New studio questions

[rlcphotos39]

I am expanding my studio from 10 x 12 to 10 x 20,,,my question is,,what kind of over head lighting would be best. Rite now I have 3 4' floursents with daylight bulbs,,is this enough or what wlse would I need

oh yes Im using umbrella lighting Smith Victor

[brian.austin]

Are you using these are your main lights? I shoot in the dark with modeling lamps on my strobes.

[Ed Shapiro]

Except for certain kinds of commercial product photographs, direct overhead lighting is hardly suitable for general photography and portraiture. When making portraits, direct overhead lighting causes the eyes and eye-sockets to become obscured in shadow and does not make for good portrait lighting patterns. If your SV lights are incandescent or quartz-halogen types, their color temperature will not balance with your fluorescents in any case. If your SVs are compact fluorescents you will be closer to a color balance, however, the coiled florescent lamps dedicated to photographic fixtures are usually a bit more compatible for photographic usages where as the daylight tubes are more geared toward general utility lighting.

Some of the newer fluorescent light technologies are more advanced in that they are "electronic" as opposed to electrical. The newer variety operates with electronic ballasts (transformers) that produce thousands of cycles thereby eliminating the flickering that takes place in the older types that operate on 60 cycle electrical ballasts. I don't know, as yet if this improves color balance or spectral function as well, I have a fixture here for testing purposes as I may want to build a few light bank systems for my own use.

For the most part, fluorescent tubes have discontinuous spectrums. That means, unlike incandescent lamps which essentially heat a tungsten filament in a semi vacuum, the fluorescent light is produced by exciting a phosphorescent powder within the tube. This system lacks in the red and magenta areas of the visible spectrum and in the days of film, would cause a green cast with most daylight balanced color films. With digital imaging, you can achieve a decent color balance with fluorescent lighting but you can't mix it with other light sources and still maintain the balance. If you dud that the green would reappear in some areas of the image- perhaps in the shadows.

In setting up your new space, you need to make a decision whether you are going to equip the room with electronic flash or tungsten (quartz) lighting where you could take Brian's advice and use the modeling lamps of your strobe equipment.

Another trick, if you will, is to use your overhead fluorescents as a fill light source, shut off the ones directly over the subject and make a main light out of a standard fluorescent fixture and use it to create modeling. A standard fixture can be mounted on a light stand and be made into a soft box or a semi-soft direct light. This method is used in television studios where there are banks of flour scent lights to create general lighting and vertical banks to act as key or modeling lights. A custom white balance in your DSLR will probably handle that.

I hope this helps. Ed

[rlcphotos39]

wow!! thank you ED that was impressive. I have really learned something from that.

I will make some changes.

I guess the real question was tho, Im not using the over head lighting for the studio I do understand the problems that can pop up from them. Using the space where the subject will be modeling from wont have a over head lite bit back where the camera will be positioned there will be overhead but more towards the the wall. Will this still interfere?

[LeeK]

Consider leaving the overhead flourescents for being able to see, build sets, clean up, etc., Have some tungsten lights on a reostat to where you can have them on so you and clients can see enough not to trip on things, yet dim enough not to affect or add color cast to your shots w/the flourescents off. This will not alter what you see w/your modeling lights(doesn't matter whether flash or stage type lighting units)Though I'm not sure what exactly you're asking as Ed touched on this subject as if you were going to use this for actual photographic lighting?

[Ed Shapiro]

Hi Rice Photo- If the fluorescents are not illuminating the subject area, unless the shutter speed is very ling, you can just forget about them and as LeeK mentioned , just use them for utility purposes. If you have modeling lamps in your flash units or are using hot lights, you are better off turning you fluorescents wile shooting. Too much extraneous light in the room will make it hard to see you exact lighting and you composition..

Ed

[Julio]

Whats the height of your new studio?

[rlcphotos39]

Originally Posted by LeeK

Consider leaving the overhead flourescents for being able to see, build sets, clean up, etc., Have some tungsten lights on a reostat to where you can have them on so you and clients can see enough not to trip on things, yet dim enough not to affect or add color cast to your shots w/the flourescents off. This will not alter what you see w/your modeling lights(doesn't matter whether flash or stage type lighting units)Though I'm not sure what exactly you're asking as Ed touched on this subject as if you were going to use this for actual photographic lighting?

No Im not going to use them as direct lighting just to lite the studio is all. But as some one has said here he does his without any over head lighting, depending if its daylight or nite I suppose.
My main lighting is 2 hot lamps SV and 1 back light.

As for room height it is 8" cant get it any higher without major expense,,,lol,,,
But Im a rookie, at studio that is so now Im ready to start on some subjects if they arent all afraid, lol,,,

[rlcphotos39]

Originally Posted by rlcphotos39

No Im not going to use them as direct lighting just to lite the studio is all. But as some one has said here he does his without any over head lighting, depending if its daylight or nite I suppose.
My main lighting is 2 hot lamps SV and 1 back light.

As for room height it is 8" cant get it any higher without major expense,,,lol,,,
But Im a rookie, at studio that is so now Im ready to start on some subjects if they arent all afraid, lol,,,

Heres a couple of pics of it,,,I have a couple of backdrops behind and really the lights arent set for anything in particular except for this photo,

[Julio]

Rick
is there any reason you are not using studio strobes?