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Lesson Info

Shooting for Color Grading: Simple but Dramatic Look

These are those $25 feathers that I showed you that you can get on Amazon. And they're actually it's really hard to see what their on its those spools of really inexpensive bendable wire. So that's what this is. And then there, tied and glued onto that wire so it can bend into any shape you want. So it's more being creative, not necessarily expensive. I am not super handy. So this was another thing that my friend Lori son put together for me. But also she makes me things that could travel easily because I can actually fold this in four and stuff it in my bag and works great. So have that wrapped around her head. And then this dress was $11 on Amazon. So we'll make it look fancy, even though a super cheap. OK, all right, so now I'm going to switch it up. We're gonna do a little bit more dramatic lighting, but everything has a purpose. So we made her eyes a little bit more dramatic. I want the make up to be a bit more dramatic, the outfits a little bit more dramatic, somebody a little bi...

t more dramatic with the lighting and maybe maybe more dramatic with opposing. The thing is, when I have really crazy headpieces sometimes like big dramatic poses, it's too much sometimes, like the creepy standing, staring at camera works. Great. So, I don't know, Maybe will make you creepy will think. Okay, so I'm going to bring you right out here and the other thing that I'm worrying about again, this would be height. So I can't bring her way up here because the big head piece should be cut off the background. So I'm gonna bring you a little bit more centered and right about there is when I need we have you faced straight on to me and your little feather thing is uneven to tell me if I hurt you. Okay? I don't want to. Okay. Some bluefin it out. All right. Cool. Good. Okay, great. So in this case, what? I'm gonna try first as I'm going to try a beauty dish. So I want to show you the two modifiers they use most often in portrait work. I use a large umbrella with diffusion when I just want nice, even light on. I use a beauty dish when I want a little bit more pop. A little bit of more contrast, a little bit more drama. It may or may not work, but we're going to start here, so I'm gonna show you straight off the bat what it looks like for this beauty dish. In case anyone wants to know This is the one size that pro photo makes it asked about sizes all the time. But somewhere around 20 inches is what you're looking for. And white, they haven't. And silver don't get silver. The only time silver ever works is like fitness and stuff. But you don't. You add that perpetual highlight on the forehead that you will never be able to get rid of. So white is going to be much easier. All right, so let's just take a test with this beauty dish. And, uh, unlike some of my other friends, I'm not gonna meet her. I'm just gonna take a picture. I tease Chris all the time. We have our metering battles, mitten, many battles. Okay. All right. Who? Okay, Cool. What's that? No, it was surprisingly okay. So it's looking dramatic. Um, but I got a couple issues going on one of the issues I have is she blends too much in with the background. So let's try that grid again. And so the grid, we'll see. I'm gonna work this out. Is there 20? Yes. Is it accessible? Okay. The reason I'm saying this is the 10 degree is really focused. And if the whole point is I want a little glow behind her. Her whole giant headpiece will totally cover it. So we're gonna switch to a 20 so it's a little bit wider. The next part of this is when I use grids. If they're really close to the background, like real close I Oh, you've seen me teach lighting. You've heard me say this. The bucket of water thing. If I throw the bucket of water real close, it only gets this much wet. But if I back up, the water spreads out. So if I need a little bit more spill a little bit more spread from that grid, I switched to 21st which gives me more coverage, spreads it out, and then I back it up if I need more. So it's back and forth. I asked I really want an all in one of thes put it out there into the photo universe. Give me one where I can dial it. OK, but anyway, are infinite. Who's listening to me, But just in case. OK, John. So can you back it up this way? Just a little bit. Yeah, Perfect. And try angling it up. We're gonna test and see where that separation is. All right, let's see. And a little bit to the right. Just a teeny bit. Okay, let's try this. When I actually shoot this, I shoot with, um, all the ambient light off, local shooting darker space. I can actually see what's going on. So there is my separation. Okay, give me a little bit more. Little bit more space. Um, OK, so far, so good. But I'm not not feel in the mood yet, so I'm gonna change