BetterPhoto Q&A
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Studio photography

My question is in regards to purchasing studio lighting equipment. Such as soft boxes, umbrellas, flashes, etc.. I really have no knowledge in this area as far as what is good to buy. I am a begginer to the studio setup, and I just have NO IDEA where to begin.

So does anyone have any good advice as far as what is some good starting off equipment to buy and look into? What will I need to start off?
If it helps, I enjoy photgraphing people primarily in a comfortable setting. Kids are great as well...so I do not know (once again) if I need to buy equipment accordingly. Well thanks for anyones help! MUCH APPRECIATED!

Joe

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July 01, 2004

Most popular equipment makers:
Light stands: Bogen/Manfrotto
Monolights: Photogenic
Modifiers (umbrellas, softboxes, etc.): Photoflex and Westcott
Backdrops: Westcott
Flash Meter: Gossen and Sekonic
Sync (PC) Cords: Paramount
PC hot shoe adapters: Hama and Kaiser
Slaves: Wein, Pocket Wizard and Quantum

My criteria for listing those manufacturers:
Major manufacturer, very competitive prices, durability, reliability, and availability of accessories and replacement parts. There are certainly many other manufacturers that make excellent products for studios, but in my scouring the countryside looking for the best bang for the buck with reliabiltiy and durability, these emerged at/near the top.
Example: I own Hensel lights, and they're Germany's quite excellent equivalent to Photogenic with similar pricing, but parts and accessories aren't as available here in the U.S. (you have to know where to find them).

My specs for a start-up studio:
* Two 500 Joule (watt-second) monolights with 250-watt (or higher) halogen modeling lights.
* Two 8-foot or 9-foot light stands.
* Three 45-inch umbrella reflectors; silver or white satin lining (one spare).
* Used Gossen Luna Pro F in EX or better condition
* Midtone gray, gray/blue or gray/green 10x20 foot muslin backdrop with nondescript subtle and random pattern (mottled appearance)
* Two hotshoe PC adapters (one spare and these are easier to use than plugging a trigger cord into a camera PC socket; if yours has one)
* 20-25 foot sync cord extension (the cords that come with lights are never quite long enough)
* Two 25-foot, 16 guage (minimum), 3-wire (ground pin) orange or yellow AC extension cords (color is so you'll see them and mine have female ends that glow when there's power)
* One PC plug/socket "conditioner" (Westcott makes these; they reshape PC plugs and socket contacts if the connection starts to get loose)

-- John Lind

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July 04, 2004

Some additional things:

*Umbrellas ("brollies") versus softboxes:
Start with using brollies. They're less expensive and less cumbersome to use. You will likely want to get a softbox or two later . . . these can be quite expensive . . . and you not only need the basic softbox, you must buy a speedring to mount it on the light too (thems ain't cheap either). The difference is primarily light control. Umbrellas provide an area source, and certainly most of it goes where you aim them, but a fair amount also scatters around elsewhere too. Usually that helps with fill and keeps things from getting too harsh. However, for dramatic lighting, a softbox provides not only a flat panel of diffused light, the sides keep light from scattering out elsewhere, and the aiming of them is more accurate. This makes achieving deeper shadows with less fill from scattered light easier. Neither is better than the other, it's a matter of how you want to shape and control the lighting. Basic, classic portraiture is easily done using brollies.

* Lighting Techniques:
With just two lights, one is the "key" or "main" light and the other is the fill light. There are four basic lighting methods for portraits: Loop, Rembrandt (a.k.a. triangle), Paramount (a.k.a. butterfly), and split. Loop is more universally used and consdered "failsafe," the others being more dramatic, requiring more fussing to set up just right, and they don't work with everyone's facial features. You may see a fifth one, profile, but it's not used very often and "cross" lighting is (IMHO) another form of loop with fill being at or nearly the same level as the key light. There's also camera perspective relative to the person and how their face is illuminated: broad and short side. You're working with two things: lighting relative to the person's face, and camera position relative to the person's face. Moving or adjusting one does not "require" moving or adjusting the other.

