How to get nice soft light for portraits using diffusion and reflection.

Annie Leibovitz and Sean Connery photo shoot for Vuitton behind the scenes video

Many people dream of the long, languorous days of summer, with its gentle, warm zephyrs. But, as a landscape photographer I dream of the short days of winter, preferably with snow and ice. Despite what you may think this isn’t simply a case of me being contrary. No, honestly, it isn’t! For me there are many compelling reasons why landscape photography is a more worthwhile experience in winter.

So, what’s wrong with summer? I usually find photographing the British landscape in the high summer months, between June and September, an unrewarding exercise. To my mind, wherever you are, summer limits photographic opportunities.

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# Use a wide angle lens, but get close. A wide angle lens will help you expand your viewpoint, but at the same time, you don’t want your photos to be too impersonal to the subject. Get close to the important aspects of the scene and make them the primary focus of the shot. Then, try to include other objects or people that are important to the situation. Place the primary subjects at different spots around the image to create a more dynamic photo with tension. A wide angle lens will also give the viewer a perspective of being in the middle of the action.

# Continuously look around. If you’re on the street, in a market, or surrounded by a lot of action, then you could be missing out on opportunities to grab some great photos if you don’t keep your eyes open to everything around you. Sometimes it may be easier to stand in one spot and let everything else flow around while waiting for a good scene to materialize.

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I was out with my new circular polarizer and the effects were quickly shown, here are two samples to quickly show the effects of a polarizer filter :

So first let’s look at polarization in general. You can think of light as traveling in waves. One way to visualize these waves is to imagine taking a length of rope and tying one end to a post. Moving the free end up and down sets up a “wave” along the rope which also moves up and down. If you think of the rope as representing a beam of light, the light would be “vertically polarized”.

You could also move the free end around in a circle and, if you got the timing just right, you could set up a wave that looks like a corkscrew. This is analogous to a light beam having circular polarization.

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I’ve been receiving more and more emails asking for information about the softbox I use with the speedlites.

Several brands offer this package, I opted for the Chimera set as it was complete and had a larger box than the other brand at the time of purchase.

So, here are some details about what I’m using.

As you can see it is the Chimera PRO II XS softbox that I’m using.

Nice adapter ring is within the package I bought.FIrst time you might need to get the hang of it but after a few shoots you’ll be used to it and able to set the box up in less than 5 minutes.

It has an extra reflective screen for the inside, you can attach it via velcro :

The Rule of Thirds :

“The Rule of Thirds gets trotted out more often than any other in all types of photography and is one of the first rules of composition taught to most photography students. While sometimes it can feel a little cliche it can also be a very effective technique in landscapes (although keep in mind that breaking this (and other rules) can also produce dramatic and interesting shots).”

Framing Images

While adding points of interest to a foreground is an important technique for adding interest to landscape shots – a similar technique is to ‘frame’ the shot by adding interest to other parts of the edges of an image.Perhaps the most common way of framing a landscape shot is to include an overhanging branch in the upper section of a shot. Similarly framing a shot with a bridge might work.

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” Of the many different types of lens filters available to outdoor photographers, the polarizing filter is probably one of the most popular, if not definitely the most versatile.

So what exactly does a polarizing filter do? Well, in addition to modifying overall contrast, polarizing filters can darken overly lit skies, boost color saturation, and even remove reflections that appear on water and glass.”

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Polarizing filters at Bob Atkins

click continue for set-up and additional photos.

We moved the flash from frontal position to a position of 45 degrees from the model, direct light.

While shooting portraits at the beach can be great fun, harsh lighting from the direct sunlight can result in blown-out highlights, distracting shadows, or squinting from your model.

This lesson will show a technique that we like to use for modifying direct sunlight.

Using 3 – 77″ x 77″ LitePanels, we constructed an outdoor shooting tent. The left side, facing the sun, has a translucent LitePanel fabric to transmit and soften the sunlight. The ceiling panel also has the translucent fabric.

The right side has a gold reflective LitePanel fabric to bounce light back into our model, creating a nice fill and rim light.

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shot above was taken with a slave 550ex speedlite on 45 degrees approx. – direct flash – FEL on face.

Outdoor portraits can offer a sense a drama or romance that can be hard to achieve in a studio setting. The early morning or evening sky can serve as a stunning backdrop for a portrait. The trick is in lighting your subject properly.

This lesson shows how to use just a couple of lighting fixtures to achieve great outdoor portraits.

We set up a Photoflex StarFlash 1000 Mercury 5′ OctoDome Kit for our main light.

It is important to use a light source that is large enough to cover your subject. Here the 5 foot OctoDome³ is perfect for giving us adequate light coverage for our model.

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Exposure bracketing

Fill flash

Area focus

Understanding white balance

Night Photography

Exposure compensation