Mr. Monroe
Ashley's Umbrella... Ella... Ella...
And yet another image from last weekend's PDX Strobist event...
For this particular image, I had the very lovely Ashley (who -- by the way -- has an amazing wardrobe collection) wander down an old abandoned road while holding a large photo umbrella overhead. Obviously, there was a small strobe mounted inside the umbrella, and that strobe provided most of the illumination on Ashley.
I've been wanting to do a "strobe inside an umbrella" shot for ages, but have never had the opportunity to do so with any of my clients. This past weekend's Strobist event gave me the chance to try out a brand new lighting technique, and I'm already thinking of ways in which I can incorporate a set-up like this during a corporate shoot.
Camera info: A beat-up ol' Nikon D200, with the amazing (and amazingly cheap) Nikon 55-200mm VR lens mounted onto it. The ASA was set at 100, and the lens was set at 122mm and f6.3. Oh yeah, 1/250th of a second on the the shutter speed.
Strobist info: A 36" black and silver photo umbrella, with a Vivitar 285 and Pocketwizard strapped to the inner ribs. The strobe was set at 1/16th power. A bit of daylight (literally, the last rays of the day) gave a slight side hit of light onto Ashley's face.
Other info: I ended up having to brighten Ashley's legs a bit in Photoshop, otherwise, she sorta' looked as though her upper body was just floating in space. Also, a bit of high pass filtering was used to increase the overall contrast of the shot. Lastly, I darkened the corners of the image just slightly, all to help bring the viewer's eyes more towards the middle of the shot.
Were I to do this shot again, I'd probably have two extra strobes set just slightly behind Ashley (to her left and her right), and I'd use those strobes to kick a bit of rim light along Ashley's lower torso.
Ashley's Umbrella... Ella... Ella...
And yet another image from last weekend's PDX Strobist event...
For this particular image, I had the very lovely Ashley (who -- by the way -- has an amazing wardrobe collection) wander down an old abandoned road while holding a large photo umbrella overhead. Obviously, there was a small strobe mounted inside the umbrella, and that strobe provided most of the illumination on Ashley.
I've been wanting to do a "strobe inside an umbrella" shot for ages, but have never had the opportunity to do so with any of my clients. This past weekend's Strobist event gave me the chance to try out a brand new lighting technique, and I'm already thinking of ways in which I can incorporate a set-up like this during a corporate shoot.
Camera info: A beat-up ol' Nikon D200, with the amazing (and amazingly cheap) Nikon 55-200mm VR lens mounted onto it. The ASA was set at 100, and the lens was set at 122mm and f6.3. Oh yeah, 1/250th of a second on the the shutter speed.
Strobist info: A 36" black and silver photo umbrella, with a Vivitar 285 and Pocketwizard strapped to the inner ribs. The strobe was set at 1/16th power. A bit of daylight (literally, the last rays of the day) gave a slight side hit of light onto Ashley's face.
Other info: I ended up having to brighten Ashley's legs a bit in Photoshop, otherwise, she sorta' looked as though her upper body was just floating in space. Also, a bit of high pass filtering was used to increase the overall contrast of the shot. Lastly, I darkened the corners of the image just slightly, all to help bring the viewer's eyes more towards the middle of the shot.
Were I to do this shot again, I'd probably have two extra strobes set just slightly behind Ashley (to her left and her right), and I'd use those strobes to kick a bit of rim light along Ashley's lower torso.