contrasty monochrome

[Steven G Webb]

I'm with Fran (as I am most of the time) there are two things that small children give us license to do. One is flat lighting, there is something about the age of innocence that makes flat but soft lighting flattering. The other is square posing. Body angles and language are meant to flatter and illustrate the contours. Oh, we have power angles, feminine angles, the "S curve" and lots of complicated contortions. Children are pretty much asexual and far from complicated, so, simple works.

This small girl almost lost in the environment with such a stoic expression is great. I find it either a tribute or parody to earlier (depression era) photos of kids with stern looks. I kind of find it PJ in a way, not overboard just a hint. Like the salt in the soup, there but not noticeable on its own.

I don't see anything wrong with the lighting ratio. What are you going for? 3:1 ? And where are you placing the lights? I know Fran and Benji are sort of your guides, which is good- they both know what they are doing and they use solid methodology. So, can you describe the light placement including the modifiers including elevation relative to the subject and angle of descent (tilt downward).

Steve

[Rain Lily]

Originally Posted by Athena

I really like the crop on the second one! I love her little boots, I love how her feet don't reach the floor, I love that she's alone in the frame with George. It's not a smiling happy picture, but it's emotional and I love that. I'd love to see THAT one in mono. xx

ps: It just occurred to me that if she were wearing a scarf, she'd be dressed just like me! lol

LOL including a pink bow in your hair, Athena?

You touched on all the things I wanted in this - boots, alone, dangling feet, serious expression. I'm glad you liked those things too. And for the record, I did monochrome this 2nd one too but it was even more contrasty than the crop, so I'll work on it a bit more and then post it for you.

Originally Posted by patterfr

For the record sis I think a straight on camera shot of a little girl like this can absolutely be awesome. IMO, the "complimentary/slimming aspect" or dynamism accomplished by this with photos of women/models/adults probably doesn't apply to cutie pies like this little one.

You're right! Kids can get away with just about anything, especially because they are so dang cute.

Originally Posted by Songman45

I'm with Fran (as I am most of the time) there are two things that small children give us license to do. One is flat lighting, there is something about the age of innocence that makes flat but soft lighting flattering. The other is square posing. Body angles and language are meant to flatter and illustrate the contours. Oh, we have power angles, feminine angles, the "S curve" and lots of complicated contortions. Children are pretty much asexual and far from complicated, so, simple works.

This small girl almost lost in the environment with such a stoic expression is great. I find it either a tribute or parody to earlier (depression era) photos of kids with stern looks. I kind of find it PJ in a way, not overboard just a hint. Like the salt in the soup, there but not noticeable on its own.

I don't see anything wrong with the lighting ratio. What are you going for? 3:1 ? And where are you placing the lights? I know Fran and Benji are sort of your guides, which is good- they both know what they are doing and they use solid methodology. So, can you describe the light placement including the modifiers including elevation relative to the subject and angle of descent (tilt downward).

Steve

Thanks, Steve - love the comments.

As far as "what was I going for?" I am not there yet - I am at "chimp and does it look acceptable" stage

I had the main to the right - 60" softlighter with a strobe in it, and the center of that setup was at about 5 feet high, so the top of the softlighter was over my head (I'm 5'4"). It was about 4 feet away from where she is sitting, Fill light was 46" softlighter with a strobe also, and the center of that softlighter was about 5 1/2 feet high. Placement of fill was right to left of me, I was almost under the umbrella, and we were about 6 feet away from subject. Fill was probably about 35 degrees angled toward subject, main was more like 45 degrees. Main was metered at f8 and fill at f5.6. Camera settings - SS 1/125, f8.0, ISO 100, focal length 45mm. Subjects eyes were maybe 3 1/2 feet high.

I'm just guessing at these angles/measurements. Next time I'll try to remember to bring a tape and really measure, and write it all down.

