Photography News Issue 42

Photography News | Issue 42 | absolutephoto.com

Technique

The importance of metering

> Feathering the light without metering

Whenever you change the type of modifier you’re using, change the power, the angle or the distance of the light from the subject, you’ll be changing the intensity of light that’s hitting them. Of course, this includes significant movement by the subject towards or away from the lights, too. What this change in intensity means is that, from one shot to the next, the subject will likely get lighter or darker, becoming too bright or too dim, if you don’t adjust power. You can prevent any problems by remembering to meter after each and every change. For example, take a look at the examples right. In this set-up, an Elinchrom Rotalux 130x50cm stripbox was used to light Emma, but in some shots, the light was feathered by pointing it away from her. The first set of pictures show the same power and exposure settings being used in each case, so as the light is swung towards Emma it goes from under to correct exposure and then under again as it’s swung away. In the second set, with each turn of the stripbox, a new meter reading was taken (the meter held in front her face) and the power of the flash adjusted accordingly. Consistency of exposure is important if you’re working with large numbers of files; with a limited number you can edit them individually, but larger numbers need batch-processing, and if there’s lots of variety in the exposure, this can’t be achieved.

Angled far left, 4.3 power

Angled left, 4.3 power

Straight on, 4.3 power

Angled right, 4.3 power

> Feathering the light withmetering

Above Every time you change the position, power or angle of a light, the intensity of that light will be altered too, so it’s a good idea to check metering.

Angled far left, 4.9 power

Angled left, 4.5 power

Straight on, 4.3 power

Angled right, 4.5 power

Left A beauty dish like Elinchrom’s 44cm Softlite Reflector provides deeper shadows and more definition than a softbox, so it’s a vital part of any portrait photographer’s kit. Like other Elinchrommodifiers, the type of deflector in the middle can be changed to alter the look.

the grid, and with a central deflector fitted, it a gives soft, wide-angle illumination, but with the grid you get a more manageable but still soft pool of light. Re-metering the light, at the same exposure settings of f/11, ISO 100, I set the light at 2.3 (or 1/16 power). With the grid fitted and the light still angled down, I got just the sort of soft, directed light I was looking for, but made sure to meter again having changed modifiers. There was still something not quite right though; the shadows, while in a good style were a little too dark. Adding a fill light To improve the shadows, I decided to add a fill light, giving those darker areas a little lift. This was achieved using a second BRX 500 head, this time fittedwith a 66cm softbox, and set up on a low-level stand below Emma’s position. It was important that this fill light didn’t wash out the defined look created by the key light that’d already been set up, so I set the power to its lowest, and, like the key light, the softbox was angled away slightly from Emma to feather the effect. A quick firing of the lights to check the metering confirmed this, and on reviewing the shots it added just enough fill light to lift some detail out of the darkest areas.

Thanks to: This month’s model was the wonderful Emma Davis, and we shot on location at the beautiful William Cecil Hotel, Stamford, Lincolnshire.