Hairlight fashion photography question?

Mooder Man · Aug 16, 2015

Hi all,

I am somewhat happy with the picture but it is missing backlighting which I tried but failed. My wife also looks like she doesn't want the picture taken but this is not the case. It was between shots and she did not know the pic was coming, however it is the only clean shot I got out of the shoot.

The front Einstein e640 was shot through a 60" softlighter.

The 45 degree side angle e640 light was through a 22" Mola.

I tried shooting from behind with the Mola but it was whiting out my image.

What is the trick? A hairlight softbox? Should it be real high? What angle?

Is it the special highlight flat looking softball needed?

I only have highlight pics with natural sun light.

I can't seem to get it right.

Thanks in advance.

Mike

Paul P K · Aug 22, 2015

Mooder Man said:
Hi all,

I am somewhat happy with the picture but it is missing backlighting which I tried but failed. My wife also looks like she doesn't want the picture taken but this is not the case. It was between shots and she did not know the pic was coming, however it is the only clean shot I got out of the shoot.

The front Einstein e640 was shot through a 60" softlighter.

The 45 degree side angle e640 light was through a 22" Mola.

I tried shooting from behind with the Mola but it was whiting out my image.

What is the trick? A hairlight softbox? Should it be real high? What angle?

Is it the special highlight flat looking softball needed?

I only have highlight pics with natural sun light.

I can't seem to get it right.

Thanks in advance.

Mike

In my experience, and looking at the specs of the Mola, you woud have used the wrong type of lightmodifier for the effect (highlight on the hair) you're after with the Mola.

Your Mola basically has the same character of spreading the light as your softbox, even if somewhat harder, i.e. speading the light over a wide area (which as you found out will risk to whiten out your picture). So using a softbox would not give you the desired effect either, even when used with a grid (OK, maybe not with additional barndoors on top of that to block part of the light , but that would make quite a voluminous contraption to lug around with or quickly set up, especicially since it's not even intended as the main light)

In my experience using a modifier that would have focused your 'hair effect' light more would have been more effective, since then only a small part (ideally only the back of her hair - maybe even only partially ) would/should have been whitened out (which BTW is what an effect light will do anyway, if underexposed compared to the mainlight it will risk not getting noticed)

The quick and dirty way is to put a 'bare' light behind the model to give it a rim of light, but then it will also risk/give the same effect on the rest of the figure of the model. Using barndoors will help counter that, but still gives a less controlled result.

Better put a snoot on it, possibly with an additional honeycomb grid (cheaper and more flexible then a dedicated spot), in a (in my experience best) slightly higher position then the head of the model and somewhat aside of it (so it will not only outline the hair, but also a small part of the hair on top/side).Of course using such a focused light will limit the freedom of your model to move arond, but then again nothing comes for free.

Putting the light too low directly behind the model will create a halo, nice if you want to shoot a picture of a saint, but not the best choice for portraiting of a mere mortal.

Works out like this (even if in this case it was exaggerated for dramatic effect) http://www.pbase.com/paul_k/image/159077491 , or otherwise look at the pictures of the classic Hollywood photographers of the 1920's and 30's like Hurrell, Sinclair Bull or Willinger

HTH

--
all in a day's work

Galleries by Paul K

www.pbase.com

tony field · Aug 22, 2015

Mooder Man said:
Hi all,

I am somewhat happy with the picture but it is missing backlighting which I tried but failed. My wife also looks like she doesn't want the picture taken but this is not the case. It was between shots and she did not know the pic was coming, however it is the only clean shot I got out of the shoot.

The front Einstein e640 was shot through a 60" softlighter.

The 45 degree side angle e640 light was through a 22" Mola.

I tried shooting from behind with the Mola but it was whiting out my image.

What is the trick? A hairlight softbox? Should it be real high? What angle?

Is it the special highlight flat looking softball needed?

I only have highlight pics with natural sun light.

I can't seem to get it right.

Thanks in advance.

Mike

Hair light is always a problem. I find it difficult to do a good hair lighting with dark hair ladies. Is is also a matter of how you want the hair light to affect the entire picture. I think the Mola is not the right thing to use ... I did try the AB Beauty Dish for this ... the resulting hair light was too soft ... since the light source is too broad.

With your equipment, I would suggest that you use a simple reflector for the einsteins and also get a set of grids that fit into the reflector. The narrow grids can "focus" the light to the portion of the head that you want. The objective is to get hair highlights. Dark hair can be enhances with local adjustments ... with USM or with add-on packages such as Google NIK (Vivesa) software to improve the local apparent structure and detail.

