Set up for Hair (salon) shots

shutter_speed

shutter_speed

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Alex
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Hi guys, great site..

I have recently been carrying out some practice shots on models for a local salon.

Im using a Interfit Ex150 ii kit set up (2 heads, soft box and brolly), I have a 430exii with additional brolly and stand and I have been using a pop up backround with muslin material that covers it with a train.

the background I have is black or white, the biggest issue I have with the background is creases, for the white side I need to point one of my heads at the backgrund to wash it out and get ultra white (this kills blonde hair girls) when I use the black background I am struggling with the dark haired girls.

I need to have a medium background to make the hair stand out, the problem is creases....

so I am looking at using paper, thinking black and using my speedlight to hit background behind the models head to light it up and seperate is from the model....create an almost halo

does anyone have experience with this? here are my test shots of what I have done so far....I have a general idea on lighting the hair, just the background is killing me

http://www.alextoze.com/portfolio/nutters-test/

I have to use lightroom/photoshop to balance out the background and get it ultra white/black but its just not giving the picutres the right feel..

any advice on a paper background, I have about a £120 budget....

Thanks guys, I look forward to your responses

Alex
 
Paper isn't needed for black backgrounds, and black paper isn't ideal anyway, as it always reflects some light.

The obvious answer, which is lacking from your example shots, is a hairlight. A hairlight will add shine and interest to the hair so it's pretty much needed for most shots, it's certainly essential for brunettes and will separate the hair from the black background nicely.

To be frank, your shots against a white background aren't very good. You tend to seriously overlight the background, which is destroying the fine edge detail - not a good idea, let alone for shots of hair:)

Have you considered unlit light grey backgrounds? They will work fine for every type of hair, you can vignette the shot if required too, and will produce consistent results. If you use grey it will definately be better to use paper.
 
I appreciate the response and feedback Garry, thank you.

I will spend the next few days now solidly studying hair lights and look at my options. I thought I was doing enough but initial research shows I was way off :)

As for my white background shots I agree with you, I am extremely concious that my pictures look very flat due to me wiping out all sign of a background, all of this to remove the creases. As I said before, I am over lighting the background to get rid of the creases, im then using photo shop to remove all shadows where the light is dropping off.

Can you give any advice on what I could try apart from investing in paper/vinyl and practicing with that? at the moment its looking like there is little point using this http://amzn.to/ni6ht5 unless I can iron it down a bit first...??

Any advice is really welcome..

thanks again for the reply

Alex
 
Alex,
At least you now understand where you're going wrong - which means that you're well on the way to getting it right, and it also means that I don't have to be rude to make my point:)

Basically you have to concentrate on doing just one thing at a time, instead of trying to do everything at once. You need to light to bring the hair to life, and you need to forget about the background, which is an entirely different subject, until you've made real progress with the main subject. And you need to understand that a photographer is judged by the way s/he creates shadows, as thousands of people demonstrate every day, any idiot can produce photos without shadows - but nobody wants to look at them:)

As you've now discovered, unless done really well, white backgrounds destroy contrast as well as edge detail - and very, very few people do them well.

Black backgrounds don't cause that problem but they do have a common problem with white backgrounds - they make the shot look 2-dimensional, lacking a sense of depth.

A Lencarta customer sent me some hair photos the other day, straight out of camera, all of them are against a grey background, they are all lit very simply and they all jump off the page and grab attention - exactly the sort of shots you need to learn how to produce. I wish I could show them to you but he doesn't have clearance from his client yet, so I can't.

Take a look at this website, for a hairdressing school, it may help a bit. And take a long, hard look at some of the work on Marc Gouguenheim's website - much of it is definately NSFW.

Marc tends to retouch quite heavily but he is also a master of lighting. BTW, most of the shots have just a painted wall as a background. The wall isn't lit in any way, he just adds textures and vignettes in PP
 
Garry, I cannot thank you enough, I will certainly take on board what you have said and will put it into practice. This has certainly changed my train of thought.

Also thanks for the links.

I have until the end of August before taking some more shots at the salon so I wll be sure to spend the next 5 weeks practicing and probably really annoying my wife lol.

I appreciate you taking the time to help.

Alex

P.S I see a massive amount of debates regarding the best tool for a hair light...I'm going to work on the basis there is no "best" and will practice with what I have.
 
shutter_speed said:
P.S I see a massive amount of debates regarding the best tool for a hair light...I'm going to work on the basis there is no "best" and will practice with what I have.
Click to expand...

Yes, that's about right, there are a lot of different ways of doing similar things.
Basically...
A tight honeycomb (say 10 degrees) will put the light exactly where you want it but it's a precise tool that won't work with amateur models because the buggers move:) Also, you can't leave the modelling lamp on because of the risk of an expensive bang if the flash head overheats

A snoot with a honeycomb fitted produces an even smaller circle of light (at the same distance) and has the same limitations. But you can leave the modelling lamp on so hopefully will see if the model has moved.

A beauty dish with a honeycomb is very useful, tight control of the light but without the need for the model to be in exactly the right place - to some extent.

A reflective umbrella is far more forgiving of movement but far less precise. Often used partly collapsed to create an uneven, smaller circle of light (use a clothes peg to control exactly how far it collapses). Silver produces a more striking effect. Problem is, the light goes where it isn't wanted as well as where it is.

There are a lot of other choices, like bouncing light from a wall or ceiling, but the light goes everywhere.
 
Hi Alex,

I think that some of those shots are a massive improvement. Just getting rid of your chavground beautiful white background has improved them no end, and although there's still work to do, at least you are now lighting the hair directly instead of just flooding everything with spilled light from the background.

6,5,4 and 3 are pretty well lit on the hair and make the hair look interesting. 1 and 8 need moving to the recycle bin, IMO.

4 and 7 are OK on the hair but there are some badly burned out areas (face, shirt) and these detract badly - what you need is high contrast on the hair and low contrast on the clothing, you want people to look at the hair and not be distracted by burned out areas.

TBH, your equipment isn't up to the job, in the sense that you will always struggle unless you have good quality lights that produce consistent power, and unless you have the right type of modifiers - beauty dishes, honeycombs, a softbox with a fairly tight honeycomb too, black absorbers to create dark edges and so on. You can manage without these tools but it will take longer, it will be more difficult and will require more skill.
 
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