Hoping that the 50% chance of rain isn't going to happen. Who knows with the weather around here...

So, I have a friend who wants more photos for her portfolio and I need photos for my portfolio and some actual experience. Not getting paid, but you have to start somewhere!

I'm planning on shooting portraits outdoors, and have for kit I'm taking a 5-in-1 reflector/diffuser and its stand/holder, plus I've been studying up on shooting outdoor portraits as best I can. Besides having a rained-out backup plan ready and drafting a model release, is there anything else I should do to prepare?

Anybody?

I prefer shooting on overcast days.  

Do you have a flash?

If so, do you have a way to take it off the hotshoe?

If not, you can use that reflector, just be creative with it.  

What exactly are you shooting?  What's the subject matter?  What's the setting?

19ish female. Going to a park if the weather is good. I have some backing and lights which might get here in time if the weather sucks. No flash yet. I'm planning out a couple hours of stuff planned tonight and getting the paperwork written up.

Ok, so no flash but you have some reflectors.  What do you refer to when you say "backing"?  

With no flash or other lighting, the best thing that could happen to you is an overcast day.  That will soften the light enough for your reflectors to work and not be overbearing.  

Do you have a telephoto lens?  Use that as much as possible, but I wouldn't recommend going any lower on the aperture than f4.  You want to keep her in focus from nose to ear, but keep the background fairly blurred.  On models I used to shoot from waist or boob level.  Sometimes I'd shoot from knee level and a wide lens.  

If you can find an area of the park that's shaded but has concrete underneath, like a car port or pavilion, you can get some pretty nice lighting that way.  If in the evening, find a street light and illuminate her from the top.  Those are cool and moody, but you have to get them right.  

Get a mix of full-body, knee-up, chest-up, and headshots.  The most important is for her to feel comfortable.  If she's not, the images will suck, but that doesn't mean for you to not give her direction.  A head-tilt here, chin up there, will do wonders.  Also keep in mind that even though you're shooting a head shot, if her hips or legs aren't posing as well, it will translate to stiffness up top.  You may already know all of this, so I'll stop there.

That's exactly what I'm looking for! I've not done this before, so I'm trying to learn as much as I can from YouTube and other websites. All these pointers are appreciated!



Muslin backdrop.

Go to a park that has cover if the weather is bad. Photos in bad weather make for more interesting ones IMO. Sometimes after a rain the sky looks great.

A lot of it is going to come with experience.  I did seniors for about a year and then models for another year, and left without looking back.  Get yourself about 6mo of experience and a decent portfolio, and then start charging.  

The internet is a great resource.  Get on Pinterest or just do a google search of your favorite images, then dissect them for lighting and such.  Then try to replicate them as close as possible, but with your own style added.  You don't have a style just yet, but you'll develop one with the more experience you gain.  

One thing to always have in your head when doing this stuff, ALWAYS study the light.  The light is what will be the difference between a good and great photograph.  You can have great poses, but a sucky photograph.  If you get a chance, today or Friday, go and scout the park with this in mind, at the time you will be shooting your model.  Study the way the light falls.  If you find a few good spots to shoot, then walk around them and watch how the light falls on them.  It only takes 20min or so, but you'll be prepared in your head and be in the right frame of mind when you're shooting.

I'd probably leave the backdrop at home on this shoot.  

Also, have a mix of shots of her wearing heels if she has them, or go barefoot.  There were studies done years ago how shoes detract from images and make people, especially women, lead their eye to the foot rather than the body.

ETA:  I'm writing a lot, but I'm not 100% right either.  You do what works best for you and you'll do good.  

Thank you guys! The park I'm going to is kinda small, but in walking distance to my apartment. I'll stop by there for lunch tomorrow to get an idea about the lighting at the time we'll be there Saturday.

The backdrop and lights are if the weathers really, really bad and we can't push it to Sunday, then I can get a setup in my living room going.

You're going to share with us the results, I assume???  

Oh, absolutely!

Ok, so it went swimmingly! My friend/model, SloupM, (no MM yet,) was very patient with me and my lack of experience... everyone's got to start somewhere! The biggest issue was my stand for the reflector didn't work well at all... reflector and the boom arm were too heavy for the cheap stand. Oh well, better luck next time! Also, my Amazon light kit worked really well, though I should have ironed out the creases in the backdrop and played around with the lighting more for the studio style shots.

