Studio work

Working in the studio for my shoot

As this was the first time I have ever shot in a studio I was quite nervous about getting the lighting right and whether I would be able to re create my idea properly as lighting is key. I'm mainly used to using natural lighting and shooting outdoors but I actually really like the results of working in a studio. I was able to create the dramatic imagery that I wanted, which couldn't be done without the black back drop and the hard lighting on the subjects. There was a lot of pressure due to having a time limit and being unfamiliar to shooting in this type of environment, so initially it took a while to get everything together.

 I made sure I did test shots so I got the perfect lighting on the subjects before I shot the actual film on medium format and digital. 

Once I was in the studio I realised that I was at some points limited to what I could do with the models, the composition of the subjects was hard to alter at times because the lighting would not fall on them both correctly. Over all, I felt that you don't get as much freedom when working in a studio but for this project in some respects this worked for me, and the specialist studio lighting really helped finalise the look of my prints. 

Experimenting in the studio before actual shoot

Studio equiptment includes: a flash head (strobe), light meter, stand, power leads, umbrellas, soft boxes, honeycombs, beauty spots, slave unit, sync cable, boom stand, back drop, wind machine, battery pack.

We went through different lighting situations such as using low key lighting and high key lighting (using three or more lights.) Learning about the studio was really useful to learning about what type of lighting I would use for this project, because I want an editorial look for my final prints I'll be using a black back drop with hard lighting therefore I will need to use a smaller attachment over the light so there is not much diffusion and more definition there will be in the shadows.