Portrait Photography Class at HACC

27 October 2008

I recently attended the Portrait Photography class at HACC Lancaster Campus taught by Darryl Nicholas. It only runs 1 night for 3.5 hours. I arrived to find a whole 2-light studio strobe setup with backdrop, etc and got pretty hopeful -- I wasn't expecting much lighting discussion. Unfortunately, I found that the lights were only there for the most basic setup discussions and otherwise for making a shopping list.

The group was sort of amateur, so I guess we couldn't get as specific as I had hoped, but I still found it weird that we had all the gear setup, and the instructor didn't even crank off one frame. The largest disappointment came toward the end of the class, when a classmate asked, "The holidays are coming, and we'll not have all this studio gear with us, so what can we do?" and the instructor answered, "Well, they're called snap shots."

At this point, I had to pipe up and mention that a nice, fast prime lens (50mm f/1.8) works nicely with available low light, and that you can do some nice things with small strobes. The instructor dismissed my strobist comment/question with a story about a photo shoot needing $20,000 worth of lights and then double that when a designer tried to make a change. It didn't leave the beginner with much to start. A simple discussion of using reflectors with ambient light could have benefited the class.

In the end, I was thankful for the little bit of non-lighting discussion we had, and for about 20 minutes, I furiously scratched down lots of notes:

There are spring-loaded caps that can be purchased to fit over 2x4s to be used to create somewhat portable posts for mounting lights.
People often view images in the same direction that they read, so in western civilizations, our eyes start in lower left and proceed to middle of a photo, so subject should look to frame left. Right to left processing is sometimes less comfortable. In movies, you see the good guys ride in from the left, and the bad guys ride in from the right. Japanese car commercials often have the car enter from the right, while American car commercials bring the cars into the frame from the left.
Consider the perspective on the face: showing both ears would accent the natural asymmetry of the face, so turn the head to show only one. Don't let the nose break the cheek outline, since the nose will look larger and again accents deformities.
Consider gender roles in the society: shoot 10-15 degrees down on women to make the subject appear more feminine, and shoot up at men to show more power.
Flat or low-ratio (1:1 or 1:2) light is safe and easy, especially for children. It produces soft shadows.
When varying the lighting ratios for more interesting looks, harder shadows look better for men. Beauty dishes from above look good on women. A beauty dish would accent the ears too much on men.
Consider moods in environmental photos. The sales guy can be shown happy, but the financial officer should be somber.
To avoid red-eye from flash, ensure that the distance between the center of the lens and the flash is greater than the focal length of the lens. Which is easy, because I never have the flash mounted anywhere near the lens.
Nikon Cafe is a useful resource. I'm finding interesting lens reviews and comparisons and discussions of photography locations.

Interestingly, I found out that this class was part of a series in the computer track. It started out with basics of digital and ends with post-processing and printing. My next class is approaching quickly and it's 2 nights and lives in the Photography track, so maybe this one will be packed with more creative potential.

Filed Under: Photography