Lighting Technique: Three Lights and the Sun

Posted by John Keatley | Filed under Lighting Technique, Personal Work, Tools Of The Trade

Portrait of a retired university professor and his wife. Photo by John Keatley.

A month or so ago, I was hired to photograph several people for a marketing publication.  They were looking for lifestyle type portraits.  So I shot most of them in natural light, often with a reflector or two.  Warm, happy, and beautiful was my direction, and so I was looking for bright colorful backgrounds.  When I arrived at this couples home, I went through the usual introductions and before long, I was taking the grand tour of their home.  It’s always funny to me that as a photographer, I can walk into a strangers home, look around in all of their rooms, and tell them what to wear.  Years ago, this took a bit of getting used to, but now it feels somewhat normal.

There was not much in the house that lent itself to what I was looking for, so I decided we would head to a park.  As we were leaving, I took notice of this room with the piano, the old lamp, and the bright sun streaming through the window.  For a moment, I turned off the filter in my head that was only looking for commercial lifestyle type portraits.  The muted colors and the overall feel of the shot that began forming in my head was not something that would interest my client, but I decided that it was worth exploring for myself.

This was a really fun lighting process, and there were some elements that I don’t often get to work through.  I know a lot of you are often curious, and email me about my lighting, so how about a lighting walk through.  Take out a sheet of paper and a number 2 pencil.  Here we go.

Direct sunlight was coming through a large window on the left side of the frame.  You can see the bright spot on the floor pointing toward the piano.  There were soft rolling shadows all over the wall and furniture from the sunlight bouncing off the white carpet and other light surfaces.  It was beautiful light, but the range between the light on the floor and the shadows was too wide to capture with detail.

I took several frames with just natural light, to get a rough idea of what the shot could feel like.  After I felt confident that something interesting could develop, I ran out to the car and brought in all of the lighting that I had with me.  Three strobes in this case.  I almost didn’t even bring them because I didn’t think I would be using lights that day.   The first thing I did was get an exposure that had some detail in the  sun spot on the floor.  I wanted it to be bright, but not blown out.  My goal was to mimic the natural light, but bring the range from highlight to shadow down to something that is within the camera’s range of capturing.  I shot at ISO 100, and the exposure was 1/125 at f/9.0.

Exposing for the brightest spot in this case made the rest of the frame very dark.  The next step was to add in light and bring up the shadows.  I like to add and work with one light at a time when I am building my lighting setups.  I start with the brightest light source.  The sun in this case, and work my way down to the fill lights.  I feel like this gives me more control, and allows me to better see the results and consequences of each light that I am using.

Equipment: Before I get into how I used my equipment to create this shot, here is a list of the actual equipment I used along with links to the product pages.

Camera: Canon DSLR
Lights: Elinchrom Ranger Battery Pack and Head x2
Extra Elinchrom Ranger Free Lite A Flash Head
Light Modifiers: Photoflex Large Softbox
Wescott 45” Umbrella x2

The Key Light: I set up a large softbox on camera left, in front of the window.  There was a lot of furniture and items in the room, and although I did rearrange quite a bit, I didn’t want to make a complete mess of their home.  There was not enough floor space to set up a stand where I wanted the key light, and even if there was, it would have cut into the frame of the shot.  So I set up a C stand with a grip arm and mounted the softbox on the end of the arm.  I swung this over the couch and up against the window so that it was angled down toward the floor and feathered away from the wall (pointing across the frame toward the right side of the room).  The reason for feathering the softbox from the wall was because I wanted to create a darker shadow in the upper left corner of the frame.  The more the softbox is pointed away from the wall, the larger and deeper the shadow in the left corner becomes.  I also wanted the light to be a little more even across the frame, and feathering gave me more reach.  You can see a slight shadow with a hard edge on the floor on the very far right at the base of the drawers.  This shadow was from the softbox.  If I had the softbox pointed directly toward the couple, the light would not have reached that far.  And finally, let’s not forget.  It is kind of important to actually light the subjects with the key as well.  So I made sure that the light was hitting them how I wanted.   The head and softbox were actually a little too large for the C stand arm, so I did have to do a little work with some tape, clamps and an extra light stand to keep the softbox from pointing straight down.  Clamps and tape are a must if you ask me.  Now we have a floor highlight that is not blown out, and properly exposed people on the piano bench.  But, the right side of the frame was still really dark.

