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Recent business/corporate headshot session...

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Trevor Stevens

Trevor Stevens

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Just finished this job for Lexus of Portland here in Portland, OR and thought some of you might like to see how it was set up. The job consisted of shooting almost 50 employees over the span of three days. This was my first attempt at a portrait of this type and I think the results came out perfect!

I traveled to the dealership and set up my studio in their conference room where there was plenty of room, no windows and the overhead lights could be turned off to avoid any color imbalances.

Here is the setup shot...



Studio equipment:
  • An Impact background stand I purchased from B&Hphoto.com along with a roll of Thunder Gray seamless paper (4.5').
  • A stool borrowed from the service drive of the dealership.
  • Olympus E-510 and Zuiko 50-200mm @ 100mm mounted on tripod.
Lighting:
  • One Sunpak 433D @ 1/4 power mounted on a stand with a 45" shoot though umbrella, camera left, eye level to model.
  • One bounce card (sheet of white poster board), camera right, eye level to model to fill left side of face.
  • One Sunpak 433D @ 1/16 power w/ 1-stop gel and DIY grid, mounted on stand, behind model facing seamless, angled at 60 degrees.
  • Both flashes triggered with YongNuo CTR-301P wireless triggers.
And here are a few of the results...









--
Celerity Photography: http://www.celerityphoto.com/
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/stetr24vw/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Celerity-Photography/175164432528845
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These are great and giving your lighting setup is useful but I think you have another ingredient - you have your subjects beautifully relaxed which makes these photos excellent!
--
Don.

A Land Rover, a camera ... I'm happy!
 
deep7 said:
These are great and giving your lighting setup is useful but I think you have another ingredient - you have your subjects beautifully relaxed which makes these photos excellent!
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Very true... this is why I like landscapes... you don't need to deal with people! :D

You should be very happy with the final results, excellent shots and interesting to read about your flash setup.
 
rssarma said:
These are excellent! Very nice lighting and very nice colours as well. Thanks so much for sharing the lighting info.
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Thank you and not a problem!
deep7 said:
These are great and giving your lighting setup is useful but I think you have another ingredient - you have your subjects beautifully relaxed which makes these photos excellent!
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Trust me, these were four of the almost 50 people I shot. There were some folks that were not so easy to make comfortable, lol.
TedKurkowski said:
+1 These are excellent, Trevor.
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Thanks Ted!
blohum said:
deep7 wrote:

Very true... this is why I like landscapes... you don't need to deal with people! :D

You should be very happy with the final results, excellent shots and interesting to read about your flash setup.
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People are fun to work with. They make the job interesting for me. Thank you for your comment!
--
Celerity Photography: http://www.celerityphoto.com/
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/stetr24vw/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Celerity-Photography/175164432528845
Twitter: http://twitter.com/Celerityphoto
 
Brad Ross said:
You included that first shot of the set up and how you did it. Makes your post very instructive for someone like me who has never attempts such as task,, thanks
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Not a problem Brad! I encourage everyone to try this setup if you have the equipment!
--
Celerity Photography: http://www.celerityphoto.com/
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/stetr24vw/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Celerity-Photography/175164432528845
Twitter: http://twitter.com/Celerityphoto
 
Those are excellent photos...thanks for sharing how you did it also.
 
Very interesting indeed. So you would suggest using a reflector for fill and the second flash on the background if you only have two strobes? I've been asked to do some headshots for a friends Chiro practice, I have Metz 58 & Fl36, a 3in1 reflector and have ordered two stands with brollys, but don't have a background. I figured I would just have to find a suitable wall for bg, or black the bg out with a fast shutter.
--

You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.
R. Buckminster Fuller
 
Digirame said:
Those are excellent photos...thanks for sharing how you did it also.
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Thank you so much!
Kurt Petersen said:
Very interesting indeed. So you would suggest using a reflector for fill and the second flash on the background if you only have two strobes?
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Digirame said:
I've been asked to do some headshots for a friends Chiro practice, I have Metz 58 & Fl36, a 3in1 reflector and have ordered two stands with brollys, but don't have a background. I figured I would just have to find a suitable wall for bg, or black the bg out with a fast shutter.
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Exactly! If you only have two lights at your disposal, this is a great setup. You could also use the second light as a hair light if you have suitable light for your BG. In your case, I would use the Metz for my main light and shoot it through the umbrella, use the reflector for fill on the opposite side of the face and use the FL-36 for background or hair light. When it comes to lighting, I believe less CAN be more...

