Whispers
Nov, 2015Views
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Behind The Lens
Location
This photo was taken in my studio at home. I tend to only use my studio for portrait shots, anything bigger and I'd rather be on location.Time
This was taken at about 5:30pm in June. I waited to get a day when it had been bright all day but clouded over in the afternoon.Lighting
For this image I decided to use natural lighting, which I prefer to use over artificial lighting any day. I planned to whole shoot around the best time of day to shoot so I got that soft dusky light, this helped enhance the feeling of mystery and emotion in the image. The lighting had to be muted and soft so by doing it on a cloudy afternoon in summer it alowed me to have the soft lighting i wanted without the image becoming too dark.Equipment
My Nikon D700 with a 50mm lens. I used a peice of black cardboard ( cheap and easy to cut into smaller sizes if you need) on the left of the image too enhance the shadows under her jaw and around the side of her face. This shoot was minimal, by bringing in to many components I might have distracted away from the raw and organic feeling I wanted from this shoot.Inspiration
At the time I was studying a lot of Dutch golden age art and the movement and lighting they create in their paintings. But also I was exploring emotions, feeling of whimsy and intimacy but also of melancholy. This was all inspiration that went into creating this image.Editing
I normally use quite a lot of post processing in my fashion photography, but here I used very little, I tweaked the colours so the black wasn't so harsh and sharpened certain areas but that was it.In my camera bag
My Nikon D700 and my 50mm 1:2 prime. It's a beautiful lens and I honestly don't go anywhere without it, it's my go to lens. I also take my 18-105mm 1:3.5 lens, it a great lens for weddings when you don't want to be getting right into people's space for photos! I have extra batteries and bodies etc as well. I'm a minimal photographer, I know what works for me and I stick to it so I don't carry a lot of equipment, but it doesn't work for everyone.Feedback
This Image was all about lighting, my advice would be to be patient, check what the weather will be like and take tested shots at different times of the day a couple of says before to make sure you know exactly when the best lighting is. When I do natural shots like this I do a lot of research and planning into getting the exact lighting conditions I want. Trust your model! I knew what I wanted from the shoot and explained that to Lindsey, I positioned her and got my camera angle ready and let her move and pose in the way she thought would portray the emotions I wanted. And obviously experiment, this wasn't the first photo in the shoot or the last, I changed a lot of things during the duration of the shoot and doing that is what gets you the good shots.