Fill Light #1: The goal for the fill light was to control the shadows.  I don’t want this light to be even with the sun, or the key (softbox).  What I want out of the fill is to bring up the dark shadows to a level that has detail, but still looks and feels like a shadow.  I used a 45” umbrella with black backing that I bounced a strobe into.  So the strobe is actually pointing away from the subject into the umbrella and bouncing the light back onto the frame.  I experimented with a number of positions for the first fill light, but I ended up placing it about a foot or so behind me, and two or three feet to my right.  The height of the strobe head was about a foot above the subjects head, and the umbrella was not angled much.  The umbrella rod was about parallel with the ground.  You can see the shadows created by this light on the ground behind one of the piano bench legs, and the right piano leg.  There is also a very soft and subtle shadow on the wall to the left of the drawers.  This tells you that the actual strobe head was just to the right of the edge of the drawer, but the umbrella just swept over the edge to create that soft shadow.  If I would have moved the light further to the right, the shadow would have grown and become darker.  If I would have moved the light more to the left, the shadow would have disappeared completely.  I left the shadow in to create some depth on the right side of the frame.

Fill Light #2: I also set up a second umbrella for fill light.  I placed this about 9 feet away from me on the right side of the frame, and used it to fill in the shadow on the wall to the right of the drawers.

And then it was time to start shooting.  After a number of different poses, I decided on this one.  I really like this shot.  The man is a retired professor, and it turns out that he taught photography for a few years.  This was many years ago, and the program eventually was shut down when funds became tight.  But it was a lot of fun talking to him about cameras and equipment.  It was also the first time I had a subject offer to set up and take down stands and actually know how to do it.

I hope you found this interesting, or helpful.  Feel free to post any comments or questions.  I will do my best to respond and answer any questions you may have.

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Permalink | July 21st, 2009

64 Responses to “Lighting Technique: Three Lights and the Sun”

  1. Tim Broyer Says:
    July 21st, 2009 at 1:27 pm

    Great post! I like how you write the lighting description in an easy, flowing manner that lends itself to being understood. Thank you for sharing this.

  2. John Keatley Says:
    July 21st, 2009 at 1:43 pm

    No problem Tim. Thanks for your comment! I’m glad you liked it.

    Once again. A very big thank you goes out to David at http://www.strobist.com for linking to to this post. It is exciting to get this kind of interest in my work.
    Here is the link to the Strobist post.
    http://strobist.blogspot.com/2009/07/inspired-by-natural-light.html

  3. Krystal Kerr Says:
    July 21st, 2009 at 2:17 pm

    I love hearing about the behind the scenes lighting, and how photographers set up shoots… It is interesting to see the step by step processes that people go through in order to get the shot they’ve envisioned. Enjoyed the post!

  4. Marcin Retecki Says:
    July 21st, 2009 at 2:29 pm

    That was really interesting story. Thanks for sharing! You should definitely write more “backstage” posts like this one. One in a month is a must :)

  5. Alejo Says:
    July 21st, 2009 at 3:27 pm

    Thank you very much for this post.

  6. Eric Corliss Says:
    July 21st, 2009 at 11:46 pm

    Thank you! I am always wondering how you light your shots and have wanted to email you before. Your lighting always looks…complicated (maybe sophisticated is a better description) so this post was awesome.

    Question: what elements did you get to work with in this shot that you do not get to work with very often?

  7. John Keatley Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 7:26 am

    Hey Eric,
    Natural light / direct sun for starters. Maybe has something to do with the fact that I live in Seattle. But a good amount of my work lately has been studio. And the other elements would be working in an environment like this picture. Where there are many little objects and corners casting shadows. There were a lot of details to watch out for. And again, because of so much studio work, environments are a welcome sight for me. A lot of my personal work in the past couple of months has been outside, and environmental to try to balance this out. I’ll try to do another one of these lighting walk through’s with some of my personal work in the weeks to come. Thanks for your comments and question.

  8. Anon Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 8:00 am

    Thanks for not only sharing your setup, but detailed info on your thought process.

  9. Chris K. Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 9:27 am

    As the designer on the project for which these photos were taken, I have to say I loved this photo and the others in this setting the most. It’s unfortunate when a client doesn’t really “get the picture,” but it looks like much good has come out of this image. Thanks for the tips and walkthrough. Great work, John!

