Studio Quality Lighting You Can Carry

Studio-Quality Lighting You Can Carry: Tools and Tips from 3 Portrait Shooters
By: Jason Ernamann

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Photographing on location doesn’t have to mean giving up control of your lighting. Thanks to the increased variety and portability of lighting gear, photographers like Joe McNally, Jerry Avanaim and others (interviewed in our October 2004 issue) revealed that they’re able to achieve precise, sophisticated lighting with the contents of one lighting case.

Portrait photography often demands simplicity: The CEO has only 15 minutes to be photographed, you’re under pressure, and you need to keep your eye on the subject, not on your clamps and power packs. Here, three portrait photographers with decades of experience share their philosophies for getting maximum efficiency from portable lighting.

Michael Taylor, a 23-year veteran commercial photographer and environmental portraitist, sees many photographers as mired in the “apprenticeship trap,” emulating the styles and techniques of their mentors to such an extent that they cannot respond flexibly and creatively to new situations that don’t fall within the established concept. “When you’re shooting on location, you have to know how to build a portrait using whatever lighting and situation you’re confronted with” says Taylor.

If the most important step in creating a portrait is building a connection with your subject, then the second most important, Taylor says, is lighting the face.

To simplify this complex issue, I begin with concept called the Wall of Light, a basic building block of any portrait I’m making. This concept is equally applicable to shooting on location, in your studio, with color or black-and-white, film or digital. The most obvious Wall of Light is a large picture window. Whether it’s facing north at an open sky or no direct sunlight is coming through it at all, if it provides proper lighting, it will give you a soft, directional light that is pleasing when it falls on the subject. Such lighting is very forgiving, and usually allows the brightness range of the scene to fall well within the tolerance of the capture medium, film or digital. The key to making the window work is to use the whole length of it as your light source. Generally, you’ll want to place your subject at the far end of the window (opposite to where the camera is placed) rather than halfway down the window. That way, the entire light source, all of the window light, wraps around the subject.”

“It may be helpful to think of the half of the window closest to the subject as the key light, and the half farthest away as the fill light. This beautiful, natural light source is the foundation of all portrait lighting, and you can translate this concept into any situation. For example, you can create a Wall of Light by artificial means using two strobes. For most artificial lighting situations, I use a strobe as a fill light, that is, a foundational light I use to provide the basic exposure. I build any additional lighting on top of that, typically placing my fill light on the key-light side of the camera. Many photographers advise placing the fill light directly behind the camera, but I believe in using a “form fill,” a fill light placed closer to the key light. “Form fill” is a term coined by Peter Nicastro, a very innovative PP of A member who passed away in the late ’70s. I find this kind of fill is more flattering (in other words, slimming) because it follows the form of the face. This placement actually puts the fill and key light close together, creating one rather large light source, an artificial Wall of Light. For the same reason, when shooting in the studio, I usually use an umbrella as a light modifier on my fill light, and some kind of a soft box for modifying my key light.”

“On location, I generally employ two light sources to create a form fill and a key light–another version of the Wall of Light concept. It’s not always necessary to use a light modifier like an umbrella or soft box to achieve this either. Sometimes it’s either necessary or more convenient to point your strobes toward a wall and just get the same effect with bounce light. But however you create it, the Wall of Light is a concept that will let you consistently shoot portraits of the highest technical and esthetic quality, and reveal the truth and beauty of your subjects, which is really what portraiture is all about anyway.”

Taylor lights his portraits with one or more ProFoto 600 WS Compact strobes, and typically triggers them with a PocketWizard Multimax system. Most of his work is shot with a Mamiya M645 D with an 18MP Kodak Pro digital back and 55-110mm Mamiya lens, and a Kodak Pro SLR N with 70-200mm f/2.8 Nikkor VR lens. His classic “Dutch Masters” portrait of artist Hud Andrews was lit with two Profoto 600WS units placed forward and to the left of the main subject to create a Wall of Light, takenwith a Mamiya M645 D and 55-110mm lens, and metered with a Master Sekonic L-608. His compelling portrait of legendary photographer, civil rights, blues, and rock archivist Ernest Withers was lit and metered similarly, but both Profoto 600 WS units were bounced off the opposite wall, and a shutter speed of 1/4 sec was used to pick up the ambient light from the table lamp.

Lamar Bates has been shooting professionally for 40 years, starting with his first wedding at age 17. Based in an Atlanta suburb, Bates describes himself as a generalist photographer.

“My basic techniques are all of the K.I.S.S. variety,” he says, “and I use fill flash all the time. Regardless of what some say, fill flash is a snap. I set my exposure for a general ambient light reading (I use a Pentax spotmeter and average the highlight and shadow readings), and set up my Sunpak 120J flash so that its power setting corresponds to the general exposure. That way, the flash will illuminate the shadows and the background will be naturally exposed by daylight. I generally use an aperture of f/5.6 to f/8 and drag the shutter accordingly. My typical shutter speeds are 1/2 sec or 1/4 sec—1/8 sec is a fast exposure for me. At speeds like that, my heavy-duty Slik tripod is worth its considerable weight in gold. See my shot of a baseball player for a good example of this technique. For darker-skinned subjects, I use the same setup, but dial in a little more power on my 120J.”

“Since I shoot Hasselblads, the flash will sync at all speeds, but I always use a tripod. Even if you shoot at 1/60 sec or faster, learn to love your tripod because your pictures will be sharper. For weddings I use the same procedure. For example, my photo of the groom was taken late in the day and strongly side-lit. I dropped the shutter speed down to expose for the background, and dialed in my 120J to the proper power setting to correspond to f/5.6-f/8. The results speak for themselves. Even when shooting a larger group as the sun is setting, I use the same technique–expose for the ambient lighting and use flash for fill. It works! And I don’t get those horrible black backgrounds you sometimes see in flash shots taken outdoors.”

Bates says his simple approach lets him concentrate on the poses and expressions of his subjects rather than fussing over technical details, and says it works equally well with film or digital capture. “I use Kodak Portra 160NC film in my ‘Blads and am also a Nikon D100 shooter. This simple system yields excellent results with both. Mastery takes only a few shoots, and then it becomes second nature. After that, you can set up and shoot ’til the cows come home, and get great photos for your clients.”

Richard Smith: A lightweight, two-light kit with adjustable power can solve practically any lighting problem.

Chairman/ Photography Department

North Georgia Technical College

Clarkesville, Georgia

“I have always made the point of traveling as light as possible when going on location to photograph portraits,” says Richard Smith, a professional photographer for 35 years who has also taught photography for 21. His approach to location lighting is basically simple, but with a touch of sophistication that marks the work of an experienced, knowledgeable pro. Smith’s portrait of “Daniel” is a good example of the effectiveness of his approach to lighting.

“My usual equipment consists of two lights with stands, a portable background stand, and of course my camera equipment, which is a Nikon D100 at this point. My favorite lens is the 28-105mm f/3.5-4.5 Nikkor. I use Photogenic Power lights with medium-sizes soft boxes for my main and fill light sources. The power units are adjustable, which makes creating lighting ratios easy to achieve without having to move the lights around in small spaces. If space is very limited, I’ll use one Power light, and a reflector as my fill light source.”

“I also carry a couple of muslin backgrounds and use them when photographing individuals and small groups. These backgrounds come in a variety of beautiful colors and fold for easy packing. I can pack all this equipment in one or two packing cases of manageable size that can be easily handled by one person, or with the help of an assistant. Finally, one piece of equipment I consider essential is a PocketWizard plus Digital Receiver for sync-cord-free photography.”

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