Time of day makes a big difference. Later in the day or early morning is much better. You'll find the light to be softer and the color saturation to be much nicer. But, if you want to shoot at high noon... that is fine as well. Open shade as suggested helps. Having someone hold a diffusion panel would make a huge difference. I use a 4x6 panel for location work. With a single subject and she is small, a 5-n-1 reflector/diffusion panel would be fine as well.
Sometimes you can't wait until later in the day. Every year I shoot a bunch of high school cheerleaders after school (the only time they can get together for the length of time required to shoot each one). For these waist-up photos, I have one of them hold a diffusion panel just out of frame on the sunny side, and fill with a Qflash fitted with a socked beauty dish. Works great, and handholding the diffusion panel enables us to deal with any wind that might otherwise topple a stand-mounted scrim.
Agree with Steve, but we shouldn't be afraid of working with sunlight. Granted, this isn't mid-day sun but it is still pretty intense about an hour before sunset and I lit this couple with one SB-910 speedlight on a stand.
I've shot mid-day portraits with my Einstein light and a parabolic umbrella. You can get a really gorgeous blue sky this way.
I think in your example the angle of sun is hitting behind them which can actually add to a picture. His example was sun on side of her face. With that said, I agree, does not mean you should avoid time of day unless you can control it. I also use einsteins and don't mind any time of day with it. Can pretty much walk into any situation and come out lookin pretty
I hit is with a softbox, a beauty dish, hell even a boring brolly..it's all about the appliction. First shot is a Softliter II from really, really close (I wanted to not interfere much with the ambient light)
bbourizk wrote:
Don't shoot at 2-3pm...shoot later in the day and have the sun behind your subject. If you have to shoot at those times try to find open shade.