  10. Kevin Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 10:03 am

    John,

    Thank you so much for this post! I came across your work about 6months ago, it has had a huge impact on me. I’ve been a “pro” photographer for the past few years. I kinda hit a wall as far as my style and what I was shooting. When I saw your work I was so impressed and influenced that I’ve started to climb the wall and create a style that truly makes me happy! This post is truly inspiring and helpful. Do you have a photo of your light set up by chance?

    Kevin

  11. Carolyn Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 12:31 pm

    Thank you so much for providing such detailed lighting info! I really appreciate it! This is an excellent portrait and I so admire your work.

  12. Abba Richman Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 8:19 pm

    Beautiful preconceived photograph and very thought out lighting, superb craftsmanship and a stunning photograph

  13. mark donovan Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 8:21 pm

    Just came over from Strobist, thanks for posting this,very nice detail. very heplfull, another site for my favs

  14. Leon Godwin Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 8:42 pm

    Word on the Tape and Clamps. Never leave home without them.

  15. Geoff Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 9:37 pm

    Thanks for the run through. Excellent work. I really like your methodical approach to adding light one at a time. I totally understand the concept but don’t quite implement it in such a professional way. Thanks again.

  16. Dan Depew Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 9:51 pm

    Great post, John, thanks. Amazing work, as always.

  17. Green Tee Readings » Links for July 22nd through July 23rd Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 10:05 pm

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  18. Joachim Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 11:12 pm

    Really nice writeup.

    Great portrait as well.

    Thanks for sharing.

  19. Alan Bremner Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 11:16 pm

    Thanks for posting this. Its great to be able to read about your thought process when lighting.

    Alan

  20. a j french Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 11:21 pm

    thanks for this post (so it via strobist.com)
    very interesting to see how you work.
    A few questions: how long did it take you to get the lights set up so you could start shooting and were the couple there all the time ?

    (btw. in your “leave a reply” part the text is white on white and one can’t read it!)

  21. Dave Warren Says:
    July 22nd, 2009 at 11:56 pm

    top draw, the way the mans head cuts the edge of the picture, also very brave to not have the lady facing into the camera, thank`s for sharing.

  22. UncleSam Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 12:15 am

    I liked the setup with 2 fills, as well as the extreme placement of the key. Very interesting. First I tried to get the positions of sources by the shadows on the floor cast by the objects in the frame. Partially, I got these, but the text clarified all.

  23. Eric Mesa Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 4:52 am

    Thanks for not only sharing the setup, but also your thought process. With just the setup I know how to light this exact scene. With the thought process I can begin to understand how to light my own scenes.

  24. Taylor Young Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 5:14 am

    Very nice post!

    One of my favorites. Love all the detail.

  25. Kathy Marciante Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 5:31 am

    Great post! What I find interesting is in the past I would set up a lighting situation … I would have shadows and feel I didn’t get it “correct”. You’ve shown us that it isn’t always “correct” the first time. Don’t panic ( as people sit there watching you figure it out). Stop and think. LOOK and SEE what you have then add other lights (or reflectors) one at a time, until the lighting is “correct” or what you’re looking for. Thanks! Hope I can do this next time!!

  26. Heinz Schmidt Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 5:43 am

    Hey wow, great post. Brilliant explanation of your light placement, love it love it love it.

    Great job on the lighting and great post.

    Regards
    Heinz

  27. Great lighting blog post « Commercial Portrait & Stills Photographer Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 5:54 am

    [...] It is therefor an utter joy when one comes accross a very well written blog post regarding lighting on a commercial photography shoot, like this one by Seattle based advertising and editorial photographer John Keatley. [...]

  28. Sarah Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 5:55 am

    Thanks, John, for the step-by-step process of how you set up your lights. Very educational!

  29. brennandesigns Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 6:11 am

    wow i love the shot.. it has a humbleness that really makes me feel like im in the room with them. also great post and balancing of light…
    thank you

  30. AJ Mallory Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 6:27 am

    John,

    Thanks for posting this info it is insightful. Question for you, how long did it take you to set up this shot and what did you do with the subjects in the interim? Hoping to understand the process from a people side.

    Thank you!

