This is my first post in this forum. The Mrs allowed me to rent some space in downtown KC to set up some lights since the basement is too small (and messy). I don't get a chance much to work on lighting so I'm excited. The image below is my first attempt and I need some assistance on what I should be doing, or what I'm doing wrong, or what I can improve upon. Don't pay attention to the subject (that's just me staring blankly at the camera). I didn't have a subject lined up so it's just me and the self timer. The hot spot on my left check is more noticeable after I ran "auto contrast" in Photoshop. It's not normally something I do, but I did it anyway. In the raw conversion it's not as objectionable. The setup is: large octobox on camera right, approx 45 degrees, medium softbox behind the camera, background light, and a hair light (ok, a hat light, just cause I didn't turn it off) which was a strip light with grid. The main light (Octobox) was at 125 and F5.6. The fill was at F4, the hat light was F2.8 and I believe the background light was F4 (I don't recall). This was a Canon 5DMKII with 85 F1.8 on selftimer, tripod, and manual focus. The focus is off, but it wasn't a concern for this exercise.
It appears to me that the octobox needs to be a bit higher, and the hat light is may need to be more feathered.
Here's the setup (the place is a bit "rough" (yes an understatement). There's a bank of windows on the right (west) and towards the middle of the afternoon the ambient light caused problems with the optic slave portion of the alienbees. The big Octobox wasn't firing so I had to setup a reflector or use my hat to block the ambient light.
I think you're making a couple of classic mistakes. First, and possibly more importantly, I get the feeling that you're putting all of the lights in place at once and then looking at the results, as opposed to building your lighting one strobe at a time and evaluating the use and purpose of each light.
Also, I think you've got your lights too far away from your subject: pushed back that far they all start washing the whole area, losing their specific purposes and becoming a bunch of general area lights. The image will become more flat and lose that "pop".
In your position, I probably would have brought the main light higher and a little bit closer to the camera. I also would have reversed the modifiers on the main and fill: you're using the big, broad source as key and the smaller, more defined source as fill, which is a little backwards. I'd have used the softbox as key, then lowered the fill by a stop or so to gain back a little shadow modeling and dimensionality. Honestly, I might not have used the fill at all...I would have looked at it first and decided whether I felt it was necessary. I also would have repositioned the hairlight so that it provided a little kick to both hair and shoulders, probably pushed it further to camera-left - right now its effects are a little subtle and I tend to like a little rim light.
Remember, just because you have four strobes doesn't mean you have to use them all! Start from an idea of what you want the image to look like and from response you want to elicit from the viewer, then build your lighting one instrument at a time to achieve that result. Just throwing all your lights up there and trying to make sense of them usually gives you flat and confused lighting.
Shatterkiss, Thanks for taking the time to review and provide input. I did try just the key light by itself but it was too dramatic (too much shadow on the right side of the face). I did not try a reflector to fill in the shadows though and will give that a try on Tuesday. The Octobox is larger than the softbox and I'll swing them around too. When I tried the hat light (I'm mostly bald so fill silly calling it a hairlight when using me as a subject) by itself, the intent was to create an edge light on the my left shoulder and the hat. I agree on repositioning it a bit. Perhaps pumping it up a bit too might make a difference. I have a lady coming over Tuesday with hair which is why I was working on it.
I agree with shatterkiss on everything and also think your key light is about a 1/2 stop too bright, or maybe that's the extra window light. Plus I would reduce the background light and do as shatterkiss suggests with your hair/rim. Try just the octa for a key and reflector for fill or none at all. Then crop your image down tighter from the top. Have fun.
Greg, Thanks for taking the time to review and provide feedback. I metered off the key at the stool and it read 125 at F5.6, at ISO 100. I've just started using the 5DMKII and am not that familiar with how it meters as opposed to the light meter. I know there was a difference between the 5D and the meter. The ambient light was 1/25 at F2.8 when I started around noon and I know it gained more light but I neglected to take another meter reading later.
Regardless of workflow you did a very good job of executing a classic four light studio configuration, which was the main purpose of the exercise. Self portraits are hit and miss regarding precise placement of the light and facial angles but this one is more a hit than a miss.
In terms of the metering, you need to compensate an incident meter to each camera used because the camera ISOs are accurate (per the ANSI standard the meter is calibrated to). Also you are not using the technique suggested by all meter manufacturers for making the reading. The dome of the meter is designed to mimic the 3D shape of the face and as such the exposure reading is performed by putting the meter in front of the face, standing behind it so as not to shade or reflect light from your clothing into it, the POINT THE DOME AT THE CAMERA. That way ALL the light in front of subject (key and fill) hits the dome in the same overlapping manner it hits the face.
