Lessons
Lesson Info
Analyze Your Environment
New density filters or your friend if you're trying to shoot things on location you're trying to get as much bowlers possible without moving that light if you don't have a lot of room analyzing your environment look at things like the centers like I said it's a grid I'm looking at things in a perspective of what fits where and where what goes where and that's important it's situational analysis and ergonomics that's really what we're looking at that's really what this is called eleven point three feet from one corner to the next if I would have put a background in the top right hand corner for example say it's a three feet wide a three foot wide background mathematically from one point to here I won't be able to fit a three foot background that tiny corner I need to put it probably about here writes if I wouldn't if I were to do the math it actually shorter space that I would eight feet this way so if I was going to put a background inside my image I need to put it on the wall maybe ha...
ng it up maybe drape it may be having on lights that was just a light stands background stands that are auto polls like the man photo auto polls into the corners just try to push that back a cz much as possible because you remember your relative distance to your subject is important but if you're using a lens and you're focused, distance say, is more than three feet and you're moving back and forth, you know, drive yourself nuts have my camera, I give myself a lot, I'm six foot peter pearly says I'm not six with three, but I'm going to go out and say I'm six foot three because he says, he's six foot one and I called lies. I'm six foot three, I give myself a lot of room in a space always do if I would. We talked about the viewing angle before of my viewing angle. I put this forty five degrees, I can photograph that subject in there from using the appropriate lens. I'm I'm thinking about this in perspective if I have ten feet above may finally have eight feet above me, I need to really take that light moving into a tiny corner of that that well, I wanted to get rembrandt like if that's what I'm trying to capture, but ultimately I can photograph my subject in that small room and have extra distance between my subject and use a longer focal length. I can shoot rembert light on my subject this way as well, but we talked about if you're not trying to get a great nation on the background you want make sure to use the flag you want to make sure you use a grid something in order to stop yourself from photographing that background if you're not trying to get it in focus and again if you're skeptical about photographing things in corners these are all shot in corners this and these are shot in corners little corners of rooms now the differences that's obviously naturally I say obviously you guys like I mean obviously it's not if you don't look at the settings catch lights I could only see the catch light in the eye and figure out how that was left we'll go back and show you guys exactly from talking about so these two images are taken in a b flat much so much of that very short distance for my subject if you look at my settings they're amusing the samson any x one which is a crop sensor camera one point five times and I'm currently at thirty two millimeters so it's approximately about fifty millimeters is on a full from camera that's how close I am to my subject is not much of a distance between us two all right, same thing cannon five d mark three this signal thirty five one four shot it to two so I'm very close to my subject it's a thirty five I'm really close to his face I'm literally like here but I can still shoot in a small space that may not be good for every specific subject as you might have lens distortion but there are ways to correct that in post production those air ways that we can judge can I do this in camera or can I do it if by stepping back or can I do that in post production if you're doing in a post reduction, the easiest way that I do is in light room and just correcting for linz distortion within the menu itself how my removing the line in the background I have two options I can use a shallow that the field like we did before okay? I can move my angle of you I can move around different parameters and photograph the subject where the line isn't literally here it's behind his head can use of those elements so needs to images the corner go back the corners literally behind their heads I don't have to be touched that way I don't have to sit there and like click because if you use of e flat for example and there's a lot of holes like there are in our studio is most knowing thing to go through to retouch all those little white holes in black background is many hours spent doing that is behind our subjects same thing I'm using that thirty five making sure that high that seem right behind her subjects and this is our setup I'm using diffused north facing window light if you guys are in your house and you don't think I can afford a soft box that can't afford anything and you're shooting in a very, very small space and you happen to have a north facing window assuming that you live not in new york city, you know have a brick wall right behind that might be a good idea for you to be ableto take a b flat or take tio, make a diffusion between the window and your subject and put them in a little tiny corner see what it does now not only zeevi flat acting is my background, but v flats when they're black absorb light and I'm also carving out my subjects features with the same defla I can go ahead and create more dramatic effects on his cheekbones and drawing this is a shooting space that we have in new york city two huge spaces, twelve hundred square feet I won the shooting here like seventy five percent of that in that little tiny corner as big as this studio us, I don't need that large former space, but I know when I have commercial clients I needed you know that that's the type of space that I need but I literally move everything that is a mess, whoever they need, they need to clean that up I could move away the furniture and kind of just put myself in that little corner and that giant window that's their access, my giant soft box so if you're not pictured yourself like houdini and you're not in a little tiny cube like a literal black black up cube and your happened to be in a small little room that house in north facing window that can act strictly as your life, you don't need to add strobes or speed lights that could be the sole purpose of what you're trying to photograph, so that can save you money as well. Those little things that I consider other things I've done this as I'm going to give you an idea of how this photograph is. The front of that couch to the wall is approximately twelve feet, so the giant space that, uh, that desk there is huge it's like this big. So where the desk is there, on the left side to the wall there that's the little tiny area that I work in a very, very small space, right? But if I wanted to create this same light, aiken potentially remember the sixteen box grid. I can put a large form of light source behind that, given the right focus or sorry, the right angle of view, given the right lens and still create something similar
Ratings and Reviews
Bill Bistak
I'm not sure why so many rip on this class. This is exactly what I needed to know (after I pulled my head out of my rear about wanting highly technical explanations). I do have an unusually small studio and really listening to him taught me loads of goodness, which I immediately applied and earned several awards by doing so. Thank you! Although a very calm video (which I also appreciated), it paved the way for deeper understanding of small locations and how to use them for great portraits.
Amber Tolbert
I was at a shoot the other day, lugging in so much equipment, and found myself crawling on tables to get the shot I needed. Jeff's course shows exactly what you really need for effective and impressive portraits in small areas, a huge help and my next shoot will be much more efficient and powerful.
a Creativelive Student
He had some good ideas like using corners, light modifiers that emit focused/directional light, and dealing with color casts. Showed some excellent fashion portraits shot in really small spaces. Wish he had gone more into shooting in a room with average ceiling height.