Studio Photography Brief: Final 3 portraits & Evaluation

The culmination of many weeks practising the photographing of various subjects, objects, models and textures etc in the studio, finally resulted in the submission of between 5 and 7 images, each encompassing one of the genres we had spent time practising. Due to how happy I was with the various portraits I had shot (and owing to a bout of amnesia in not being able to remember how I had shot some of my earlier still lives) I chose to submit three portraits, three still lives (glass, flower and jewellery) and the Action Man set-up that apparently counts as a still life in its own right. I will be discussing each of these in detail below, drawing attention to lighting and composition, equipment used and the thinking behind the particular mood I was after (NB: the Action Man shot has its own post dedicated to it).

  Since my previous post dealt with the work of Robert Mapplethorpe in its various thoughts, I thought it only right to start this post by discussing the portrait I produced of my classmate Noreen using what is apparently the Mapplethorpe style, of using two soft boxes either side of the camera directed at the model, a hair light (preferably with a honeycomb attached), and two black reflector boards at either side of the model. Below is the resulting image, but- as per my previous brief posts- I will do my best to detail how I got there by way of including previous images from the same shoot.

Camera Settings: f8, 1/100th, ISO100, 50mm.
Lighting: Two soft boxes either side of the camera, aimed at model; one head (with honeycomb attached) behind model at waist-height pointing up towards hair (hair light).

This is the shot straight from camera. 

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You see how that the camera is positioned between the two soft boxes, and the two black reflector boards are there but there is no hair light at this point, which is why I have included a diagram below.

Here we have everything: both soft boxes, both black boards and the strobe used as a hair light.

  You will see from the final image that Noreen's face very illuminated amongst the black background. This is because the soft boxes keep things light and soft on the model's face, and the black boards retain the light in the area where she is stood. It took a while to decide how bright I wanted the soft boxes, and how narrow my aperture, so I remembered two pieces of advice that I always carry with me into the studio: 1) start at f11 (this is what a portrait photographer advised me to do a while back, and I'm also told that most lenses work best between f8 and f11) and 2) don't turn the lights above 3. The last point was what I learned during the Action Man/Rex shoot, for at the time I had the lights too high and using apertures as narrow as f20/22. Also, wanted a degree of depth to the face.

In Camera Raw, I increased the exposure by a stop, along with increasing the contrast and the highlights a touch. I lessened the shadows to ensure the hair didn't get lost in the black of the background. 

In Photoshop CS6, I removed any rogue marks on Noreen's face using the Spot Healing tool first and foremost. I then duplicated the background layer, selected a Gaussian Blur filter (6.6) and applied a black mask to the layer, allowing me to use the white brush (opacity 25%) to brush the blur back into her face to soften the skin incrementally. This would compliment the use of soft light from the boxes. I then converted the image to Monochrome using a Black and White Adjustment layer and adjusting the colour channels. However, after John Kiely's session on B&W on conversion, I returned to the Photoshop Document prior to printing to use Channels to highlight only the Red channel (for this is well-known to make female skin appear softer) and added re-added the B&W adjustment layer. I then reduced the shadows some more using Image>Adjustments>Shadows and Highlights, and increased the Brightness to +30 to ensure the print wouldn't come out too dark, as it has in the past. 

Earlier examples from the shoot

The early examples were using f11 without the hair light at the back, for I wasn't aware this was part of the Mapplethorpe set-up at this point. I started by using Mina as a model. Although work I do in ACR makes a hell of a difference (sometimes to the point of rescuing images), the hair had no real light or definition without use of a hair light (1). I then brought the hair light in, tilting down from above Mina's head, but I felt the light was too pronounced (2). Finally I placed the it right behind her head (obviously out of frame) to illuminate her head from the background, and this seemed to work a lot better (3). All three of these examples are below (ignore the compositions and expressions).

  

1

2

3

I repeated this technique with Noreen, but increased the aperture to f8 and brightened both soft-boxes by half a stop. If I remember correctly, the hair light would been a stop lower than the boxes. Below are the the first couple of Noreen with the hair light directly behind her head, but- with her being dressed in complete black (the thing that helped the image finally, I may add), as well as having jet black hair, it did nothing to pull her head away from the background.

  The next two portraits were shot using exactly the same lighting arrangement as one another. Let's take a look at them now:

Camera Settings:  f11, 1/100th, ISO100, 50mm.
Lighting:  Beauty dish (left of camera) directed at model; soft box to model's right (one stop lower than BD); black reflector to her left; black background.

Camera Settings:  f11, 1/100th, ISO100, 50mm.
Lighting: As above (model seated; lights lowered)- see below

  These two are not a million miles away from the Mapplethorpe style, but I knew the beauty dish aimed directly at the model would make for a crisper, more prominent light on the face, as opposed to the ultra-soft effects of the two soft boxes. However, I used a soft box to the right of the subject just to soften the harshness of the light (see 'Introduction to Studio Lighting') and ensure one side of the model's face was lighter than the other. Needless to say the black reflector helped a lot here, as it did in the shot of Noreen.

  The shot of Anita is one of the best portraits I have ever made. I shot a few of her during the session, but in many she was looking right at the camera. It was only until I started getting a lot more creative and confident in directing her that tried something different. Below are some of the ones I didn't opt for. In this instance, I am still very fond of them, but it was a matter of the final one or two eclipsing what had one before. 

Too smiley, but still a good, friendly shot.

Either look at the camera and smile or look mysteriously away from it. Never the twain. My opinion.

Nice, but the fact she look likes she's about to speak ruins it.

Other than the one I submitted, this was the only other I'd have chosen. She looks placid and relaxed, and the portrait benefits from her looking away.
Reason not for choosing: It lacks the majesty/sense of the regal of the other.

  
From the same session I also shot quite a few of Andrea, but I just didn't it anything fit with the other three models (below).

It may be an ethnicity thing. In my final choices I feel I have represented three women with different heritages, and I think the monochrome conversion only serves to highlight the skin tones of each. This adds another dimension to what I feel quite comfortable in calling a series: Anita the African Queen in all her majesty; Mina looking sophisticated and serious and Noreen looking mature and dominant, her face aglow by the way I shot/edited her. As good a portrait it is of Andrea, as relaxed as she looks, something didn't quite work for me when I put them all side-by-side.