  31. Todd Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 6:41 am

    Just a thought…but you mention that you take shots along the way as you build in each light one by one. It would be very helpful to see the effect of each light you add along the way as part of the post. You know how visual photographer are :-)

  32. Rick Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 6:48 am

    Thanks so much for this detailed and thorough walk through. Any chance that you could post or provide on-line access to those preliminary shots, i.e., key-only, key + 1st fill? It would be particularly instructive to see how each element changed the previous shot. Thanks again. Great post.

  33. John Keatley Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 7:31 am

    @ Kevin – Comment 10
    Hi Kevin,
    Wow. Thanks for your kind words. I’m so glad to hear that you are shooting things that make you happy. I went through a similar experience about a year ago. It started with me forcing myself to shoot more personal work and listening to the ideas in my head. It makes such a big difference, and that is why we got into photography in the first place. Because it’s fun! I don’t have a shot of the lights on this one, but that is something I will try to show in the future. Thanks again for taking an interest in my photography.

  34. John Keatley Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 7:44 am

    @ AJ – Comment 20
    Good questions. I took a look at the time stamps on my pictures, so this is exactly what the timeline looked like.
    From the time I took the first really rough test shot with just natural light, and all my equipment packed in the car. To my first test shot with just the key firing, was 22 minutes. The umbrellas were set up at that point as well, but they were not firing or placed where I wanted them. Next I took many test shots and tried different positions and a few different lights until I got it looking like I wanted. This took another 13 minutes. So the entire setup process was 35 minutes. There was also quite a bit of moving furniture around in that time frame.
    Yes. The couple was there the whole time. I was talking to them as I worked and they were pretty interested. At one point, he left and came back with a digital camera and asked if he could take some pictures. I guess it would feel pretty exciting to have a bunch of lighting set up in your house. Especially if you are not used to having your picture taken. And he also used to teach photography, so it was especially interesting to him.

  35. Tom Li Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 7:47 am

    Excellent post! Very educational. I’m glad that I was directed to your blog through strobist. :)

  36. John Keatley Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 7:58 am

    @ AJ – Comment 30
    Thanks for your questions AJ. I think my answer in comment 34 should explain, but adding to that. It always helps when your subjects are talkative, or ask questions. When someone just sit’s there and doesn’t try to make conversation. There is only so much you can do, and it might not feel super comfortable. These people were great though, and they were very interested in the whole process. And excited to be photographed.

  37. Olance Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 8:05 am

    Hi John,

    got to your post through strobist.com…
    That’s a great walkthrough and I love how you detailed the effect of each light, showing me shadows I wouldn’t have even noticed !

    However, I now feel like the shadows of the right bench and piano legs don’t look really natural, given that all the light seem to come from the left.

    Anyway I do love the result, it’s really inspiring !
    thanks !
    Olivier

  38. Quan Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 8:05 am

    John — great post and really eye opening to how you so gracefully think your way through a shot. You don’t over complicate the process.

    Would it be possible for you tell us the power settings of the strobes?

  39. Matt Kendall Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 9:54 am

    Thanks for sharing a great photo and an even better explanation, much appreciated!

  40. Me Ron Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 12:51 pm

    very nice image, I like the way the upper part is vinetted to hid the clutter. I see only two shadows comming from the keroscene lamp on the piano. I guessing one is from the Sun and the other from the first fill. I had expected perhaps three shadows or even a trace of 4. What’s your take on the lamp shadow? The question is did your photo ed see this image and did it sell?

  41. Chrisdavid42 Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 1:46 pm

    Came over via strobist. Got you on my Reader list now. Thanks for the article, and I definitely will practice your suggestion of adding one light at a time.

  42. TenisD Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 10:33 pm

    Found You thru strobist, second time allready and im not dissapointed.
    Great article, would never guess the light setup of this shot!

  43. Jeff n Says:
    July 23rd, 2009 at 11:33 pm

    Thanks so much for this John.

    I’ve been following your blog for some time now and enjoy your style (and wit).

    Always helpful to see the behind the scenes thought and action.

  44. Bogdan Diaconu Says:
    July 24th, 2009 at 1:11 am

    Thank you for your details ! You have a very good style to tell stories!

    ps: I paste some ideas from your post in my blog (of course, keeping your link). If it is not ok with you, please tell me.

