Shooting from the hip
Take some time out to develop the technique of shooting very quickly. You’ll probably produce
some very blurred and even disastrous images, but fortunately mistakes aren’t as expensive
in the digital age as they were when Winogrand was working the New York streets.
Produce a set of eight images that demonstrate the life and vibrancy of city living. If you
don’t live anywhere near a city, choose a spot or a day when there’s a lot going on – the
busier the better. If you need to, re-read the safety advice in the Introduction to this course
guide.
Analyse and reflect on your final images in your learning log or blog:
• What makes the successful images work well?
• What difficulties did you experience?
• How do you feel about this type of work? Is it honest? Are your images a truthful
representation or did you edit the truth in some way, consciously or sub-consciously?
Outdoor Portraits
On a bright day photograph a person in the sunshine. Do this outdoors in three stages.
1. First, photograph them with your back to the sun. Write down the exposures and look at the issues involved in getting the person’s expression and pose right.
2. Next, photograph the person with their back to the sun. Write down the exposures. If you can, look at the highlights and the shadow readings given from the spot metering. If you can’t set spot metering then you can still get some indication of the difference in
brightness. Look to see if there’s burn-out – over-exposure of the hair or black shadow areas without any light at all. The contrast ratio will be very high – what do you think it is?
3. Take the photograph again but this time use a reflector. Write down the reading that you get from the face and the contrast level.
A reflector can be aluminum metal foil over a cardboard box. It can be a bed sheet, it can be a fancy professional item; it can be big (2m2) or small (30cm diameter), square or round – it makes no difference. What does make a difference is the quality of the light coming off it.
To prove this, repeat the third shot with silver (kitchen foil on a board) and then white and note the difference. Put your reflective material on a stand or get someone to hold it for you. In practice, of course, you can use reflectors that already exist – a white wall, for example. Keep your eyes open for possible surfaces.
- Analyse the differences between the images you’ve made in relation to the exposure you’ve used. Write up your findings with images in your learning log or blog.
- How much difference has the reflector made?
- Is there evidence of hard or soft light in this exercise?
Hollywood-style
What you do for this exercise will depend on whether you have access to a full set of studio lights and a studio to use them in. If you haven’t, don’t worry – go straight to Part B.
Part A: If you have lights
You’re going to create your own version of Hurrell’s Bogart image. Choose someone who might fit the bill, borrow some props (or look in a charity shop), then take a good look at the Humphrey Bogart image and the lighting diagram again.
Set up the lighting as shown in the diagram. You need a good distance to the background, perhaps about 3m. It should be Black. It is Black when it meters up 5 stops below the face reading for the exposure and not before; at 4 stops, it’s dark grey, at 2 stops it’s light grey.
Remember you need plenty of space to avoid light bouncing about where it shouldn’t be.
For your next project you’ll move forward 20 or 30 years to look at the photographic portrait of the 60s, exemplified by the work of David Bailey.
The light at the back is quite high, coming down on the sitter and washing over the shoulders. Note the shadow on top of the hat front side and the highlight along the top edge and also the light falling over the shoulder in front. All this tells you that the light’s quite high, probably 1m above the sitter. The fill dish indicated is a beauty dish with diffuser. It is straight on here as a fill light.
Look at the shadow on the collar – that’s what you’re looking to reproduce. The black board indicated is to stop light going directly into the camera lens as this will cause flare and degrade the image. The light front left has a grille on it to stop the light straying around; it puts more light on the front rear shoulder and the left side of the hat image.
You may need to place a little white card at the opening to bounce the light down a little.
The light should be above head height. You’ll need a small table lamp with a soft light as the fill light and, if possible, a small off-camera flash gun to provide the left-hand light. This puts more light on the front rear shoulder and the coat area.
Part B: Without lights
There are plenty of Hollywood images to choose from. Pick one that you enjoy and can re-create using window light and a small amount of bounced flash. You’ll need a suitable model, preferably someone who is prepared to enter into the spirit of the task!
The first thing to do is analyse the lighting. Where is it coming from? Look for the deepest shadows for the main light. Then make your own lighting diagram and produce a Hollywoodstyle set of portrait images.
Produce three images in black and white – 10×12” or A4 at 320 dpi.