I took a wide variety of equipment out, including my Canon EOS-5D SLR, a number of lenses (many in my collection are now Canon's L-series, which is typically considered the "good stuff"), an Alien Bee B400 and B800, two silver/white umbrellas, light stands, a Sekonic L-758DR flash meter, three PocketWizard Plus II transceivers (for remotely firing the strobes), and a Photoflex Multidisc reflector (which was used for some photos outdoors). That weekend I mainly used a Canon 24-70mm f/2.8L lens, but I did use a Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L IS lens for a short time (it was generally too "long").
I got the light set up, and I got out my light meter. Since this was the first time that I had used it for flash photography, I had to pull up the owner's guide on my friend's computer. I was planning to use the L-758DR PocketWizard capability. It took about ten minutes, but I figured out how to fire the strobes with the meter, and to also understand the peculiarities of the meter. I adjusted the camera and strobe output in order to get a proper exposure. During this photo shoot, I think that I had the exposure generally correct. Unfortunately, I had other issues, as seen in this photo (the color may be washed out since this was shot in Adobe RGB color space and has not yet been converted to sRGB).
1. Distractions: It's like I wasn't even trying to take a decent photograph. On the left hand side of the photo you see several distracting items. I just wonder if I'm not paying attention to those things when I am looking through the viewfinder (because whether they appear is dependent on the focal length used). Anyway, I should have moved those items out of way.
2. Annoying reflection: The fireplace facing is marble and is highly reflective. At the top left corner of the marble you can see a reflection of the umbrella. Although you can't make out the spokes of the umbrella, you can clearly see the hotspots caused by the folds of the umbrella.
3. Color balance is off: The adult in the picture above was wearing a purple sweater. In the photo the color does look pretty close to the way that I remember it, but when viewed larger it seems to be too blue. I did notice this during the shoot, because on the viewfinder her sweater definitely appeared too blue.
4. Dust on the sensor: The photo above does not show a rather large dust particle. It was obscured by the adult's hair, but it is definitely there and was present during my whole weekend of shooting. I had shot pictures on the previous day at the Franklin Park Conservatory. Many of those pictures were quite busy with leaves, flowers and so on in the picture. They were also typically shot with a wider aperture. These family portraits on the other hand was mostly shot at f/9.0. Smaller apertures tend to accentuate the dust. I figure that of the 89 photos I shot at their house that day, I have 53 where I need to fix the dust.
5. Shadows: I suppose the shadows are not too distracting, but I should have tried to avoid them. I own three Alien Bees strobes, but one quit working a couple of years ago and I have never sent it back in for repair. More light would help with the shadows.
6. Posing: I don't know squat about posing. I relied on the mother and father mostly for posing. I did speak up sometimes when I saw a particularly annoying reflection in someone's eyeglasses, but that's about it.
How to eliminate or lessen these issues?
#1 and #2: For distractions and reflections, I am actually looking at two types of products that should be able to take care of that. The first item is a backdrop and its accompanying supports. I am currently looking at the hand-painted muslin backdrops from Aura Backdrops. They are 10' by 20' in size and include a rod pocket for the support beam. The one issue that I can see with a backdrop that I haven't encountered yet with walls, is that the backdrop will need more light on it, to separate it from the people. I can relegate my Alien B400 (the least powerful) to a shorter backlight stand to take care of that, but then I need another Alien Bee unit, I think. I am looking at the Alien Bee B1600 (their most powerful) which can also be used with the second type of product I am looking at for getting rid of reflections (not distractions). That item is the softbox. A proper softbox should be able to provide a nice uniform light that, even if it is reflected, might be mistaken for something else (such as a window). It's hard to mistake the reflection of an umbrella. I am currently looking at Photoflex's Multidome. The Multidome has an internal diffusion panel and the front diffusion panel and also has optional gold and silver inserts to modify the light.
#3: There are two ways to be proactive about color balance. The first is to shoot in RAW. The 5D supports RAW and I need to start using it. As RAW implies, the camera is recording the raw data from the image sensor. Color balance can be adjusted on the computer later. The other thing that can be done to be proactive (whether or not RAW is used) is to shoot a gray target under the same lighting conditions that will be used for the portraits. I've got a Lastolite EZYBalance 20-inch target on the way. What I notice on the JPEGs that I did shoot that day is that prior to me adjusting the camera's white balance from auto to flash, the colors appeared too cool. After changing the white balance, the colors appear too warm. Of course, I still haven't converted them to the sRGB color space. Shooting a gray target should allow me to nail the color balance.
#4. Dust on the sensor: I didn't see this until I got home. The dust is too small to see on the 5D's LCD display, but it clearly shows up on 19" monitors. How do I eliminate dust? The first is to be aware of it. If you take a longer focal length lens, manually focus it to infinity, stop it down to a smaller aperture, and shoot against a plain background, the dust particles should be easy to see. I already have the complete VisibleDust kit including the lighted-loupe, static brush, and swabs, and I also have a Giottos Rocket Blower. I need to start carrying those items with me. Of course, short of examining the actual sensor each time, which I feel is just an invitation for dust, the problem is going to be trying to see dust on the 5D's LCD display. Now that dust is on my photos, I've got to learn how to eliminate it. I figured Photoshop had a tool for dust removal. Sure enough, one of the best tools is the spot healing brush, but I currently have Photoshop CS, and the spot healing brush was not released until Photoshop CS2. However, in a couple of days (when my latest B&H order arrives), I will have upgraded to Adobe Photoshop CS4.
#5. Shadows: As I alluded to earlier, another key/fill light could help out. If I buy a B1600 and and have my B800 repaired, then I will have four strobes. One can do a lot with four strobes.
#6. Posing: I've just got to learn how to pose people. I recently purchased one of Monte Zucker's portrait books. Of course that book contains just one person's opinion, but his portraits were usually highly-regarded.
So that's quite a lengthy post, but I wanted to share with you some of the pitfalls with shooting portraits, and I hope that you will learn from my mistakes. By the way, I thought that the Photoflex Multidisc that I used (for the first time) outside worked quite well, as shown in this photo.
Until next time.
Ned
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