A Recent Head Shot

A Recent Head Shot

by William Lulow

A week or so ago, I was asked to do a headshot for a young woman who was looking forward to graduating from college and getting into the workforce. She wanted something plain but very well executed. As with many of these assignments, I convinced her to hire one of my hair/makeup stylists to put some finishing touches on her total “look.” I have written before about how a stylist serves not only to make the subject look their best, but also involves them more in the process of photography itself. Most people think that a portrait is created by just having the subject stand still so that a proper image can me made. They don’t really think about what the lighting does, how really good lighting techniques make the skin look better and how hair and makeup styling really complete the look of the portrait or headshot. Headshots are supposed to show what the person looks like but in the best possible light. (Pun intended!)

I have written before about my technique for setting up these shots, but here is a diagram again, of how I start:

And, here are a couple of images of what it looks like live in my studio:

Notice, in this shot, how the light is contained within the umbrella and bounced back to the subject position. Same with the small softbox fill-in light. In the top image you can see that the accent lights are really just raw light without any diffusion or bounce to them at all. That’s one way of making sure that they are one f/stop brighter than the mainlight or fill-in. Bounced light has to travel from the flash tube to the umbrella and then back to the subject. The size of the mainlight is what keeps it soft. My umbrella is about five-and-a-half feet in diameter, way bigger than the normal human head. Here’s one of the results of this setup:

Notice how smooth the skin looks and how the face is surrounded with light. Because the fill-in light is smaller, it allows for just a hint of shadow on the right side of the face adding some depth to the subject. Here’s another example:

Here I was experimenting with just turning off one of the accent lights and letting the hair go darker on one side in order to set up a little more interest. But the face is still lit the same way.

The real secret to creating light like this is to surround the face with large, soft light. The principle is that the “larger the light source in relation to the subject, the softer the quality of the light will be.” Think of how soft the light is on a cloudy day. Or think of artists always craving “north light.” The reason for this is that indirect light is really ideal for creating any kind of art work. And, it stands to reason. Direct light from a small reflector is harsh and creates a lot of shadows. No portraitist wants to deal with that unless they are trying to create a contrasty portrait to begin with.

A large light source can also be a large softbox. Here is a completely different image created by placing a rectangular softbox BELOW the subject’s face:

This is what is known as a “MONSTER LIGHT” because it usually creates ghoulish-type shadows on the face. But notice this one. The shadows are there on the top sides of facial features but because the light is so soft there are no deep shadows.

As a contrast, this image was lit with DIRECT LIGHT. Notice that the shadows are deeper and less information can be seen:

This is called a SIDE LIGHT. It was made with a 150 watt bulb in an aluminum reflector. It is an example of direct light. Notice how deep the shadows are. This kind of lighting should only be used when intentionally trying to make an image with a lot of contrast. This is known as a SIDE LIGHT. All the light is on her right side (camera left) while the other side is in total shadow. The softness of some of the details in this image was caused by having to use a large lens opening. When you use electronic flash, you are providing much more light than was used here, therefore, you can use much smaller lens openings.

So, you’ve got several choices when you set up your lighting arrangement. You can use one light: this will provide you with a very contrasty image with almost no detail in the shadow areas. You can then add light to FILL-IN those shadows, making them more transparent so that detail can be seen, or provide an overall soft light which tends to minimize the shadows altogether!

There are many controls you have when your lights are set up correctly. You can use all of them or just one or two depending on the kind of image you are setting out to make.