{"id":1917,"date":"2009-12-20T21:18:51","date_gmt":"2009-12-21T01:18:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.planetneil.com\/tangents\/?p=1917"},"modified":"2017-08-09T18:41:27","modified_gmt":"2017-08-09T22:41:27","slug":"portrait-session-using-a-beauty-dish","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/neilvn.com\/tangents\/portrait-session-using-a-beauty-dish\/","title":{"rendered":"Portrait session using a beauty dish"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

Portrait session using a beauty dish<\/h1>\n

As my daughter, Janine, grew up from being a baby, it became more difficult getting photos of her. I think most parents can relate to that increased resistance by your children to having their photo taken. This is Janine, a few moths after her 16th birthday – since I have so very few recent\u00a0images of her that are of professional quality, I was able to cajole her into this on this snow-bound afternoon. She loved the results: “Facebook profile photo FTW!”<\/p>\n

I set this up in our living room, with a grey paper backdrop to create a quick home studio.\u00a0The main light was the Profoto beauty dish<\/a>\u00a0(B&H<\/a>\u00a0\/\u00a0Amazon<\/a><\/em>), using the\u00a0Profoto AcuteB 600R power pack,\u00a0which has since been replaced – in the studio by the Profoto D1<\/a>\u00a0(affiliate<\/em>), and on location by the Profoto B1<\/a>\u00a0(affiliate<\/em>).<\/p>\n

I find the light with a gridded beauty dish can be too contrasty at times. I still prefer softer light\u00a0– so this time I added\u00a0a\u00a0diffuser\u00a0sock<\/a>\u00a0(affiliate<\/em>) over the beauty dish.\u00a0The sock over the beauty dish really helps with this. It spreads\u00a0more light into the shadow areas\u00a0–\u00a0differently than\u00a0the bare\u00a0beauty dish. \u00a0With a sock over the beauty dish you’re perhaps\u00a0no better off than using a softbox of the same size, but I still prefer the look of the ‘socked’ beauty dish over the ‘unsocked’ beauty dish.<\/p>\n

The light on the grey backdrop is a Quantum flash, with the usual Q-flash diffuser disc over it,\u00a0pointed directly at the backdrop.
\nThe image is straight out of camera, aside from healing brush on a few skin blemishes.\u00a0 This is how I had set up my B&W images to look in my Nikon D3 bodies, with a warmer tint to the B&W.\u00a0 I still shoot RAW though, so could always go back to the color image.\u00a0 But I like these rich-toned B&W images.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n