Help please - beach sunset portraits

[hankchinaski]

I promised two friends of mine to take their portraits at sunset at the beach. Problem is...I 've never done it before! Please advise:

- metering? As usual? Spot on face + 1 (they are white)? Is the light tricky at sunset?

- Film? I was thinking Gold 200, since sunset are super warm lighted so the Gold being "coldish" it would balance it out a little bit, or maybe Ektar?

- Backlighting? Not?

Thanks!

 

[cliveh]

I would let the sun backlight them, but with the sun out of shot and use large white card or something similar to reflect diffused light onto their face. Colour negative reflective reading, colour slide incident reading.

 

[RalphLambrecht]

I promised two friends of mine to take their portraits at sunset at the beach. Problem is...I 've never done it before! Please advise:

- metering? As usual? Spot on face + 1 (they are white)? Is the light tricky at sunset?

- Film? I was thinking Gold 200, since sunset are super warm lighted so the Gold being "coldish" it would balance it out a little bit, or maybe Ektar?

- Backlighting? Not?

Thanks!

backlighting with fillflash will work and give a nice depth effect through rim lighting. I'd take an incident reading from the chin towards the camera. take the timing from that reading and manipulate the fill flash to match the respective f/stop.

 

[loccdor]

One idea for backlit beach portraits is to use a star filter (cross screen filter) so that all the specular highlights in the water behind them are increased in their effect.

I've always thought of Ektar and Gold as warm films, not cold. If you want cold you could go for Fuji Pro 400H, or Ektachrome E100. Or adjust the colors colder in post. I'd personally use Portra 160 or 400 for this for better skin tones and wide latitude.

Spot meter or incident meter for sunset portraits.

If you don't add light to their face somehow, you'll have to choose between an underexposed face and correctly exposed sunset or a correctly exposed face and overexposed sunset. If you use normal in-camera meters (not spot) for sunsets they tend to overexpose and blow out.

However, another idea is to do silhouettes in front of the sunset. You'd lose their faces but could still create expressive pictures if they know how to pose dynamically enough. You wouldn't need to add light to the scene in this case.

And another idea, double exposures with their faces lit by gentle sunset light, then the other shot of the sunset itself, putting their faces in the dark underexposed water so that they show up. This would be tricky to get right and would need several attempts.

 

[BrianShaw]

Fill flash or fill reflector.

Do a test before the real photo session!

Gold200 would be fine, but I’m not too sure it’s “Col dish”. Ektar may be too garish and finicky. I’d probably use Portra 160.

 

[Ian C]

If you are trying to blend a sunset in the background with a portrait, you need to make a sunlight-balanced fill flash exposure. The Kodak book Using Flash does a good job of illustrating this and gives some useful starting points for the flash value relative to the ambient light.

Amazon.com: Electronic Flash (Kodak Workshop Series): 9780879853723: Lefkowitz, Lester, Eastman Kodak Company: Books

A good starting point is to set the aperture and shutter speed on the camera for the ambient light. Then add about one stop less flash exposure to properly record the portrait subject without overpowering the light from the sky. This is referred to as a -1 stop fill flash. Done properly, the results can be quite beautiful.

Its useful to make fill flash exposures of -2/3, -1, -4/3, and -5/3 stops relative to the ambient exposure. This is most easily done with a TTL automatic flash. You need only set the film speed on the flash unit to the appropriate speeds. Of course, the shutter speed must be no faster than the flash synchronization for the camera’s shutter.

For example, suppose that you’re using ASA 100 film. Set the camera’s meter to ASA 100 and choose an aperture that will work with the flash’s aperture limitations. Let’s suppose this is f/5.6. If you want a -1 stop fill flash, set the ASA speed on the flash unit to ASA 200. That will give a correct ASA 200 exposure of the subject that will lighten the subject, but not overpower the ambient light portion of the exposure.

With ASA 100 film in the camera, you’d use the following ASA film speed settings on the flash for fill-flash exposures:

160 for a -2/3 stop fill

200 for a -1 stop fill

250 for a -4/3 stop fill

320 for a -5/3 stop fill

400 for a -2 stop fill

This can also be done with a sensor-automatic flash. It’s a bit fussier with a manual flash, but can be done. You might need to use a flash meter so that a manual flash can be positioned appropriately relative to the subject to harmonize as wanted with the ambient light.

The flash portion of the exposure will produce normal color balance with a 5500K daylight balanced color film. The warmer colors of the sunset will look approximately the same as you see it. The result can be charming.

For best results, do an informal set of test shots with your equipment so that you can sort out any problems prior to the actual portrait session. You can then choose the particular ambient-to-flash combination that works best.

 

[BrianShaw]

Another good reference would be the Kodak Master Photoguide