PS and more importantly, increase your revenue and make you more desirable to work with.

By getting your lighting perfect in-camera, now you can batch process everything and send out client proofs the next day and get paid faster. I pity the fool that spends hours or even days on end PhotoShopping a single image, lol.

This concludes the lesson for today, hopefully I provided a bit of information for you to use on your next shoot.

Zeroplusplus Photography Tutorials - Photography Techniques and Tutorials for the Photographer

Every image in my Fashion or People book has a team of people behind it. These people are makeup artists, hair stylists, and wardrobe stylists. My skills are in photography, lighting, posing the model, casting the model, and finally assembling the right stylists and MU artists for each shoot. Think of your role as the crew leader and general manager. I do not dictate the shoot, but rather keep us on a theme and make sure that we are all on the same page.

All the stylists and MUA I use have been found on ModelMayhem. This website is a terrific resource for finding extremely talented folks both locally or in any part of the world you may find yourself shooting. OneModelPlace is also excellent if you have a paid account. Either way, take a look at both websites and see how many folks are available in your community.

Yes there is also Craigslist, but I stay away from that site because because most professionals are on MM and OMP. Or to put it more honestly, CL is very hit or miss….mostly miss, LOL.

Finding a great MUA requires looking at their portfolio, here is what I do. I look for a clean style of makeup, is it well blended and does it make sense with the wardrobe and model. The makeup should appear smooth and reflect current fashion trends such what we see in a current NYC fashion magazines. If the makeup completely overpowers the model and it looks like a mask, I pass on them. This look may be intentional, yet it will not get me work with a modeling agency or any other commercial client….period. The best MUA artists will make it look like the model is not wearing any makeup, and that demonstrates the finest skill level to me. I want the MUA to enhance the natural beauty of the model, not hide it with layers and layers of odd colors. If the model is 18 then I want her to look her age and not 40.

Cosmetic schools and salons can also be a hit or miss situation. My experience has been that the graduates/students makeup tends to be too overpowering. This is to to say that they are all bad, but rather my personal experience with the four or five I have used. A formal education does not guarantee that they will be great, natural talent always prevails in my search. We are not here to pamper the model or make them feel like a celebrity, this is work. Once I find someone, we shoot often, and after a few shoots we jive and develop a type of ESP that contributes to the overall flow of the shoot.

Many of the same rules I mentioned for a MUA apply for a hair stylist so I will not go into great detail. Does the hair look well styled and is it currently in style. I want the model to look youthful and energetic. For the work I shoot, the model needs to look real and the hair always has a polished appearance. My MUA all do hair as well so be sure to ask, not all will so do not assume they do both.

Wardrobe stylist are crazy fun and bring so much to a shoot, I can’t imagine working without one. They have all the clothing and accessory connections. They know all the boutique owners and do all the shopping and borrowing and returning of items for me. I send them the models comp card or web portfolio with the measurements, discuss the shoot look we are after and then wardrobe stylist goes to work. Sometimes they take quick camera phone images from various boutiques and ask if I prefer this or that.

The best wardrobe stylists have a great reputation with the boutique owners and get items lent for free or for a small fee. They find the most obscure items to make your shot special and unique. More importantly, they know how to put it all together so that the final image has a balance and continuity. They fix the wrinkles in the outfits, tape and clamp things that are not right. They make the clothing look its best on the model which is not always the way the clothing is worn by the consumer.

The wardrobe stylist and MUA work very closely together to finalize the balance of the image. Sometimes and more often then not, the poses I want from the model will twist the wardrobe around and make it look odd. This is where the wardrobe stylist jumps in and fixes it so everything works with my crazy ideas. The models job is to pose and act…not fiddle with the clothing…we have a crew that will fix what needs adjusting.

I do not bounce around and try to see how many different MUA/hair/wardrobe stylists I can work with. If the recipe works than I keep it. The models see how comfortable we are all working together and that reassures them as well. A happy crew is a creative crew…and it shows in the images.

Take a look at the credits in the NYC fashion magazines. There are 5-6 people involved on every editorial story. It is the combined input from all these talented people that create the images. The photographer or the art director is the ring leader. I certainly can’t take all the credit for my images. If your serious about improving your work as a fashion photographer, put a crew together and simplify your life.

Zeroplusplus Photography Tutorials - Photography Techniques and Tutorials for the Photographer