Studio Portraits

I really liked doing studio portraits. The studio portraits include, butterfly lighting, chiaroscuro lighting and Rembrandt lighting. Butterfly lighting is when the key lighting is above the photographers camera, to ensure that the lighting is pointing down on the subjects face. The aim of this lighting is to achieve a butterfly-like shadow under the subjects nose. Chiaroscuro lighting is when there is a split of light and shadow on the subjects face to create a high contrast photograph. The last lighting technique is Rembrandt lighting, this uses a reflector and two lightings. The aim of this lighting technique is to gain an upside down triangle under the subjects eye.

I really enjoyed doing all of these lighting techniques because it was interesting to see the different images being made. I really liked the Rembrandt lighting technique in particular, because I liked how the images turned out dramatic however had a natural look to it. This is an image from one of my Rembrandt photoshoots:

I really like how this turned out because the upside down triangle is very noticeable. I also like this image because the foreground is dark which creates a high contrast with the face that is lit up. This helps the viewer focus on the subjects face and it makes it the main focus point of the image. The photograph is very dramatic because of the high contrast, however I feel as though the triangle under the subjects eye makes the contrast less harsh and the light and dark blend in with each other.

I also really liked creating the butterfly photographs. This lighting technique was quite difficult because the shadow under the subjects nose was hard to achieve because it had to be defined and look similar to a butterfly. However, I tried my best to achieve this lighting technique and this is how it turned out:

If I were to do this lighting technique again, I would try and get the shadow under the nose more defined like a butterfly. I would ask the subject to turn her head to the side and put the main lighting higher at an angle to achieve this technique. Overall, I think it turned out well and I really enjoyed doing this photoshoot. I liked playing around with the lighting to see which angle worked out the best.

The last one I did was Chiaroscuro lighting. I like this lighting technique because the images turned out extremely dramatic and the images are high contrast. This was another lighting that was quite difficult, however once I had played around with the lighting the images turned out really good. This is one of my images:

If I were to do this lighting technique again, I would make the image darker and have the subjects face slightly lighter. This way, the image would be more dramatic. This image also has a triangle under the eye which could be used as Rembrandt lighting and therefore next time I would make sure the image was distinctive to one lighting technique and not two.

Masculinity and Femininity

I really enjoyed doing this project because I enjoyed creating ideas of the photoshoots I could do and I enjoyed creating them. For this project, I went into the studio and took photos of the female subject being masculine and feminine. This was to create the idea that females can be masculine and feminine and just because a female doesn’t wear makeup, or dress like a girl doesn’t mean that she is less than any woman. This was also to portray how men see woman and how woman are seen to be pretty and to put makeup on. These are how the images turned out: