Alternative Portrait Lighting

So, have you ever had a portrait session where you used your flash right on your camera and your image looked like the image on the right ?

No matter how you twisted your flash or dropped the exposure to soften it or reflect it or diffuse it, the image just didn't seem to come out the way you envisioned it or imagined it.

Images like the one on the right are all to common in the photography. With this image, I simply bounced the flash up in the ceiling to soften the light but as you can see if you look right behind Jenn, there is still a shadow and the image is not really all that pleasing to the eye.

Another problem that I had was the lay out of Jenn's apartment.

It was basically the shape of an "L" and didn't give very many options to the natural eye. This would make creating various images with different looks quite difficult.

So what would some options be ?

LIGHTING OPTIONS ON LOCATIONS

I usually take the time when I arrive to a clients home to have a look at where the natural light is. And if there is no available light, then I start looking for alternative lighting and how I may use it in a portrait or commercial image. (in the following post I will show you how I used the natural light I found in Jenn's home to create some beautiful images !)

In this case, Jenn's home was primarily lit with this lamp you see on her right and a few halogen's in the kitchen. The problem with the lamp though was it's height, which was about 4 to 4.5 ft high. But I think I found a solution that would make for a great image, that I think is better than just flash on camera. Coolest thing is that I pulled off quite a few different poses just from this one area alone all from posing. But we will save that discussion for another time. Have a look for yourself and let me know what you think.

Rockie