9 tips for natural light portraits in studio 2
This is a shoot with Adelaide model Marie Dimopolous (represented by RMT Management) done entirely with natural light in our studio 2 space. Luckily it was a sunny day (this definitely helps), but it was late Autumn and pretty cold in the studio. Make sure that when planning your shoot in the cooler months you have a hot water bottle for your subject, and that you dress warmly! We recommend closing the carpark gates when shooting with the roller door up too, so that if you are standing outside the studio you are safe from anyone wanting to park in the carpark. We just opened up the door like a valet service when people arrived :)
We have provided some behind-the-scenes (BTS) shots to help you consider where to position your subject in the space. These shots were all done using fast telephoto lenses - mainly a Sigma Art 135mm f1.8 lens shot at f2 for the most part. The resulting shallow depth of field is appealing to soften the background and highlight the eyes of the subject. Take care when turning the model to the side (as in shots 1 & 2 ) to avoid having the far eye too out of focus (unless you want that look).
This first set were done with white backgrounds using the besser brick wall (behind the black vinyl backdrop) for the first two, and the main white wall at the back of the space for the third one. You can see the setups in the BTS shots below the reference images.
Style #1
- Backlit using the top window
- Roller door open
- No reflector
- Morning light
Style #2
- Backlit using the top window
- Roller door open
- White reflector
- Morning light
Style #3
- frontlit using roller door
- Top window open
- White reflector
- Morning light
Here we have changed up the background using the black vinyl backdrop (permanently set up in studio 2). This backdrop sets you up for side-lit portraits, but you can see below that you can still manage the lighting ratio on the face by using reflectors. The third shot below replaces the black backdrop with one of our textured canvas backdrops (available for hire), at the same position (but a little outside the studio). Have a look at the BTS shots to see where the subject was positioned in relation to the backdrop and the roller door.
- Side-lit using the roller door
- Roller door open
- No reflector
- Black vinyl background
- Side-lit using the roller door
- Roller door open
- White reflector
- Black vinyl background
- Side-lit using the roller door
- Roller door open
- No reflector
- Cocoa canvas background
The last set here extend and play with the previous setups, as you will see below. For shot #8 we have used a paper background (instead of the plain white wall in shot #3) - note that we have a large number of colours available, so you can experiment using complementary or analogous colours depending on what your subject is wearing.
PLEASE NOTE: if you are unfamiliar with how to set up paper background rolls you will need to watch our video about how to do that safely and effectively. Please check our YouTube channel for this and more demo videos about using our studios.
- Side-lit using the roller door
- Roller door open
- White reflector
- Cocoa canvas background
- Front-lit using the roller door
- late morning / early afternoon
- No reflector
- Olive green paper background
- Front-lit using the roller door
- late morning / early afternoon
- No reflector
- Olive green paper background
Credits:
Model: Marie Dimopolous (RMT Management)
Photographer: Sam Oster (@silvertracer)
Documentation: David Xiberras
If you'd like to see these as a video, you can watch the long (3.5min) or short (around 1min) video on our YouTube Channel:
Watch the video/s showing this natural light studio shoot ::
3min 20s overview with video BTS content
54s summary