Note: Any metering method used consistently will work, but the flaw technically in the "meter the key" method is that the lighting ratio and key light position are variables which affect the overall exposure whenever key overlaps fill, the convention on which lighting ratios are based. Fill is always the constant "1" in the lighting ratio convention because the convention assumes fill is even on both sides of the face (i.e. coming from neat the camera) and the key light overlaps. That's why there is never a 1:1 ratio with the portrait lighting ratio convention.
But if you follow recommended DOME AT CAMERA procedure you'll probably find the camera will not expose correctly at that setting! That I suspect is why people develop work-around metering methods, but the better solution, also mentioned in the meter user guide, is to compensate the meter reading to the actual camera ISO. Canon ISO 100 typically is actually around ISO 120, which will result in over exposure of about a stop. So what you need to do is compensate the hand held meter to match the actual camera sensitivity. That's really simple with Sekonic meters.
Shoot your tri-tone target with just your fill light near camera. Toss a white towel over it so there's a textured highlight to evaluate. The point of overexposure is when detail in objects in like the towel disappear. The tone of the towel, which will fall around 235-240 in the eyedropper measure when correctly exposed. The brightest part of an optimally exposed skin highlight (the red channel) also falls in the same range. So if you get the towel held next to a face exposed correctly in a set-up / test shot you can be assured of having correctly exposed skin tones on the face.
To determine the compensation factor bracket +/- 1 stop from the meter reading. So if the meter reads f/8 shoot from f/5.6 to f/11 in 1/3 stop increments. Some prefer the precision of meter readout in 1/10th stops, but I find setting the display to read in 1/3 stops exactly like the camera less confusing (done on a L-358 by setting switches 3&4 in the battery compartment).
Open the 7 files from the test on your computer in your RAW editor. First look at the highlight detail in the towel and find the point in the series where it starts to disappear - you'll see the subtle shadows of the fabric loops melt away. Usually the shot with 1/3 less exposure than than will be optimally exposed. On my 20D f/9 produces the best actual exposure when an f/8 reading was obtained with the point-the-camera-at-meter method.
When you find the "delta" between meter and camera enter it into the meter. On an L-358 that is done by pressing both ISO buttons at the same time and turning the dial. In this example (e.g. f/8 reading, f/9 optimal exposure) the adjustment factor would be +.3 (i.e. camera is 1/3 stop faster than ANSI standard meter reading). Once compensated, when you take the reading of the same set-up the meter will read f/9.
Once you find the correct f/stop visually based on texture in the highlights go look at the histograms on camera and in the RAW editor and more importantly look at the overexposure warning in the camera. Train your brain to recognize how much over-exposure it takes for the towel and the white patch on your target to clip. Its typically about 1/3 stop. So then in the future if you watch the playback as you shoot and see your highlights starting to clip you'll know exactly how much to adjust to get perfect exposure.
The thing to be aware of with flash is that to expose everything optimally it must be an equal distance to the lights. Most of the "classic" poses also work well in the technical sense because the front of the face winds up closer to the lights than anything else. That's one of the reasons they became "classics" - they work both ascetically and technically When the FRONT of the face is correctly exposed and there are no blown highlights or brighter distractions anywhere else the face will be a stronger center of interest in the sense of how contrast attracts the eye. That's also where the simple OEW on camera provides very valuable feedback. If you get the exposure on the face set correctly with the meter (confirmed with a test shot with target/towel) but see some other area in the viewfinder is clipping and blacking out then you'll know the pose or lights need to be adjusted.
You've got a great space, all the tools you need, and a great starting baseline to work from. Now just try everything else and objectively compare the reasons against your goals for each exercise
Chuck, thank you for reviewing and adding comments. I appreciate you taking the time to do and leave the detailed information. I'll give the towel exercise a go.
I had a friend stop by today and sit for me. You can tell she wasn't particularly thrilled about it. Forget the pose, we were just working on lights. The octaox was on the right (raised a bit and moved more towards the center) a reflector was used on camera left, background light set to the lowest power, and the hair light was the same as before. We tried it with and without the two (hair and back lights) and decided to leave them in. Is the lighting still too flat? BTW, we're working on posing later this week.
That's up to you to decide for yourself: we all have our own preferences and taste. For my taste, yes, that's much too flat. The only place on her that has any real shadow modeling or texture is in her sweater, where the coarse knit forces it. But look at how much richer and more three-dimensional her sweater looks compared to her face or skin! Remember, shadows are your friend - without shadows we can't perceive dimension or shape. Don't eradicate the shadows, just make them work for you.
When the FRONT of the face is correctly exposed and there are no blown highlights or brighter distractions anywhere else the face will be a stronger center of interest in the sense of how contrast attracts the eye. That's also where the simple OEW on camera provides very valuable feedback. If you get the exposure on the face set correctly with the meter (confirmed with a test shot with target/towel) but see some other area in the viewfinder is clipping and blacking out then you'll know the pose or lights need to be adjusted.