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Fashion Photography Lighting Biography
Photography lighting for catalogs is different than lighting for advertising or an editorial. You rarely get the chance to get creative because the objective is to make the clothes look good and show details in the fabric. Many fashion designers use some very nice fabrics and the designers goal is to sell their clothes to buyers of department stores and get them seen in magazines. Therefore the photographer doesn’t really have the freedom to use radical lighting ratios with dramatic shadows. So what kind of lighting is recommended for shooting catalogs ? Well I like very nice Rembrandt lighting. This is where you see the triangle of light under either the left or right eye. The reason I like to use Rembrandt lighting is because it isn’t flat and it isn’t too dramatic and shows the details of the clothes at the same time. Now for this shoot you can see I did a little variation of Rembrandt. It’s not a perfect typical triangle of light under the eye. You can see the shadow is more opened up so there is a little more light on the model’s face. I chose to do this variation because when I originally showed the designer the actual Rembrandt set up, she felt it was a little too shadowed. As you can see in the images that the model’s LEFT side is in a light shadow. Look at the tighter shot and you see her LEFT cheek looks sculpted and my variation of Rembrandt lighting.
Recently I had the opportunity to go to Nashville and shoot an up and coming country singer named Hannah Bethel. I got the call and was thrilled ! I LOVE Nashville ! The people are friendly and the state is just beautiful. I also love country music. Now I have been to Nashville several times but never in the middle of the summer. Well living in Southern California my whole life I’m used to heat , but dry heat. It was sooooo hot and humid in Nashville that I couldn’t keep the sweat out of my eyes while I was shooting lol.
So the next step to this project was talking to Hannah herself and throwing around ideas for her EP cover, back of the EP as well as press kit shots. Even though I had been to Nashville before, I still don’t know the surrounding areas and locations like I know the locations here. So that meant obtaining some location shots and having them emailed to me. Once we decided on the concepts Hannah had someone go out and just take some shots with a point and shoot. So I get the shots and the locations are beautiful. We got some nice green field locations, a really cool flowing stream, a straight long road lined with wild flowers etc. My imagination started over flowing with ideas. The only problem was that even though I knew what time of day the shots were taken, the shoot was still about a month away which means the location of the sun in relation to those photos was going to be different. But that’s ok, that is something you work out when it’s time for the shoot.
I also had to use my imagination to visualize where Hannah would be placed in the shot. This is where I want to stress how important it is that what makes a good photographer is not just his or her lighting skills but that they have that sixth sense of being able to “SEE” the shot before you shoot it. That cannot be taught. Having an inner eye is a God given talent and you better be able to tap into it if you are going to be successful. But I had no idea what time each different shot would be taken and where the sun would be at that specific time. It’s not like I could just call Hannah on the phone and say I’ll be right over to do some test shots so we can figure out how we want each shot to look. So that made this whole process a bit more difficult. But again, that’s ok because I knew I was flying into Nashville a few days early so I would use those days to go with Hannah and check out each location and note where the sun is, how the sun affected her, where the shadows would fall etc.
But before going out to Music City there was much to be done. Hannah sent me photos of the clothes her stylist got for her. I needed those photos so I could put the whole scene together in my mind and also make sure that the shots were designed around her music and her personality. How did I get to her personality ? I talked to her on the phone alot of course, looked at her Facebook page that had just regular photos of her in her daily life and I spoke with her manager. I also listened to some rough cuts of the songs.
So now I arrive in Nashville and am slapped in the face with hot, sticky air lol. We started our location scouting and to my shock the locations in the photos that WERE nice and plush with green were now brown and dried out. The beautiful flowing stream was pretty much dried up and the wildflowers were pretty much non existent. Alllll the planning of the shots, all my ideas and excitement went right out the window. Well as you can imagine I was just lovin the situation at this point lol. So I did what a photographer can only do in that situation. I changed gears and scouted more. I planned my ideas based on other locations that I liked better that even though were dried out, they had other characteristics that I could use. For instance, an old abandoned barn, a long dirt road, etc. I just changed the whole theme of the shoot and adapted as best I could.
Let’s move on….. I went to each location at different times of the day over the course of a couple days. Now we get to the shoot day. Living in Los Angeles the weather never changes in the summer. It’s just hot with no clouds. Well as I was about to experience, Tennessee is not at all like that.
Big puffy white clouds roll by covering the sun every 5, 10, 15 min etc. So I set up my first shot while Hannah was in make up and hair, the one with Hannah standing in the middle of the dirt road and everything looks great. Hannah comes out of make up, I inspect every detail on her face making sure all the lines are clean and eyelashes don’t have any dried clumps of mascara ( my BIGGEST pet peeve) and tell everyone it’s time to shoot !
As I am shooting sweat is pouring down my face as I wipe it away every couple of minutes. I’m drinking water like crazy. Now the clouds begin to do their thing and cover the sun almost as if they are playing a trick on me. Covering the sun, I wait for them to roll by. They roll by I get off one frame and here they come again. This went back and forth and I just had to succumb to the fact that the clouds ruled in this part of the country lol. So eventually I made it through that shot. I got some great images.
