Chiaroscuro Puff

Day 212 of an Unknown Number

"Chiaroscuro Puff"

 

So, I found this puff the other day, and was not sure what to do with it photographically. I thought it might be interesting in front of a macro lens with a very shallow depth of field. So, I did it. Not very interesting. Then it came to me that lighting it in a chiaroscuro style might salvage the image. Chiaroscuro is simply a description of a style of lighting in which there is a clear break between areas of light and darkness. In portraiture, it is commonly shown as a dark background, next to the lit part of the subject's face, then the shaded side, and lastly the lit part of the background. Very dramatic!! I found that when dealing with a piece of puff, it was not so easy to shade the shadowed part of our subject, as the fluff reflected much of the light hitting it, thereby causing it to overexpose. So, I snooted one speedlight directly above our subject, and simply shaded the camera-right side with a lens cap. For our second light, I hit another speedlight against the white background, and feathered it enough that it did not light the camera-left part of the frame. Lastly, I stuck an orange gel on the puff's light, and a blue gel on the background strobe. Double contrast! So....puffy. Thanks for drifting by!!

 

#puff #fluff #flower #floral #nature #canon5dmarkIII #canon100macro #macroextensiontube #chiaroscuro #contrast #canon580exII #pocketwizard #macrophotography

Done