Another round of low-key photos. I am figuring out a lighting setup I want to use for an upcoming photo session plus with the weather getting cold I am inside more, and low-key is just fun to do.
This time I put the light source (a photography strobe with an octagon soft box) above her and to an angle. Obviously, I have her turned in the direction so some of the light hits her face and then starts to fade off. When doing this sort of stuff just think how the moon phases operate and work from there.
I also did some processing trickery by editing out the softbox for most of these. The closer your light source the harsher your shadows and harsher shadows is something you want in low-key lighting. So I put my softbox very close to my subject to the point where it is in the photo. Well, it isn’t in any of these photos because it I removed them. The thing to remember, if you do this, is that it is easier to remove if the background is consistent – in low-key photos the background is usually black – and if your light source doesn’t overlap with your subject in any way.
For posing, I let my subject bring a toy in. This kept her happy and made it easier to give posing direction. She can actually hold something to her chest or look at something in her hands. Don’t discount the uses of toys with younger subjects. Also, for the last photo, it was just out of focus but I liked the pose so I grayscaled it, which is something you can do something in attempts to save a blurry photo.