  45. Weekend Links – Week 30, 2009 « compose.click.edit Says:
    July 24th, 2009 at 3:38 am

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  46. Abhishek Says:
    July 24th, 2009 at 7:22 am

    Superb work mate.. thanks a lot for the info :)

  47. Pat Bloomfield Says:
    July 24th, 2009 at 8:27 am

    Great article John. I think the key to great lighting is to be able to make it look completely natural whilst removing unwanted shadows as you have done.

  48. N2U Photography Says:
    July 24th, 2009 at 8:35 am

    I really like this photo. The lighting, setup, poses and color all are eye capturing. And you explained your light setup procedure so clearly. I just looked at your site too. Marvelous photos! I just learned more about lighting!

  49. Nikita Buida Says:
    July 24th, 2009 at 12:20 pm

    The concept of recreating and controlling natural light is very interesting indeed. I like the shot and lighting setup. I also like the fact that multiple shadows were not photoshoped away as they usually do in ad shots – this is truly great for learning how to light.
    Thank you John!

  50. Photorina Studios Says:
    July 24th, 2009 at 1:27 pm

    Thanks for sharing…as a first time reader I was impressed with your giving of information, after all, humility in education is what lends to passing the torch to the next generation and creating great photographers for the future!

  51. DEEP Says:
    July 24th, 2009 at 6:15 pm

    The article gave a new thinking to me about photography.. Thanks a lot for sharing..

  52. A narrative on lighting - Louis Rene Jacome Says:
    July 24th, 2009 at 9:50 pm

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  53. Chris Biele Says:
    July 25th, 2009 at 2:30 am

    Thanks for the setup walkthrough. You explained it all very well. Just by glancing at this you wouldn’t be able to tell strobes were used at all, so you achieved your goal. Way to go.

  54. Die browserFruits sind da. | Digitale Fotografie Lernen - KWERFELDEIN - Martin Gommel Says:
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  55. Uwe Noelke Says:
    July 27th, 2009 at 1:12 pm

    Hi John, thanks for sharing your creative lighting strategy with us. I like the image.
    Regards Uwe

  56. John Thomas Says:
    July 28th, 2009 at 7:01 am

    I found you from the stobist and now you are on my reader list. I can’t wait to look at your other posts. I’m sort of a newbee and trying to learn about light and I think you gave me some really good insight. I’m having a blast shooting and learning and with such a generous community of photographers to share it is a real pleasure.

    Thanks
    John

  57. Jim Says:
    August 6th, 2009 at 7:19 am

    So what about the power that you use for the softbox and strobes? Interested to know how do you determine the setting on this.

  58. John Keatley Says:
    August 6th, 2009 at 7:43 am

    @ Jim (and everyone else interested in strobe power) – Comment 57
    I don’t know what each light metered at for this portrait. I do still use a light meter from time to time, but most of the time I am just going by the look of things on camera. I am also a big fan of the on camera histogram. It’s a good way to see where your highlights are registering. You can’t completely trust the the LCD screen on your camera. If it looks perfect on that bright little screen, you may actually be under exposed. The histogram let’s you see exactly where things sit.

  59. Chris Ridley Says:
    August 10th, 2009 at 7:08 am

    Excellent post, thanks for sharing your lighting setup, it certainly has given me food for thought.
    Thanks again,
    Chris

  60. Robert Says:
    August 13th, 2009 at 1:45 pm

    Very interesting post, especially pointing out the subtle shadows from the various lighting. Now I’ll be forever paranoid about that in my own work!!

  61. Martyn Says:
    August 16th, 2009 at 5:19 pm

    Hello John,

    Jim wrote………..
    ” So what about the power that you use for the softbox and strobes? Interested to know how do you determine the setting on this”

    I also wondered how you had worked this out. So, i’m assuming that you had your strobes set to iTTL or manual settings from the lowest output.

    And camera set on manual.

    I’m new to using strobes and learnt a lot from your article…thanks for posting.

    Regards,
    Martyn.

  62. David Guedel Says:
    September 23rd, 2009 at 2:45 am

    Thanks for sharing this wonderful image.
    I’ve been browsing through a lot of images on the net lately, but this one keeps coming to my mind.
    The light, the pose, the simplicity of it just make for a beautiful experience. And thanks also for sharing the setup.

  63. Links!! – Pamela Helme Photography Says:
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  64. Dave Perris Says:
    November 4th, 2009 at 4:23 pm

    Great step by step explanation, thank you. It’s made me want to get out there and try some new things. Love the image.

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