Details |
ISO 400 … 200mm .. f/4 … 1/160 sec

Intent |
Fun, freestyle.

Comments |
This was in the afternoon during a break in our shoot when Klara was standing in the staircase. The way the light softly fell across her face was just perfect. “Don’t move.” I said. Once I got the camera and started shooting, it took a few frames to get her to fully relax and get this one.

Most of the time, it’s best to keep the sun behind you or off to the side. But sometimes, shooting right at it can work. In this image of Klara, it’s over her shoulder in the top right hand part of the frame. The sunlight hitting the glass of the lens directly created a soft milky cast over the whole image, which was my goal. It’s just an effect called lens flare and it’s what hoods are designed to control, but only for sun coming in at an angle. To address direct light lens flare, I could have just moved myself a few inches to the left, putting her between me and the sun, thereby creating a shadow for my lens. Shooting into the sun during the day is a great time to manually turn your flash on. You need it to fill in the dark shadows created by the bright sunlight. This is called fill-flash and I will discuss it more in another entry.

These are the other ways I processed the image from yesterday, in Lightroom.

1/500
f/4

The sun creates unbelievable, ever changing light and shadow all day long. The key is finding the right balance of the two elements in combination with which to create an image. In terms of lighting, this is nothing more than direct, winter afternoon sun, shining on Klara’s face. She’s in a large room that has 4 big windows passing a finely sliced block of direct sunlight. I asked her to lean forward into the sun till she could feel it on her face. I must say, that she was NOT in the mood for being photographed. She was complaining how she didn’t look good, didn’t feel good and just didn’t want the camera pointed at her. But she didn’t see what I saw and I convinced her to humor me. The warmth of the sun relaxed her and she let go for just a moment. I have about 25 images, all so different. But I really like this one. There are a few others I will share in the next few days, along with the other ways I chose to process this image in Lightroom.

1/40
f/2.8

Klara is from the Czech Republic, has a unique aura and is very comfortable in front of the camera. Her eyes are pale blue and incredibly striking set against her black hair. We’ve been working on a joint portfolio project for a little while now and it’s coming along fantastically. Here’s an image we made the other day that I think gives her bit of a 50’s movie star look.