Bridal Boudoir – How it was done – Damian McGillicuddy
Well I must say its an absolute pleasure to be invited in to such a warm, photocentric community dedicated to the development and betterment of the art and craft of photography. Photocreative 365 seems very big on caring and sharing so its my turn to see if I can pass on something useful for you guys!
February the 14th is an important date in Team McGillicuddy’s diary as its a great date to hang our funky fashion and boudoir photography marketing around. If you haven’t promoted anything to catch the Valentines market, shame on you… now take this as an early warning for next year!
OK, all that said there seems nothing better to pen a “how it was done” around than a beautiful young lady in her undies – all in the spirit of St Valentine ;0)
Location: The members bar, Oddfellows, Chester
Subject: Nic H
What was in the bag: Nikon D3 fitted with Nikons 85mm f1.8
2x Nissin Di 866 Speedlight
2x Elinchrom Universal Skyport
DMLS 19” collapsable beauty dish
The Portaflex snoot
Sekonic L-758D light meter
Camera settings: Image captured in RAW
ISO 200, f3.2 @ 1/40 sec
RAW file processed through Aperture 3.1
So what did I do and why did I do it:
This image was shot during one of the Team McGillicuddy “Bridal boudoir” days. Now bizarrely an image being used to promote Valentines day contains a Christmas tree!!! bare with me, it is deliberate because it enables me to talk about a specific technique (honest).
I’m having a rekindled “love affair” at the moment with my prime lenses and it’s hard to stack an argument up against using primes! They are light, the IQ is generally magic and in this crazy world they even represent a cost saving over the latest f2.8 wonder zooms… now thats a lot of words just to tell you I selected my favorite 85mm f1.8, but why select the lens, what is it going to do for me?
The short telephoto gives me access to two effects I like to use in my imagery very much. Firstly, it compresses perspective, in essence “stacking up” the various planes within the image closer to one another with the by product of it being great for flattering the human body and face, in simple terms “pushing” the subjects nose back into the mask of the face, flattering the subject.
Secondly, by selecting a large aperture, in this case f3.2 the compression of perspective enhances the use of differential focus, in other words the ability for me to select the area of the images that appears sharp. In this image it gives us the “pop” of the subject out of the background, isolating the primary focal point (Nic) from an otherwise distracting and cluttered background. We want a feeling of Christmasy warmth, not a view of every needle on the tree!
The 19” collapsable beauty dish was used as the key light, I just love the crisp, sculptural light it gives me. I set it camera left, approx 45 degrees up and away from the median of the mask of the subjects face. It was then “feathered” so I could achieve the most pleasing “Rembrandt” lighting pattern possible.
My second speedlight was fitted with the snoot from our Portaflex modifier kit set to its widest aperture and placed approximately 10 to 12 foot behind the subject to camera right. It was carefully aimed to throw a slice of light past the tree, highlighting some of the baubles, and accent Nic’s curves and hair creating back lit accents to again stand here off the background!.
Getting the flash to sync together was easily accomplished by the use of Elinchroms Universal Skyport transmitter and receivers. I just want the speedlights to flash at the power I meter and determine, I don’t want the equipment to “think” for me, just do my evil bidding mwhahahahah!!!
Ok, so why the Christmas tree??? In point of fact the inclusion of it other than compositionally alludes to the choice of our third light. The f 3.2 aperture selection is achieved by the careful metering of the speedlight chosen as the “key” or main light and contrast controlling “fill” light is supplied by the ambient light present in the scene. The level the ambient light is allowed to record is determined by the selection of the shutter speed, the slower the shutter speed the more the ambient light plays a part. So an initial incident light meter reading is made on my sekonic which would probably have read about a 15th or 20th at f3.2 but I don’t want to set that as my shutter speed because I don’t want to balance the lights, I want a ratio between the flash and ambient so the ambient just reduces the contrast within the image, and that is a how salty do you like your soup question!
Finally our beautiful model was posed deliberately to enhance her feminine curves but as it was a bridal boudoir training day we used her positioning within the chair to show the delegates how props can be used to either a) spare a brides modesty or b) hide any aesthetically unpleasing lumps, bumps or creases ;0)
Her positioning as the foreground of our composition enhances the directness of here projected beauty to the viewer, it is indeed all about her. Allowing the tree to climb up the image compositionally gives both a second area of interest and a scale to the image, it also means to enjoy this composition the client isn’t really going to get away with just buying a 10×8… always thinking eh guys, we can’t do this for nothing ;0)
So there we go, hopefully you have enjoyed the stroll through the madness of my mind as much as I have enjoyed sharing it with you. So, what now, go CREATE and enjoy, thats my suggestion.
ttfn
Damian McGillicuddy Lord of Kerry (aka The BIG Dog)
McGillicuddy and his close knit team are based at their fully-functional studio in Warrington, Cheshire, where they offer the entire range of photographic services. However, you are just as likely to find them out on location somewhere in the world, or taking time assisting other photographers by sharing his knowledge through one of his many photographer-focussed training programs.
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