a couple of things with my presets that I just want I just wanna I know I want this mysterious and cool, so I'm going to go into develop module, okay? And I'm going to cool it down a little and I'm going to de saturated a little bit and we'll talk about this later on a pop. My whites, little Ah, see porter skin tone a little bit, okay. And well, like I said, we'll go over this later, and I'm gonna make it even bluer. So, like, that's that's a little bit more. The one on the right is the warm or what I'm feeling going real mysterious. So I like it when you shoot a couple of frames of that and then switch it up before you move on. All right. Um, can I have you pull it down just a little bit more? Just a tiny bit. Good. That's good. Um, I want toe. So the reason I had to pull it down just a little bit more is I want to give a visual to make her look a little longer. If she had, like, a high scoop neck on, you're I just stops here. And so that's one of the tricks for photographing fuller figure women. When you want to make them look taller, you add, you can have V necks or longer necklaces. It's just something to pull the I up and down. So I'm looking for that when I'm styling as well. So it's Let's see. Okay, perfect. And I'm gonna put your hands on your side and pop up your elbows just a bit. So I'm trying to myself a little negative space, because right now I can't see anything. All right? Now I'm gonna have you turn your body to your right, and you can lecture arms. Good. And I'm gonna get a closer of shot and then just turn your head back towards me a little. Great. Good. Get rid of the dual screen. Okay, so see it getting the mood already? It looks good. Um, I don't mind negative space. Like it creates a little tension. So that's cool. We do one more head straight onto me. So shoulders to the right and then crank your head this way. Good. And I look at your eyes over this way a little bit. Looks nice and creepy. Good. And one more at me. Real strong eyes. Okay, so I like all those. But I would add one more thing into the mix. Okay, so the next thing I would add to the mix is done. County, Can I put the Joe on this one? Yeah. Okay. So last thing I would add to the mix before I switched my last set up is so if I know along the way that the whole thing I'm not warming this up like already know that it's not gonna be warm. Shot is not gonna be, like soft. It's gonna be mysterious and dark, so I sometimes add gels to set the mood. And so in the beginning, I said, You can change a lot of this with color grading, but sometimes I'll do it with light. So what I'm going to do is on the shadow side of her face, I'm gonna add some gels. And the other reason that I want to do that is I want to see a little bit more detail in the in the feathers. And so right now I'm missing a lot of the feathers. I do know that in my in my file, if I come in and I bring this up like the feather detail is there like it? I've got enough that I can bring it out later, which is part of what I could do in color grading. Um, but I would like to see a little bit more sparkle. Um, let's do blue. But I think I need the really, really blue one like, I think I need this one, but we'll see. So let me talk. I think I think any of this one going to pop this off. Um, okay, So the next thing that I know is when I used gels, gel show up in most in the shadows. That's how it works. Kind of like it's a dry area. And if you give it some some light, some water, it soaks it right up. So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna Joe her. And in the shadows is where it'll show up. So I know it will show up some places in the feathers and then also in that shadow side of her face. So what will work it out? Okay. And I doesn't need to have the umbrella. If it's easier, it doesn't really matter. We can totally like. All right, So Ah, one more thing is if I take a picture here and I don't see enough enough gels like, let's say I only see it a tiny bit. What I can do is I can take my main light to the side and the more shadows I create with my main light, the more. The gels will show up because basically my main lights blasting everything with light. There's no shadows. There's no dry spots to absorb the gels. Eso will try this. And so I'm gonna block you all for a minute. I'm gonna bring it over on this side if you will, John. Thank you. All right, let's test this. I have no idea. Power. I'm just going past it. I'm gonna guess you have to go to nine. But let's let's just try to tune your shoulders to the right again for me. Keep going good. And then had strong back to me. Good, good it and keep going a little more if you can. Great. Let's see. Okay. So notice watch with their shadows and then watch where the gel shows up. Like that's exactly how it works. You create shadows, and then the gel fills it in. So you're getting