Lighting for Leather Jackets

[Lyrion]

Hi,

I will be taking photos of Italian leather jackets with the models heads and lower body removed in photoshop. I need the texture of the leather to look great showing the high quality texture and light shine finish of the leather. I will use a white backdrop. I am using a Nikon D3100 with 18-55VR lens.
I have a nice shaded area where the sun is blocked by the house or underneath a white gazebo which is also in the shaded area. I would like to add some subtle lighting and not sure which type of light would help the leather texture and a jacket shape.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Thanks

Lee

 

[Garry Edwards]

The easy and efficient way of doing this is indoors, using studio lighting.

If you want to do it outdoors you can, you'll need to fire a flash horizontally across the jacket to create both specular reflections and shadows, but even shooting in the shade you may run out of power if using a hotshoe flash, and you won't have a modelling lamp to indicate what the effect will be, so not the easiest way of doing it...

 

[Lyrion]

Thanks for the reply. I am going to keep it simple with side light, fill in and back light but I am unsure about what type of lighting. I had read that the octa light isnt very flattering for clothing.

Maybe a softbox as the main side light?

 

[Garry Edwards]

Thanks for the reply. I am going to keep it simple with side light, fill in and back light but I am unsure about what type of lighting. I had read that the octa light isnt very flattering for clothing.

Maybe a softbox as the main side light?

A softbox is a multi-purpose tool, especially when fitted with a honeycomb.

A lot of people seem to think that softboxes are always placed in front of the subject, even more seem to think that they should be at something like a 45 degree angle and obviously neither of those positions would work for you.

But, placed at an acute angle, any softbox can produce an excellent mixture of both hard and soft lighting - high local contrast and low overall contrast. And with a honeycomb fitted, the angle can be even more acute and can produce just high local contrast.

 

[specialman]

A softbox is a multi-purpose tool, especially when fitted with a honeycomb.

A lot of people seem to think that softboxes are always placed in front of the subject, even more seem to think that they should be at something like a 45 degree angle and obviously neither of those positions would work for you.

But, placed at an acute angle, any softbox can produce an excellent mixture of both hard and soft lighting - high local contrast and low overall contrast. And with a honeycomb fitted, the angle can be even more acute and can produce just high local contrast.

Garry - this acute angle mallarky sounds interesting for other textures - any examples to give a better idea