Calan 2

[john101477]

I watched a couple of tutorials on skin softening today and dug this image out from the vapire shoot I did. I did other touch ups as well and also brightened up the jewelery because it was kind of lost in some shadow. she also has brown eyes which I did not want to change but they ended up really dark so I tried to bring them out a little

Attachments:

[OrcaBob]

That's an outstanding shot, John. Best lighting you've ever done.

[john101477]

Thanks Bob, I really tried to work on the lighting on the whole shoot. I even made a couple of snoots to direct light. one of these days I am going to find a black velvet backdrop like yours. black muslin is a PITA because it shows everything

[OrcaBob]

The black velvet's great stuff, but you might get good results from black paper, too.

A nice thing about the velvet is that I can drape it over stuff for various effects. In a shoot with Desi the soccer girl at a park, there was a tree with two trunks and one was cut away at the stump. It made a perfect posing place but I didn't want the tree in the shot. We draped the velvet over the stump and two moms held up the rest as a short backdrop. The end result was a shot that might have been taken in a studio.

There are other times that I do want the crumpled black velvet to show as a textured background. That's easy enough to do with lighting and camera settings.

I don't know how much it costs. The one I've got is on loan from my sister, who doesn't do studio shooting any more.

[OrcaBob]

As for snoots, I bought one with the Alien Bees set, but I very rarely use it. If I want to direct and confine light, I find grids to be far more useful. I bought a set of four: 10, 20, 30, 40 degree spreads. The 10 is essentially a snoot, anyway.

[john101477]

Yeah next time I get my hands on some cash I may take the plunge and get a good set of lights, for now the hotshoes mounted on tripods will have to do. The way I figure if I buy what I want the first time then I am not really out the money so I will scrimp and save till I have the money for the 2 800's and 1 400 along with a softbox, grid set, and stands.