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| Wow, I look weird... |
This blog post is really for me to show some of the various ideas I had for my portrait shoot.
I had a lot of ideas regarding a concept, but the one thing I really wanted to focus on was the idea of a portrait being a literal representation of a person. So a photo of someones face for example.
I was very interested in showing the differences between human facial features, thus started looking at the work of Martin Schoeller. His work inspired me to think about the idea of taking a straight-on photograph in order to show the person for what they are when they look at something/someone.
As good as this idea was, I felt that the photos themselves didn't look as natural as I wanted, in regards to the way they were lit, so I decided to experiment with simple Rembrandt lighting setups using my DSLR and off-camera wireless flash.
I experimented with this simplistic way of lighting, using my mother as a test model at home in my kitchen, I also tried using natural light instead of strobe flash to compare the results. I prefer natural light, but I have to use studio lights for this shoot. Bummer :/
I've always liked the idea of using multiple photographs in a 2x2 "quadriptych" style because it allows you to present more within a space rather than say one single photograph. I thought this would be a good idea because people often have different sides to their personality which sometimes cannot be captured within a single photograph. Doing it this way allows me to showcase more of each person at the same time.
I experimented again at home to try and figure out how I was going to light my shoot, because I'm planning to have the photos in a quadriptych, I want to keep them simplistic and almost identical. The shot below and left is, I think, to bright and lacking in tone because the subject's head is hiding the majority of the shadow behind to the right. To overcome this problem, I switched the light position to the other side and the result is a significant improvement, as seen in the photo below and right.
The decision to move the subject's head round slightly wasn't one that i took lightly, but I wanted a more human, and realistic shot instead of a mugshot that lacking in life. The shot below and right is a fairly accurate representation of the lighting setup, composition & overall look that each of the four final photos will be, just with a different model.
I experimented again at home to try and figure out how I was going to light my shoot, because I'm planning to have the photos in a quadriptych, I want to keep them simplistic and almost identical. The shot below and left is, I think, to bright and lacking in tone because the subject's head is hiding the majority of the shadow behind to the right. To overcome this problem, I switched the light position to the other side and the result is a significant improvement, as seen in the photo below and right.
The decision to move the subject's head round slightly wasn't one that i took lightly, but I wanted a more human, and realistic shot instead of a mugshot that lacking in life. The shot below and right is a fairly accurate representation of the lighting setup, composition & overall look that each of the four final photos will be, just with a different model.
The lighting setup I will hopefully be using for this shoot will mainly focussed arount Rembrandt's famous style, I will be utilising a large softbox for my main light source, this will be located on the subject's left (camera right). This will hopefully create a very dispersed, soft light that will look very nnatural and compliment a woman's face. On the opposite side I will place a large white reflector to help give some bounce-back light into the shadow areas to try and lower the amount of overall contrast in the shot, but not too much as to wash out the shadow. I will also try to create an evenly lit, white backdrop using two matching light sources from either side of the shot, but out of frame.
