Belly Dancers part 3

Settings: Ambient was 3 stops below neutral grey. One flash into a 60cm umbrella above and to the right, at 2 stops above ambient.

One of the dancers from the original shoot asked me to come out to Akranes (a smaller city about an hour north of Reykjavik) and photograph her dance team, as well as some individuals of herself. I used save, even lighting for the group shots, but once I could focus just on her, I could play with more contrasty lighting. I used only my 60cm umbrella, as she had great skin that would work well with it.



Settings: Ambient was 3 stops below neutral grey. One flash into a 60cm umbrella above and to the right, at 2 stops above ambient. There is also a bare flash on the ground behind her, pointed straight up, at 3 stops above ambient. You can see the rim slightly on the bottom of her forearms.

It was great to have someone so eager to perform in front of the camera, and the costume made it even better. Once I had my lighting ratio setup, I was able to ask for all types of poses, and as long as I stayed in the same general angle to the flash, I was getting good lighting with contrasty shadows. On this fullbody shot, I had placed a bare flash on the ground behind her aiming up. I got a little bit of rim light separation, but I should have zoomed it wider so it hit more of her veil to really light it up.



Settings: Ambient was exposed at neutral grey.

After getting some good lit photos. I wanted to try some warm candle lit photos. I asked her to lay down on a pillow, and I moved several candles in close to get as much light as possible. I cranked my camera to maximum light gathering mode (ISO 1600, f/1.8, and 1/80) The shutter speed was so low that I had to brace my elbows on the ground to avoid camera shake on the 85mm lens. Normally I try to use 1/160 of a second with this lens. Even with this much sensitivity, I had to boost the brightness about .6 in lightroom, making this about ISO 2500) The soft candlight really added a nice mood. However her makeup had an odd reaction to the candle light and slightly discolored her face to a green color. I made a quick brush adjustment with a color overlay of a light magenta, which popped it back to the color of the rest of her skin, and much more natural.

The rest of the set.