Teppotama's It's All About the LIGHT!: Basic Studio Lighting

This is stuff I learned back in the early 70's and it still applies today.

You can have basic portrait lighting with two lights. A Main Light and a Fill Light. The Fill light which is positioned above camera position is to give your portrait the overall base exposure. The Main Light which is positioned off to one side is to create the depth, roundness and texture of your portrait's subject. I normally use three to four lights depending on the effect that I want.

This is my fill light. It's located in the back of the room centered above the camera to give a non directional flat exposure.

The position and what it looks like on the subject is illustrated at left.

This is my main light. I usually use an umbrella but you can use a soft box, a large reflector dish, or even the wall if it does what you need. Exposure is one to two f-stops stronger than your fill light depending on what kind of ratio you would want for your portrait.

The Main Light is usually 30-45 degrees to one side and about 30-45 degrees above the subject's head. You are looking for a nose shadow that goes below the nose. If it goes up, then your Main Light may be positioned too low.

The Hairlight that I use is a standard reflector with a honeycomb grid on it with a "Bastard Amber" filter inserted to warm the hair. It is attached to my ceiling so I don't have to move a boom in or out.

It adds separation between the subject and the background. Because it is not diffused, it's set at a lower power.

This is my basic Background Light used to illuminate your background. There are different ways of using this depending on the effect that you want. It also assists in separating your subject from the background.

The exposure using the background light will depend again on the effect you want. If it's a high key (white) background, I would want a pair of lights illuminating a white background