Aubrey_Daybefore6-3006599.jpg

I make a portrait of my kids the day before their birthday. It's probably the most gratifying project that I work on. This year Aubrey did not want to do a portrait with his bike. I usually go along with whatever they want to, but I insisted on featuring his bike because it has been a big part of his life in the last couple of years.

 

This is a classic crosslight. The sun is getting lower in the sky and is behind Aubrey and slightly camera left. It's angle is given away by the shadow of the bike. The ambient is giving him a nice rim of light that separates him from the dark trees in the background. Flash is from a White Lightning Ultra 600 with a shoot through umbrella just out of frame camera right about 3-4 feet from him and down pretty low in order to avoid a shadow from the visor on his helmet. I should have put some spill control on it as it flared pretty badly but I was able to bring the blacks back down in Lightroom. Triggered with Pocket Wizards. Max sync speed 1/250th ISO 200 f/10.

Done