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting Biography
Photography lighting for catalogs is different than lighting for advertising or an editorial. You rarely get the chance to get creative because the objective is to make the clothes look good and show details in the fabric. Many fashion designers use some very nice fabrics and the designers goal is to sell their clothes to buyers of department stores and get them seen in magazines. Therefore the photographer doesn’t really have the freedom to use radical lighting ratios with dramatic shadows. So what kind of lighting is recommended for shooting catalogs ? Well I like very nice Rembrandt lighting. This is where you see the triangle of light under either the left or right eye. The reason I like to use Rembrandt lighting is because it isn’t flat and it isn’t too dramatic and shows the details of the clothes at the same time. Now for this shoot you can see I did a little variation of Rembrandt. It’s not a perfect typical triangle of light under the eye. You can see the shadow is more opened up so there is a little more light on the model’s face. I chose to do this variation because when I originally showed the designer the actual Rembrandt set up, she felt it was a little too shadowed. As you can see in the images that the model’s LEFT side is in a light shadow. Look at the tighter shot and you see her LEFT cheek looks sculpted and my variation of Rembrandt lighting.
Recently I had the opportunity to go to Nashville and shoot an up and coming country singer named Hannah Bethel. I got the call and was thrilled ! I LOVE Nashville ! The people are friendly and the state is just beautiful. I also love country music. Now I have been to Nashville several times but never in the middle of the summer. Well living in Southern California my whole life I’m used to heat , but dry heat. It was sooooo hot and humid in Nashville that I couldn’t keep the sweat out of my eyes while I was shooting lol.
So the next step to this project was talking to Hannah herself and throwing around ideas for her EP cover, back of the EP as well as press kit shots. Even though I had been to Nashville before, I still don’t know the surrounding areas and locations like I know the locations here. So that meant obtaining some location shots and having them emailed to me. Once we decided on the concepts Hannah had someone go out and just take some shots with a point and shoot. So I get the shots and the locations are beautiful. We got some nice green field locations, a really cool flowing stream, a straight long road lined with wild flowers etc. My imagination started over flowing with ideas. The only problem was that even though I knew what time of day the shots were taken, the shoot was still about a month away which means the location of the sun in relation to those photos was going to be different. But that’s ok, that is something you work out when it’s time for the shoot.
I also had to use my imagination to visualize where Hannah would be placed in the shot. This is where I want to stress how important it is that what makes a good photographer is not just his or her lighting skills but that they have that sixth sense of being able to “SEE” the shot before you shoot it. That cannot be taught. Having an inner eye is a God given talent and you better be able to tap into it if you are going to be successful. But I had no idea what time each different shot would be taken and where the sun would be at that specific time. It’s not like I could just call Hannah on the phone and say I’ll be right over to do some test shots so we can figure out how we want each shot to look. So that made this whole process a bit more difficult. But again, that’s ok because I knew I was flying into Nashville a few days early so I would use those days to go with Hannah and check out each location and note where the sun is, how the sun affected her, where the shadows would fall etc.
But before going out to Music City there was much to be done. Hannah sent me photos of the clothes her stylist got for her. I needed those photos so I could put the whole scene together in my mind and also make sure that the shots were designed around her music and her personality. How did I get to her personality ? I talked to her on the phone alot of course, looked at her Facebook page that had just regular photos of her in her daily life and I spoke with her manager. I also listened to some rough cuts of the songs.
So now I arrive in Nashville and am slapped in the face with hot, sticky air lol. We started our location scouting and to my shock the locations in the photos that WERE nice and plush with green were now brown and dried out. The beautiful flowing stream was pretty much dried up and the wildflowers were pretty much non existent. Alllll the planning of the shots, all my ideas and excitement went right out the window. Well as you can imagine I was just lovin the situation at this point lol. So I did what a photographer can only do in that situation. I changed gears and scouted more. I planned my ideas based on other locations that I liked better that even though were dried out, they had other characteristics that I could use. For instance, an old abandoned barn, a long dirt road, etc. I just changed the whole theme of the shoot and adapted as best I could.
Let’s move on….. I went to each location at different times of the day over the course of a couple days. Now we get to the shoot day. Living in Los Angeles the weather never changes in the summer. It’s just hot with no clouds. Well as I was about to experience, Tennessee is not at all like that.
Big puffy white clouds roll by covering the sun every 5, 10, 15 min etc. So I set up my first shot while Hannah was in make up and hair, the one with Hannah standing in the middle of the dirt road and everything looks great. Hannah comes out of make up, I inspect every detail on her face making sure all the lines are clean and eyelashes don’t have any dried clumps of mascara ( my BIGGEST pet peeve) and tell everyone it’s time to shoot !
As I am shooting sweat is pouring down my face as I wipe it away every couple of minutes. I’m drinking water like crazy. Now the clouds begin to do their thing and cover the sun almost as if they are playing a trick on me. Covering the sun, I wait for them to roll by. They roll by I get off one frame and here they come again. This went back and forth and I just had to succumb to the fact that the clouds ruled in this part of the country lol. So eventually I made it through that shot. I got some great images.
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
Fashion Photography Lighting
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