I don’t have much extra space in my living room, so as I’ve become more involved with photography, I’ve had to made some decisions. I’m currently taking a Light and Photography class at the Arts Council of Princeton, and my goal for the next few months is to increase my experience dealing with light. On Sunday, I picked up some lighting equipment, and the only suitable location in my apartment for setting up the equipment is the dining room.
B&H Photo and Video is now richer, while some items formerly in their store now find their home in my apartment. I purchased inexpensive floodlights, a two-strobe kit (Bowens brand, 800 watt-seconds total, with umbrellas), three PocketWizards, and a backdrop set-up.
As part of assignments for the class, I spent some time experimenting with different placements of the floodlights and strobes. I’ve been using this as a chance to get used to using the equipment for the first time. I discovered that I don’t want to use the strobes at full power, particularly when the space I have available for the “studio” is about eight feet by eight feet.
I chose three photos from this first session to share. The set is on Flickr and I’m including the photos below, as well.
This first photo used a strobe located at about 7 o’clock, shot into an umbrella used as a reflector. I also used a handheld silver reflector just to camera right of Amy, the model. If I hadn’t mentioned, I’m also now using a Canon 1D Mark III, which I purchased used for a great price.
I did some post-processing on the photos, primarily to remove the typical circles under our eyes.
I used a remote to trigger the shutter for the following self portraits. The lighting included the strobe at 7 o’clock shot into an umbrella as a reflector. I didn’t put the backdrop in place before shooting these self portraits, so there’s a crease that normally wouldn’t be there.
Note: I need to shave, and I never claimed to be photogenic.