a lot of that toning already. So I like it. I think I'll shoot a couple more frames. Notice where the shadows were in the background. It so accept the blue as well. So this will need a little bit of toning and post, but not much. And I've already started to bring in some of that light in the, uh, in the feathers. I'm gonna bring it around front just a little bit. The reason is I'll get more reflection off the feathers because where she has turned from the side, I can't see it quite as much. All right, so I just need a couple more frames here. Crank your head towards me. Nice. Beautifully creepy. Alright. Beautiful. Just like that. Tuck your shoulder for just a little bit right there. Good. Beautiful. Perfect. And I'll try something without the front arm like this. Perfect. Just like that. Good. Good. And crank your head towards me a little more good. And I look down that way. That's beautifully creepy. It like it and eyes beckon me. All right. And last one, put one foot society face. Let's see or like, like little more. Yeah, like that. Little lower below your lips. Yeah, it's kind of like I don't know, we're going for creepy here. Creepy, right? What's the purpose of? The image is meant to be a little creepy. And so it we're going good. Head back towards me a little. A little more dark furrow your brow good. And then drop the hand for one more Good. You know, shoulder up and looking over your shoulder. Good. Yes. Hi. I've noticed that you were shooting it if 11 for the entire morning. Yes, I think. Do you ever switch it up a little bit during a shoot, or do you started of a standard? It's lovely question that I love to answer, because if you look at any of my photos online, ever let's say 97% of them were shot. I s 0 200 f 11 2/100 of a second, right? Little every time. The reason is this I shoot with high megapixel cameras for the most part. So this one is a 30.4 something megapixel camera shoot with a 50.65 DS. And, ah, if you miss your focus even the most tiny bit at 50 megapixels and I focused on the cheek instead of the I gone, it is gone. So it here Unless I'm trying to kick the background out of focus like if I'm trying to kick it out of focus and I will, Then I will do so and I'll shoot a wider aperture, but I usually don't, and I'm usually either on textured background that I intend to be textured or I'm on seamless, which you don't see the background anyway. So it's more of my insurance policy. But if I shoot equivalent exposures with wider apertures or narrower apertures, it all looks the same. Just are the years and focus and is a background in focus about it. Um, I think you have a question. I see that. Okay, how would this change if you've got multiple people like three or four people? Great questions for changing. For multiple people, it's super easy with the big umbrella Big umbrella. You can like multiple people. No problem. Usually the darker skin tone you do bring closer to the light because of the fall off of light. Then there will be a little bit brighter, and it's more just paying attention to. As people are further from the light, they start to get more shadow on their face, so it might be bringing the light around front more, more evenly, lights everyone. And if it's really close to the lake, I'd say there's three people, and it's real close here. This person will be much brighter, and they get darker and darker. So what you have to do is you have to pull the light away a little bit because that inverse square law basically no one's relatively closer. Everyone's about the same distance so darker, skin closer, a little bit further away and a little bit more to the front for multiple people. Yeah, I notice that you have agreed on the beauty dish. Yes, the city to control the spill or just do anything else in the terms off. How it actually looks. Great question. So there is a great on the beauty dish, so just like a great on the background, it focuses the light. The reason it's important in this particular one is when you're in a tight space, it prevents the light from hitting the background. So what it does is it makes the light get darker faster. If I take the beauty dish grid off, it reaches the background. It just kind of just kind of flattens it. So it's I used all the time in small spaces because then I can separate what lights my subject from what lights the background and beauty dishes you can't feather, really? Because when you change the angle of them, you get kind of a hard edge of light. So the grid makes it so if I need to get the background dark without feathering, I can. And once the greatest on you can feather cause it cuts those hot spots all of the above, I shoot the beauty dish more often with a grid than I do without unless I'm using a reflector, because if you add the great and the out of a reflector, the light doesn't reach the reflector.