[Steven G Webb]

Originally Posted by Rain Lily

As far as "what was I going for?" I am not there yet - I am at "chimp and does it look acceptable" stage

I had the main to the right - 60" softlighter with a strobe in it, and the center of that setup was at about 5 feet high, so the top of the softlighter was over my head (I'm 5'4"). It was about 4 feet away from where she is sitting, Fill light was 46" softlighter with a strobe also, and the center of that softlighter was about 5 1/2 feet high. Placement of fill was right to left of me, I was almost under the umbrella, and we were about 6 feet away from subject. Fill was probably about 35 degrees angled toward subject, main was more like 45 degrees. Main was metered at f8 and fill at f5.6. Camera settings - SS 1/125, f8.0, ISO 100, focal length 45mm. Subjects eyes were maybe 3 1/2 feet high.

I'm just guessing at these angles/measurements. Next time I'll try to remember to bring a tape and really measure, and write it all down.

I don't want to make you feel like you're being put through the mill, being asked for particulars and such. If your description is fairly accurate then you are just about dandily where you should be. Looking at the images, I'd say close enough.

So, your subject's eyes were about 3 1/2 feet above the floor and your main light modifier is 5 feet in diameter. The center of the modifier was about 5 feet, or about 2 1/2 feet above your subject, so the bottom edge of the modifier would have been just a tad above her head. The light was about 45 degrees right of the axis. Right? (Geez lady, don't make me do so much math and deduction). I'm supposing it was tipped downward a little.

Your fill light modifier is almost a foot smaller in diameter, and it's center point raised 6 inches higher than the main. So the bottom of the fill light was oh, about a foot above your subject. To the camera left of center and aimed downward about 35 degrees.

I hope I'm reciting all this accurately, else I'm about to sound mighty foolish. Ah well, not the first time and I'm fond of the taste of shoe leather. That's why my foot is in my mouth so often.

First I've made it clear that the lighting on the little girl is fine with me. I have some questions about your set-up decisions. By the way, I just read up on softlighter and it looks like a nifty modifier. Back to the 3rd degree (are you sweating yet?): You have a larger and smaller modifier, why choose to use the larger one as the main? OK, why do I ask? Logic, that's why. The sun being the sole light source for earth is intense and effectively small. All the rest of the light is bounced light reflecting off surfaces. The reflected light is lesser in intensity but greater in volume than the sunlight. We got one sun but a gazillion bounce surfaces. So, in my logic a main light would be from a smaller modifier with greater intensity and the fill light would be less intense but coming from a larger source.

Next, why so high? You got this expensive modifier that's 5 feet across and 3 of those five feet are throwing light right over your subject's head and lighting what? Same with the one that's nearly 4 feet across. Where are half the light rays going and what are they doing there? Now this is honestly a serious question I'm not raising a needless argument. There well may be a reason for the elevation. If you had that reason in mind and say so, you get extra gold stars on Friday.

I know you grasp the concept of not pointing the hot spot at the subject, that hot spot takes up a percentage of the center light, so you can't use but the edge of it for your subject. Top edge, bottom edge, one side or the other? And so what becomes of that bright light part in the middle? Where's it supposed to go that's beneficial?

And lastly the lighting. Main=f8 Fill=5.6 a difference of one f-stop. First school of thought is main is f8 so expose to f8 and fill will be one stop less and will lighten the shadows. Second school of thought main f8 + fill f5.6 this adds a stop of light to the overall exposure so, camera set to f11 now highlights properly exposed and shadows a stop less intense. f11 too much depth of field? Drop the power of both lights by a couple of stops.

Here, have an aspirin. Sorry to be such a pain.

Steve

[Athena]

I was also going to ask if you metered the lights together as well as separately. I meter mine apart, get the ratio I want and then I meter them together and set the f-stop at that setting. Not saying that's what you should do, that's just what I do.

Can't wait to see that mono. xx~A

[Rain Lily]

Originally Posted by Songman45

I don't want to make you feel like you're being put through the mill, being asked for particulars and such. If your description is fairly accurate then you are just about dandily where you should be. Looking at the images, I'd say close enough.

So, your subject's eyes were about 3 1/2 feet above the floor and your main light modifier is 5 feet in diameter. The center of the modifier was about 5 feet, or about 2 1/2 feet above your subject, so the bottom edge of the modifier would have been just a tad above her head. The light was about 45 degrees right of the axis. Right? (Geez lady, don't make me do so much math and deduction). I'm supposing it was tipped downward a little.

