The context of that shot, as explained in the thread you linked, try to illustrate that if you use soft skylight effectively you don\'t need huge modifiers by showing what two direct flashes could produce with the type of shooting I typically do with speed lights. It not an attempt at an optimally rendered portrait session nor should it be judged as such.
Putting a subject\'s back to sun and using two flashes in front in an overlapping key over even fill configuration as in that shot is what I\'ve found to be the most effective way to deal with the fact the scene range exceeds my camera sensor range by 2-3 stops. If you know a better one, please post examples.
As for how the lighting winds up on the face, that\'s a matter of flash ratio and FEC setting when using ETTL mode with two flashes. Had I chosen to I could have used a lower A:B ratio just as indoors. In retrospect I probably should have, but as I said the session literally took about 5 min, and 10 min later I posted them in the original thread.
My criteria for exposure for that shot was simply to keep the sunlit hair and patch on the shoulder on the right 1/3 stop below clipping in camera. and then exposed the front side for a \"seen by eye\" perceptual match. I did not alter the results out of camera in this test shot because I wanted it to show, without post processing, what the two direct flashes produced. So that isn\'t typical of my complete workflow, which is explained in my tutorials if you care to look.
Again understand that while I do not shoot to any numeric values other that keeping non-specular highlights below 255 clipping and shadows with detail I can see above 0. But if you were to measure the end point patches on the MacBeth card as I just did in the JPG you will find they read 231-233 in white and 44-47 in black. That is slightly under the target values of 243 and 52 respectively for that MacBeth chart (per the accompanying documentation) but on that camera sensor range 40 units = 1 f/stop so that\'s less that 1/3 stop from optimal.
Stop and consider that if the flash in front was raised to the point it was an exact match to the sunny backlight there would appear to be any backlight so a slightly underexposed appearance is normal. The more background context is seen the more normal the slightly darker face seems, it is after all a face in the shade of the sun, not a face in sunlight as your edit renders it. That what I mean when I say \"perceptual\" balance.
When you look at a face in direct sun vs. one in shade do they look identical? Not when I look at them. I perceive the sunny side with detail, and the shaded side of the same arm a slightly darker tone of the same skin. There is a only rule of thumb/conventional wisdom that \"fill flash\" should be about 1-stop below sun in a backlit situation like that. I don\'t say that, but others do. What is \"1-stop\" darker is the highlights on the \"shaded\" side, vs the sunny back side to make the flash shot look similar to how your eye will adapt in person.
As for what you did with that similar to what I illustrated earlier in the shot of the guy holding the towel with the middle slider in Levels moved left from 1.0 to 1.2 to lighten the mid-tones without affecting the end points.
Out of camera - exposure based on not clipping non-specular highlights...
Levels tweek...
I did exactly the same thing routinely almost 40 years ago when making halftones. If you make a halftone look exactly like the photo at the proof stage it will wind up too dark in the magazine due to dot gain on press. So to make print and magazine match we had to make the halftone lighter than normal.
In the example you posted the highlights are clipping, what I try to avoid. You will see this if you hold down the Alt key and click on the highlight slider in levels — there is clipping in the red channel in your edit.
My typical post processing workflow is covered in tutorials on my site if you care to look. I prefer selective vs global slider adjustment. I have an action which creates screen, multiply and soft light adjustment layers. Screen and Multiply have the same net effect in CS5 as dodge and burn. Soft light, when applied, allows select tweeking of contrast, around eyes and mouth for example.
To be fair here critics, I can\'t recall every seen any of any of your photographs, so please point me to a collection of your photos since 2005 and let me pick one out of context to criticize with the same level of scrutiny you are here.
Jan 25, 2012 at 07:00 PM
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