Here are a couple shots from today I grabbed while browsing through them. Poo, looks like the first one's focus is kinda janked, oh well...





I'm backing up the negatives now and playing around with tweaking the second photo in PS. Also haven't really done PS in about 5 years, so I'm learning how to do things all over again! Forgot to sharpen those, for example. Still have to figure out the workflow, don't know if I'll use Lightroom or not... I know I should, though.

Any tech specs? Focal length, aperture, shutter speed etc. Both are a little underexposed for my liking.

Pic 1: Yeah, you missed focus. Focus is on the buttons. Background is distracting. It looks like your subject is leaning back slightly. Based on the perspective, it looks like you are fairly close with a short-ish lens.Try getting the camera higher and use a longer focal length. Fill light on her face/dodge in photoshop.

Pic 2: White balance is slightly off, unless that is the look you are going for. Again, slightly higher camera angle. It looks like the subject is "falling" away and proportions look a little skewed.

You are off to a good start. Keep at it.

I'll get the specs when I get home. Most of what I shot was with the 50mm 1.8 at around 2.8 and the 75-300mm wide open at 75.

I'll be the first to admit I have a long way to go. It was excruciating using telephoto lenses; I naturally skew towards wide angle.

I'm hoping to figure out what things to improve and shoot some more in a few weeks.

ETA: First pic is 50mm, f4, 1/1000s, ISO-200, second is 80mm, f4, 1/60s, ISO-400.
ETA2: Yeah, I really should have been double checking my focus, especially for the indoor ones. Oh well, duly noted for next time!

Looks good

A bit of advice regarding portraits , especially with shallow depth of field

You don't say what you are using for gear so I will assume a Canon or Nikon Body

First - best to select single point focus

2nd - put the camera in One Shot AF ( Canon ) or AF-S ( Nikon ) . This way it locks focus unlike AI ( Canon ) or AF-C ( Nikon ) where it continuous focus

What you do now is focus on models eyes ( single point on center of viewfinder ) , then lower the camera back down to achieve whatever framing you desire

This way models eyes will always be the focal point . Looks like your camera chose central frame focus point

Ever wonder why pros point the camera up and recompose before shot

You cannot achieve this with continuous focus mode single point because as you lower camera it will select focus point on their body. When shooting less than 2.8 or larger aperature , especially at close distance to subject it is enough to have eyes out of focus

You cannot achieve this with multi point since it tries to best guess the focus point on the whole scene , which most likely is not what you want !

This technique is critical when shooting outdoor portraits with distant background. Its every easy to completely miss focus of your subject when camera tries to focus the whole scene

Focal Length

Don't give up to quickly with the 70-300 for portraits

You can google more info regarding "portrait focal length compression "

Here is just one example . You can see how the model pops out more in the scene with the longer focal lengths

http://photography.tutsplus.com/tutorials/exploring-how-focal-length-affects-images--photo-6508

http://mcpactions.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/focallengtharticle.jpg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRoqNx9rlVA

Thanks for the tips guys! Yeah, I jacked up almost all of the indoor shots by setting the focus once and leaving it on manual for the rest... I'll do better next time. Thanks for all the info. I'll share some more WIP and completed photos when I get them done.

One more thing, I see some tips on model's poses. What would be a good place to get more of those basics, as I have very little eye for that yet.

I think you'll get the hang of poses as you work with better and better models. They'll teach you. You could try to get old actors to let you shoot them, they might bring a lot to the table.

With the model you used this time, I would have focused on not letting her pose, but rather tried to keep her moving. I'd try to get her to shoot some "regular person" stock type photography with her emoting, moving and not trying to look good. You're absolutely on the right track with the second photo, she's just not completely committed to the action, which makes the rope look random.

If she can act and emote, she'll fit in to your portfolio as a character actress/stock kind of model. I would avoid including any beauty, glamour, fashion or even portraiture with her, as she's unsuited to it and wouldn't give you good results.

For instance, in the park, you could spritz her with water to simulate sweat and have her look "tired after a workout". Or with a book on her chest, leaning  back and staring up daydreaming. You could shoot her in the studio looking thrilled about something in her hand, looking into a washing machine with a "what the heck?!?" look on her face etc. You can shoot some edgy "real person" journalistic/editorial stuff with her too, which could be really fun.

Great start, and the best thing is that you guys had fun and learned a few things.  Keep working at it and the more you do, the more experience you'll get, which is worth more than anything we could tell you here.  Here are a couple things that might get you started...

