Bill, The reason behind my comments were to try and get folks to relax a bit. That Portraiture done with strobes or any other type of light is extremely simple and straight forward. There is very little mystery to it, but a lot of thought, planning and most of all "Seeing/looking" at or perhaps studying the subjects face. Exposure and lighting ratios though important are not the main thing to be concerned about. I was very fortunate to have worked with several of the best portrait makers in the world at that time. I follow pretty much in their footsteps as I
relay only the information they shared with me. I began making portraits in a time that Polaroid was only passing thought in Dr. Lands mind. It simply did not exist. The only possible way to tune your lighting and exposure skills was "testing". There were not many choices back then in films, so a photographer picked the film that had the characteristics he liked and learned to use and get the best possible results with it. His choice of film generally was influenced to a great degree by cost. The testing though a bit boreing involved someone to sit for you, your choice of film and your choice of light. The next step was to study your sitters face, actually you could walk 360 degrees around and look for various things, Long nose, Short nose, Protruding ears, round shaped face/head, elongated, slim or chubby. These things alone tell you where you put your lights. This is where you will have to do some work/study on your own to find out exactly what I mean here. I would start building my portrait lighting by placing the background light on a ground at least 6 to 8 feet behind the seated subject. Adjust the BG light to "break" (Top edge of the circle of light ) no higher than the subjects eyes. Now you have a silhoute when viewing from the camera position. Next with a light on a boom adjust a hair light to give a bit of seperation from the back ground. Do not let this light shine on the shoulders or ears, it is strictly for the hair. BTW you are still looking at a silhoute from the camera position. Ok now bring in the main (key) light.
Turn your subject to what you feel is best, lets say you like him looking slightly to the left (nose not pointing directly at camera) Now you have a decision!
What do you see when you look into the subjects face. Round, tri angular long and slim. lets choose round. This tells you that the main light should placed to the right and above the subject. Why must this be? By using a term called "Short Lighting"
we can create the illusion of a slimmer face. The face is slightly back lit, with the near side of the face
in shadow towards the camera. Adjust the main light towards the camera with out the subject moving until a bit of light spills over the bridge of the nose and creates a small triangular patch of light on the left cheek. Look at the nose and it's shadow, does the shadow fall accross the upper lip and corner of the mouth? If so raise the light until the shadow of the nose falls (ends) between the upper lip and corner of the mouth still maintaining the patch of light on the cheek. Wow, sounds hard huh, believe me it isn't.
Now when we look at the subject we see a high contrast "Chalk and Soot" image. Enter stage right the fill light. Adjust it to about the height of the camera lens axis. ( Camera lens should be slightly above the seated subjects eyes) fairly close to the camera. Move it in towards the subject or back to create your lighting ratio. Whoops what if the subject is wearing glasses? Raise the fill higher above the lense axis until the reflection is gone or retouch in the finished print.
Lets say you like what you see, on the ground glass load up some holders, adjust your camera and make a guess exposure. We are using strobes, so we have no clue where to start, a strobe meter would be wonderful, but when I did my testing they hadn't been invented yet. So make a series of four or more shots. Perhaps f4.5, f5.6, f8, f11 and f 16. Move nothing at this point but the subject. Leave lights and camera in exactly the place you made the exposures. Develop your film, all sheets at the same time. pick out the one you think best and use it's exposure for your next fine tuning camera session.
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