Any solid surface or even a textured surface such as a wall of vines or bricks make great backgrounds. You don't want to pick a background too loud, or your model will not stand out. You need to find out what your client wants out of the shot and find a suitable background to help bring that vision to life.
--
Celerity Photography: http://www.celerityphoto.com/
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/stetr24vw/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Celerity-Photography/175164432528845
Twitter: http://twitter.com/Celerityphoto
 
Very nice job you did on these. The background is lit very well and the main and fill ratio is very pleasing. I also have gone to a very simple lighting set up for all of my corporate head shots. I use one 375 WS Photogenic bounced into a white 40" umbrella for my main light, and a Westcott reflector for fill using about a 3:1 ratio. I use a Botero collapsable 5X7 background lit with a 150 WS Studio Pro strobe w/barndoor-grid attached.

You may want to check with B&H regarding the Botero collapsable backgrounds -- they offer a variety of two sided 5X7 ft. backgrounds that collapse into about a 24" circle with fabric carrying pouch -- they are very reasonably priced. I simply clamp mine to a light stand. Below are two different portraits done using the two sides of my background which has a medium gray cloudy side, and a darker flat charcoal color on the other side. In the first shot I used a blue gel on the cloudy side.

Once again, I like what you have shown here -- I'm sure your client was very pleased!

God Bless,
Greg
http://www.imagismphotos.com
http://www.mccroskery.zenfolio.com
http://www.pbase.com/daddyo



 
showing your set up. I think the lighting is excellent in your sample shots and as someone already mentioned, you seem to put your clients as ease, they look so natural with the smiles.

I'm not an expert, ha far from it, but I have only one suggestion, coming from a female. I love the shots, as I said, but if it were me I would like my personal photo, if you took it, to be a little softer on the skin. Nice bright details just like you have them, for the eyes and brows and hair and all...except the skin.

I would be glad to show you what I mean. It is ever so slight but oh so forgiving!

I haven't figured out any way to batch do it, so if it were 50 women, it would take about 1 or 2 minutes each shot, or 50=1.5 hours of work.

--
S.Haden
http://www.pbase.com/shaden008

 
Very nice setup and the results look perfect, I can file this away if the occasion should ever arise, a job well done. I had recently watched some videos at Oly's site using a similar set up on some macro shots and how to give some depth to your subject all done dual wireless flash. I'll have to say the addition of the umbrella and bounce card did a great job for a nice portrait without any harsh lighting ,spot on WB, and good detail to the face without being over done.
--
And now for something totally different
Tim
 
You could probably just select all the female photos and add an extra notch or two of noise reduction in Lightroom. It works very well on freckles/sun spots, pores etc... I find that is always welcomed by anyone (male or female) over 30 :)
 
Another way in LR is to take the clarity slider down to around -30 or so....soften things up. Nik also has a nice soft portrait filter in their Color/efex package.

Hey Shirley!!!!!! An E-5, girl you are hitting the big time, I'm happy for you.....say hi to Marv.

Bill

--
Bill Wallace

http://bwallace.zenfolio.com/

"I'd rather laugh with the Sinners than cry with the Saints"
 
Thanks for the comments folks! I had brought up the subject of softening the skin for most people, but most of them denied! They love the natural look to these photos and they love the fact that I didn't mess with them. They are a very down to earth group and are proud of themselves, which I'm sure won't happen often with clients...

The previous photographer who shot their portraits went a little too far with the processing, so I think they wanted a little more realism this round.

Normally, I would have just softened up the face with the clarity slider in LR3, like mentioned above. It still allows for detail, but softens the face to draw less attention from wrinkles and blemishes. I also like to touch up "bags" under peoples eyes in PS if they are bad enough or dark.
--
Celerity Photography: http://www.celerityphoto.com/
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/stetr24vw/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Celerity-Photography/175164432528845
Twitter: http://twitter.com/Celerityphoto
 
CollBaxter said:
I was supprised not to see a E-3/5 but the mavric E-510 and a 50-200 . Very nice and thanks for the tips.
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Yeah, my trusty 510 will be with my for a long time. I've actually got a backup 510 with only 4k on the shutter, so they will be my work horses for many years. The E-5 will come soon, but that will be used mostly for personal use and for those BIG paying jobs...

--
Celerity Photography: http://www.celerityphoto.com/
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/stetr24vw/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Celerity-Photography/175164432528845
Twitter: http://twitter.com/Celerityphoto
 
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