1.  Posing:  Most of the time it has to do with shifting weight.  Meaning, putting more weight on one hip vs. the other, a slight arching of the back, will change a pose dramatically.  Experiment with that and see what you get, and if you like it.

2.  Hands:  It's personal preference, but I try to keep hands away from the face, and if I do put them there, I don't usually have the fingers open. Just personal preference.  

3.  Arms:  I try to pose so that the arms are not giving me a broadside.  You didn't do that, but one thing to keep in mind.  Some women are stunningly beautiful, but can look fat when bare arms are shown broadside to the camera.  

4.  A few things to emphasize/focus on:  Hair, eyes, boobs, back, hips, legs below the knees.  

5. Camera work:  Try your best to avoid chain fences as a background.  Those will wreck your focus and you probably won't know it until you get the images onto a large monitor.  

6.  Lighting is the most important of all.  You did fine overall.  I'd process the images with her face a little more bright, and eyes even more than that.  Whiten the teeth, saturate the hair a bit, and darken the background.  Try to avoid 50/50 light/shadow, instead try to go for 70/30 light/shadow.  

7.  Don't discount long focal length!  Those are awesome for shooting people.  

Again, everything I say is moot when it comes to experience.  That's how you'll get better.  Good luck and keep 'em coming!

Some good feedback here. Get the basics of camera operation down before you start using light modifiers. The gold reflector focused on her abdomen is not working.  Modifiers will only distract you from making a good exposure.. Once you have the basics of the camera down, then and only then do you start playing with reflectors, etc. Always know your gear before you ever take it on location.  Nothing will distract a model and degrade your clients confidence in you like fumbling with  equipment..

Also, get rid of the watermark.

Kept at it and have fun...

Do you have any recommendations for her as far as portrait/glamour goes? It seems different than "acting natural/genuine" or emoting to me... Again, she hasn't done any traditional style shoots before.

Ok, finally go to do some photoshopping... take a peek!

Original after RAW import:


Edited:


The lighting and focus of the original should have been better, but I think overall its a good image. Still need to figure out where to change the brightness of the image.

I would recommend against any glamour. I'd try doing as many different styles of portraiture as possible, from olan mills stuff, to actor headshots to candid looking reportagey stuff.

eta:I really like the new pics.Maybe a garment steamer could take the wrinkles out of the back drop?

Good job so far.  You're learning!  

It looks like you had your main key light a little too far down.  Think of the sun, point the key light down about 45deg on her.  This is a suggestion for starters.  

Are you using a reflector on the right side to fill in the shadows, or another light?  Looks like a reflector.  I'd suggest to do a session with nothing but one light for a few tries, then move on to filling in the shadows.  Once you can get really good at working with one light source, you can move on.  The reason being is that the more one works with a single light source, they will understand the subtleties in light and shadow.  By doing this, they will find out - through experience - what works and what sucks.  When introducing multiple light sources at the beginning, one doesn't get the full sense of what they are doing and can't figure out why something sucks or why it looks good.

See if there is a store where you can rent the lighting rig you want to buy. It's usually a couple hundred bucks for a weekend, set it up in your apartment and try tons of stuff. check out strobist, they show a lot of lighting setups so you can see the setup they're using and how it affects the scene.

There's several ways to do it. Easiest way (IMHO) is to play with levels or curves.

The white balance is still off. It needs to be warmed up. You can adjust it in PS, but it is easier to nail it in the camera. Adjust the white balance setting to your light source. I'm guessing you are using fluorescent continuous lighting?

Funny, I naturally tend towards warm so I consciously tried to be more neutral. Yeah, I'm using one of the inexpensive CFL kits from Amazon. It just want enough light for the exposure time I wanted.

I like that, using one source at the start.  I totally janked the lighting; I literally got the lights that morning and only had about 30 minutes to play with them.

That's cool. Some of the stuff I did when I was starting out was much worse.  IMO, you should only use one light source - and that means no reflectors - until you got that down pat.  Then move on to reflectors.  Then go to two lights.  Then two lights with reflectors, and so-on.  It seems slower, but you can learn a hell of a lot more and in a lot faster time if you do this.  Plus, one can do some pretty amazing stuff with just one light.

Have you seen some of these websites?

Virtual Lighting Studio  -  Gives you a sense of what lighting does to a person's face

SunCalc  -  Helps you plan on shoot dates where/when to shoot