The hair light should be generally "high" and at least 45 to 70 degrees above the model and usually behind the model.

My "normal" setup for hair is to use an Einstein at about a 45 degree angle about 3m away from the subject and about 1/2 m behind her. I usually do not use a grid ... but if I do, it is 5 or 10 degrees depending on how tight I want the light to be. You can guess at the arrangement from this image:

For dark hair women, more lighting balance care is needed:

--
tony
http://www.tphoto.ca

Mooder Man · Aug 30, 2015

Paul P K said:
Mooder Man said:

Hi all,

I am somewhat happy with the picture but it is missing backlighting which I tried but failed. My wife also looks like she doesn't want the picture taken but this is not the case. It was between shots and she did not know the pic was coming, however it is the only clean shot I got out of the shoot.

The front Einstein e640 was shot through a 60" softlighter.

The 45 degree side angle e640 light was through a 22" Mola.

I tried shooting from behind with the Mola but it was whiting out my image.

What is the trick? A hairlight softbox? Should it be real high? What angle?

Is it the special highlight flat looking softball needed?

I only have highlight pics with natural sun light.

I can't seem to get it right.

Thanks in advance.

Mike

Click to expand...

In my experience, and looking at the specs of the Mola, you woud have used the wrong type of lightmodifier for the effect (highlight on the hair) you're after with the Mola.

Your Mola basically has the same character of spreading the light as your softbox, even if somewhat harder, i.e. speading the light over a wide area (which as you found out will risk to whiten out your picture). So using a softbox would not give you the desired effect either, even when used with a grid (OK, maybe not with additional barndoors on top of that to block part of the light , but that would make quite a voluminous contraption to lug around with or quickly set up, especicially since it's not even intended as the main light)

In my experience using a modifier that would have focused your 'hair effect' light more would have been more effective, since then only a small part (ideally only the back of her hair - maybe even only partially ) would/should have been whitened out (which BTW is what an effect light will do anyway, if underexposed compared to the mainlight it will risk not getting noticed)

The quick and dirty way is to put a 'bare' light behind the model to give it a rim of light, but then it will also risk/give the same effect on the rest of the figure of the model. Using barndoors will help counter that, but still gives a less controlled result.

Better put a snoot on it, possibly with an additional honeycomb grid (cheaper and more flexible then a dedicated spot), in a (in my experience best) slightly higher position then the head of the model and somewhat aside of it (so it will not only outline the hair, but also a small part of the hair on top/side).Of course using such a focused light will limit the freedom of your model to move arond, but then again nothing comes for free.

Putting the light too low directly behind the model will create a halo, nice if you want to shoot a picture of a saint, but not the best choice for portraiting of a mere mortal.

Works out like this (even if in this case it was exaggerated for dramatic effect) http://www.pbase.com/paul_k/image/159077491 , or otherwise look at the pictures of the classic Hollywood photographers of the 1920's and 30's like Hurrell, Sinclair Bull or Willinger

HTH

--
all in a day's work
http://www.pbase.com/paul_k/

Thanks Paul. I bought a narrow rectangular strip softbox with a grid after watching some youTube videos. I will have to go with this for now and see how it works.

Mooder Man · Aug 30, 2015

Tony,

I like your work. It sounds like I already had the gear that was needed. It took a while for responses so I went out and bought a strip hair light with a grid.

I can see how dark hair needs requires more attention when lighting.

Thanks for the set up help.

Mike

lumigraphics · Aug 30, 2015

You can rim light with a focused light from behind or the side, or if there is something white above her, bounce a flash off the overhead for nice hairlight.

Or just use a light-colored background.

tony field · Aug 31, 2015

Mooder Man said:
Tony,

I like your work. It sounds like I already had the gear that was needed. It took a while for responses so I went out and bought a strip hair light with a grid.

Working with a variety of light sources is always a plus. You might be surprised that your strip hair light (depending on how long is is) might even be a useful thing as a main light.

I often shoot with a 1x5 foot strip box as my main light ... it adds a nice character to the image.

Lately I am playing with a single 3 foot octabox. working with a single light really makes you so careful about the pose, shadows, light hight/angle etc. Very entertaining ...

Mooder Man · Sep 3, 2015

A strip box as a main light sounds interesting, and never thought of it.

Thanks.

Mooder Man · Sep 3, 2015

Great tip, thanks.

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