Photo Tips for Beginners

Today and tomorrow, good old loose cannon here is taking over the Profoto IG channel. (Has anybody warned them?)

I’ve always loved playing with light, and, consequently, I’m a fan of the term light shaping. Big light, far away? Or small lights, up close and intimate. A long skinny light? A box of light? A dish of light? Ahhh, it’s like being in the kitchen. How should today’s soup taste?

There’s light that’s safe, and light that’s adventurous. Light that wraps, and light that slams as emphatically as a Vince Carter dunk. There’s light that tickles a baby’s chin, and light that makes the heart beat faster as it caresses a beautiful subject. There’s light that graces a scene, settling on a subject softly, silent as dust. And light that shouts, Who Let the Dogs Out!!??!!

A big blast of light, far away. Behaves like the sun. Raw and unfettered. Screaming light.

There’s big soft light, up close.

When testing this type of light, it’s always good to have a legend and lighting master on set to step in, as in the one and only, Cliff Hausner. Link to the BTS video from a few years back.

Flash out in the world! The shape of this sunlight is perfectly awful.

But with a small scoop of light, some high speed sync, and a telephoto lens racked out to its most open f-stop, the scene takes on a significantly better shape for our amazing talent in front of the lens.

Long, skinny light shapers can be appropriate for the human body, as that body stretches in a linear way.

Of course it helps to have folks on the set who are expert at tire stabilization. Another fun BTS video working with the Profoto B1.

Light can define character, and the nature of work.

It can illuminate beauty in lustrous ways.

Light can have attitude.

Or, it can be positively angelic.

Come along for the ride. For the next 48, I’m posting and patrolling on the Profoto Instagram channel. Pictures, thoughts questions…ask me anything!

More tk…..

The post Profoto: The Shape of Light appeared first on Joe McNally Photography.

Joe McNally Photography