Find a book on portrait lighting with good examples of these. Study them, and practice lighting a willing victim with the two lights for a while (using the modeling lights) without picking up a camera. When you "see" the specific lighting pattern emerge on someone's face, you'll "know" it. Don't worry about hair lights and background kickers yet (which require more lights). Just being able to do the basics with two lights will make excellent, often dramatic portraits that people cannot do for themselves. When you believe you can do each reliably, then pick up a camera and work with looking through the viewfinder at each from different perspectives of the person. There will undoubtedly be some posing techniques in the book(s) too. When you've mastered working with two lights . . . and think in terms of many, many photographs . . . not just some practice . . . then think about things like hair lights, background kickers, reflectors, gobos, etc., to refine the lighting mroe. These are icing on the cake, but until you've got the cake perfected, don't worry about them. That pretty much covers single person portraiture.

Doing couples is a little more difficult, but pretty similar if you work with lighting them such that you get similar facial and body modeling on each person. Some poses may end up with them both with short or broad side to the camera, or one short and the other broad. Look at lots of pictures of posed couples and reverse engineer the lighting on the poses you like by looking at highlights and shadow on their faces and bodies.

Doing groups of three or more is similar in some respects (basic posing positions), but in others it's also quite different (doing this with each person relative to the others, and lighting the group). These require not only individually flattering posing of everyone in the group, but creating a connection among them and working with relative heights to create a visually interesting and pleasing composition of the group as a whole at the same time. Lighting groups is a bit different also. I generally use loop type light positions on both sides and put them at the same power level. The goal is retaining modeling of facial features. I freely admit I'm more experienced with posing groups than using sophisticated lighting on them . . . something I'm still working on . . . and the larger the group, the more it devolves into getting relatively even lighting that still models facial features even though contrast is reduced. I'd rather have a pleasing composition of the group and work on posing them to achieve that.

-- John Lind

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July 04, 2004

*Canon EOS 1DS camera body
*Mono and tripod
*Cable release
*Handheld speedlight
*EF lenses
*Lens filters
*4 1GB compact flash memory cards
*Used laptop for card download and on-site checks
*Lights (I am considering Photogenic's 2 Light travel kit including: 2 PL2500DDR 1000 W/S Monolights, Umbrellas, light stands, and case)
*Backdrop stand and cloths/paper
*Adobe Photoshop CS

Would you mind recommending the lenses, lens filters, speedlight, softbox sizes I should start out with?
Is there a book you would recommend on the subject as well? Also, will the travel light kit work in-studio should I set one up at home? And finally (bless you!), do you recommend using light kits that use battery packs (I am concerned about recycle time). Any other advice you would like to throw in I will gladly gobble-up as well!!

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July 08, 2004

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July 09, 2004

I don't recommend softboxes for on-location portrait work if setup and teardown must be done relatively quickly . . . not unless you're doing something truly special. They cannot be transported very easily completely assembled and it takes much longer to assemble the lighting on-location compared to umbrellas. Don't want to discourage you from getting the boxes; work with them a little and you'll be able to assess better when you want to take them on-location. They do offer a little more control with exactly where the light goes than umbrellas.

I recommend a small and a medium . . . 16x20 and about 24x30. These shouldn't be too large to use on monolights mounted on normal light stands (not superlight small footprint, compact ones though). I'm partial to the Photoflex, but Westcott also makes excellent softboxes. You *will* have to get speedrings from the softbox maker to fit your specific lights along with the softboxes. The next size up . . . about 36x48 inch gets pretty cumbersome and can require some hefty stands with very wide footprint to keep them from tipping over. At some point with increasing box size, it's better to mount the box itself to the stand and the light to the back of the box! If you need something that size for some reason, look at Photoflex's small and medium Octodomes (3' and 5'). They offer a larger size with shallower profile. Haven't used them, but I've seen them and believe their shallower depth would make keeping the light balanced on the stand easier than a larger box of similar size. Remember that the bigger the box, the more ceiling height you could need to accommodate its size while allowing you to elevate the light.

-- John Lind

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July 09, 2004

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July 10, 2004