Your fill light modifier is almost a foot smaller in diameter, and it's center point raised 6 inches higher than the main. So the bottom of the fill light was oh, about a foot above your subject. To the camera left of center and aimed downward about 35 degrees.

I hope I'm reciting all this accurately, else I'm about to sound mighty foolish. Ah well, not the first time and I'm fond of the taste of shoe leather. That's why my foot is in my mouth so often.

First I've made it clear that the lighting on the little girl is fine with me. I have some questions about your set-up decisions. By the way, I just read up on softlighter and it looks like a nifty modifier. Back to the 3rd degree (are you sweating yet?): You have a larger and smaller modifier, why choose to use the larger one as the main? OK, why do I ask? Logic, that's why. The sun being the sole light source for earth is intense and effectively small. All the rest of the light is bounced light reflecting off surfaces. The reflected light is lesser in intensity but greater in volume than the sunlight. We got one sun but a gazillion bounce surfaces. So, in my logic a main light would be from a smaller modifier with greater intensity and the fill light would be less intense but coming from a larger source.

Next, why so high? You got this expensive modifier that's 5 feet across and 3 of those five feet are throwing light right over your subject's head and lighting what? Same with the one that's nearly 4 feet across. Where are half the light rays going and what are they doing there? Now this is honestly a serious question I'm not raising a needless argument. There well may be a reason for the elevation. If you had that reason in mind and say so, you get extra gold stars on Friday.

I know you grasp the concept of not pointing the hot spot at the subject, that hot spot takes up a percentage of the center light, so you can't use but the edge of it for your subject. Top edge, bottom edge, one side or the other? And so what becomes of that bright light part in the middle? Where's it supposed to go that's beneficial?

And lastly the lighting. Main=f8 Fill=5.6 a difference of one f-stop. First school of thought is main is f8 so expose to f8 and fill will be one stop less and will lighten the shadows. Second school of thought main f8 + fill f5.6 this adds a stop of light to the overall exposure so, camera set to f11 now highlights properly exposed and shadows a stop less intense. f11 too much depth of field? Drop the power of both lights by a couple of stops.

Here, have an aspirin. Sorry to be such a pain.

Steve

lol. Steve, you are fine, no worries - ask anything you like because making me think is probably a great way to make me learn better.

One thing that will likely answer a couple of questions about light placement is that I originally set this up for my daughter, who is 5'7" and then just dropped my niece in too. I'll post a picture of my daughter so you can see that lighting as well.

As far as throwing light over the subject's head, it wasn't so much on my daughter so...
And I'm guessing I should have changed the light position for my niece. lol

For metering, my lights aren't very "controllable" as far as adjusting power output (meaning not very sensitive to changes in the power knob), and so when I metered them separately and then together, it was still metering at f8 so I left it there...

Does this help any? Here, take an aspirin because I'm a difficult student

[Rain Lily]

BTW - I know I should have had the main higher on my daughter. Which would have put it much higher for my niece. Sheesh....

[Rain Lily]

Originally Posted by Athena

I was also going to ask if you metered the lights together as well as separately. I meter mine apart, get the ratio I want and then I meter them together and set the f-stop at that setting. Not saying that's what you should do, that's just what I do.

Can't wait to see that mono. xx~A

I did meter them separately, and then together, Athena. But I got the same reading anyway.

Here's that image for ya.

[Athena]

Oh yeah, I like it. It tells a little story inside my funky head.

What kind of meter do you use Sis? My meter gives me increments within each stop. For example it might meter F8, but next to it show me a "6". That means I am 6 tenths of my way to the next stop. kwim?

[Rain Lily]

Originally Posted by Athena

Oh yeah, I like it. It tells a little story inside my funky head.

What kind of meter do you use Sis? My meter gives me increments within each stop. For example it might meter F8, but next to it show me a "6". That means I am 6 tenths of my way to the next stop. kwim?

I think I do know, Athena - like decimal points? Mine will do that too, if I'm not mistaken. I didn't pay attention when I did these, though, to see if I should have rounded up...

I have a Sekonic Flashmate L-308S - the cheap one that I could barely even afford at the time

[Athena]

I think mine's probably not much better - Sekonic L358. I've had it for years, so I know it's not the newest/greatest. But it works just fine for me. I'm not the newest/greatest either. lol