Portraiture & Lighting

by William Lulow

I studied with the famous portrait photographer Philippe Halsman, back in 1974. Philippe did over 100 Life Magazine covers in his day. I spent a year learning from him and follow most of his lighting principles to this day. They are really the substance of classical portrait lighting used through the years by the world’s best practitioners. I have said many times, that once you learn what these studio lighting setups are and how to use them, you will never look at a scene or an image again without noticing the lighting. It will improve your picture-making efforts markedly. Here are some rudimentary examples of what these lightings are and their graphic effects:

Various lighting effects like these can be used for all sorts of different images when used in creative ways. For instance, the third from the left on the bottom row is a CROSS LIGHTING. It is made by having lights set up on opposite sides of the subject and it creates a shadow down the middle of the face. I actually used this lighting for a product shot when an art director needed a shot of a series of bulbs that showed their filaments:

Second from the left on the top row is a REMBRANDT LIGHTING, so named because it mimicked the light that most of the Dutch Master painters used in the 1600s for their amazing portrait paintings. Since there was no electricity in the 17th century, painters often asked their subjects to sit by a window which provided a “north light” which was indirect and often diffused. This lighting is handy to use on modern day subjects:

This portrait was designed to fit into a company’s website where all the images were shot with very shadowy lightings.

My current efforts at portraiture are mostly to produce commercial headshots and portraits for use on websites and for promotional materials. They are designed to show what my subjects look like, but at their best and with pleasing expressions and little if no shadows on faces:

Portraits can be really any attempt at rendering the likeness of a person. Some are better than others, but all are more pictures of what the photographer is thinking at any given point in time and his or her application of the portrait techniques that they have learned and practice every day. Many different photographers have often photographed the same subjects, famous or not-so-famous, yet each portrait is different. That’s because each artist brings his or her interpretations and styles to each shoot.

Here is an example of a more creative style portrait that wasn’t intended for a strict commercial use:

And another…

So portraits are really more about the photographer and his or her personality at any given moment in time. I photograph my grandchildren at least twice a year, and depending on the day and all of our moods during the shoot, different kinds of images are made. Here are some samples of my oldest during the years. This year she turned ten years old, the last picture on this page:

And here are the pictures of the younger granddaughter:

I usually photograph the kids on a plain white background to highlight their growth, but this year, because they have gotten more used to posing for the camera, I decided to change the lighting a bit and shoot them on a grayish background with the addition of some of the highlights I use for my normal portrait sessions. I usually go to their house and set up a background and lights. This year, however was the first year they came to my studio so the lighting was a bit more involved than it has been. I was always looking for crisp, clean images that I could enlarge to almost any size, but this year I wanted to vary the lighting a bit.

Portraits, as I have often said, are images of people seen by a photographer, painter or other visual artist at a given point in time. I like to think of them as pictures of how I was thinking about my subjects almost as much they are visual representations of my subjects. Sometimes I will want to use the lighting as my statement. Sometimes I will need to use my knowledge of what lighting does in order to produce a commercially usable product. Depending on what I want to say about my subjects, I will vary the lighting accordingly.

When I can collaborate with a subject, as I did with the fencer above, is when the most creative looking portraits are produced. Headshots are really dictated by how much of the person’s face really needs to be shown clearly and usually it is all of it. Sometimes I can get away with using a bit of shadow to add some depth, but headshots really need to show the person’s face. For actors, I can often include a bit more of the torso, but more often than not, a headshot is just what it says. It should be an image of the person, but at his or her best.