Whitening Teeth in Capture One
As of version 8 of Capture One, users have been blessed with the ability to control white balance on an adjustment layer. This is useful for a number of reasons, but the biggest win for my workflow is a very simple, and very repeatable way to whiten and brighten teeth in Capture One.
For a change of pace, I recorded a video to demonstrate this technique. Steps are detailed out below.
Step One: Make you desired adjustments to the overall image
Step Two: In the Local Adjustment tool tab, create a new adjustment layer and call it "Teeth"
Step Three: Use the paint brush tool to paint a mask over your subjects teeth
Step Four: Use the local White Balance adjustment tool to reduce the Kelvin temperature of the masked area until you achieve the desired effect. You can also locally adjust exposure and/or brightness to further enhance the teeth.
I find this to be a really effective, easy, and easily repeatable way to enhance tooth that appear too yellow, while keeping your images in Capture One. I used to rely on Photoshop to do any teeth whitening I needed, which meant I made my adjustments in Capture One, then exported to Photoshop for further editing. Now I can keep 99% of my workflow in Capture One, reserving Photoshop for only major editing.
Fake The Setting Sun with Off Camera Flash
My wonderful and beautiful wife Alesia from our maternity shoot for our third child Rockford. The sun had gone down behind some low clouds and foothills when we saw this patch of flowers. To recapture that sunset feel, I faked the setting sun with my LumoPro LP180 and a CTO gel.
I really like having light sources in frame. Or at the very least, shooting light towards my lens. When I’m shooting outside, I pretty much always try to shoot INTO the sun.
I know, it’s a little outside of some peoples understanding of the "rules" of photography.
I’ve tutored new photographers who think I’m crazy when I set up a portrait shooting into the sun. I just love it.
However, on more than one occasion I’ve been shooting away and the sun dips below the horizon. Or it was obscured by some low cloud cover. Or it was 1pm in July. Sometimes the sun isn’t where I need to it to be, in order for it to be visible behind my subject.
So, I fake it. Here are a few examples.
This was shot at approximately 1pm. The sun was obscured by tree canopy and we faked the setting sun with OCF.
This one is a little more subtle, just a very slight lightwash, from just out of frame.
Fake setting sun (the sun had already dipped below the ridge line and some low clouds). Note the placement at the edge of the frame and just above the distance hills.
This set up also included a reflector to bring some light back onto Blanca's face.
This set up is a little more in your face in a sense. This is designed to look like the sun coming through a gap in the tree coverage. The actual sun was higher up in the sky in roughly the same area.
You can achieve this look with a single speed light, a half or full CTO gel (gelled to taste), and a little know-how.
Step One: Understanding
The key thing to remember here is that the strobe is not your main light. This lighting method is the very essence of blending off camera flash with ambient light. In all except for one of the above examples, the ambient light is the main light and the “sun” light is kept relatively low output to blend in with the ambient exposure. Like the secret to a good haircut or a killer smoothie, its all in the blending.
Step Two: Expose Properly
Get your ambient exposure at or a little above where you want it. If you’re working on a close in portrait (chest, head, and shoulders) you can bounce light off a reflector and back into your subjects face. Overexposing the ambient light slightly will go a long way in making your strobe blend with the daylight.
This was the ambient for this shot. You will see we need to expose OVER this to help the strobe blend with the natural light.
This is a great example of the ambient light being too low and making your cone of fake sunlight obvious. Blend Blend Blend!
Step Three: Place and set your light
Get your CTO gelled flash in frame or JUST out of frame and set power output to your desired effect. play around with the blending of it until it looks natural.
We finally hit the goldilocks ratio of ambient and strobe. The result is a totally convincing setting sun.
Step Four: Realize this doesn’t always work
This is a little hard to explain, but there are a few situations where this just wont work. It will look fake and contrived. The most common situation is where there are a lot of objects between your flash and your subject. The cone of light is not sufficient to fake sunlight on all objects in the frame. You want to make sure that any objects aside from your subject are being hit by this fake sunlight also, otherwise it will just look really fake. Observe the image above, where our cone of light is obvious. It is a combination of underexposure of the ambient light, and the viewer seeing too many background elements that SHOULD be affected by the "sun" light, but aren't.
Step Five: Remove light stands in post (if necessary)
Whenever possible I hide light stands or use a LumoPro studio clamp to reduce the amount of post processing I have to deal with. In general however, it's not terribly difficult to remove a light stand in Photoshop.
Shooting Your Kids - 5 Tips From a Photographer and Father of 3
Top 5 tips for shooting your kids from a photographer and father of 3
Far and away the best part about being a photographer is that I have access to solid photography all the time. As a father of 3, that comes in really really handy. I've been thinking a lot about how to get great shots of your kids, and here are the top 5 things I came up with.
Disclaimer: These are more philosophy related, than technical tips, although I will include a few quick tips at the end of this post.
Here we go!
Patience and a little bit of right place/right time can create some really nice images.
Patience
Arnold H. Glasow said “The key to everything is patience. You get the chicken by hatching the egg, not by smashing it.” As parents, you and I understand this concept probably more than most people do. Children have a way of requiring seemingly inhuman amounts of patience. This virtue is the number one key to getting great photos of your kids. I can’t stress enough how critical it is, and there are a few aspects to it.
You need classic, good old fashioned patience. Not losing your cool. Going with the flow. You don’t want your kids on edge when the camera comes out because they’ve come to associate it with mom or dad getting snippy and pushy.
You also need patience in the form of restraint. Don’t try to snap away at every moment. Be selective in what you shoot, and leave the image reviewing until later. It’s a hard habit to break, but burying your nose in the LCD screen is a surefire way to lose your kids cooperation. Be present in the moment with them (more on this in step 5).
Lastly, you need to recognize that you may not get a great shot this time around, but with perseverance you will eventually get some incredible pictures of your kids.
Sometimes you just don't get the shot you want. And sometimes the result can still be pretty fun.
Technique
The second most important thing is having a good grasp on photographic technique. Understanding how the functions of your camera work together to achieve exposure is critical. If your kids are moving around a lot (which they definitely are) you probably want a pretty fast shutter speed in order to freeze the action. But you also probably want pretty generous depth of field if they are moving toward you or away from you, which means a smaller aperture setting. The only way to reconcile those two things is to increase ISO.
There are a lot of ways to get the right exposure, the example above simply illustrates that you need to understand and be thinking about photographic technique and fundamentals during your session. If you don’t know the basics, take a class. A simple community college course will be enough to get you started, and the rest is practice and patience (see above).
Hannah runs away from me, but with the right shutter speed and aperture (thus, depth of field) I still get a killer shot
Planning
If I had to take these 5 tips and cut them back to 3, planning would make the cut. Even when keeping it simple and casual, planning is vital. You have a secret weapon when it comes to planning! They are YOUR kids. That means you shoot on your schedule, and because you control meal time, nap time and bed time, you can leverage all of these things to work in your favor.
Maybe Jackson is usually a little grumpy right after nap, but tends to open up and get silly about an hour before dinner. That might be the time to strike. Maybe Hannah is really cuddly and sweet first thing in the morning, that might be the right time for a quick mother daughter photo shoot. Leverage your kids naps and bed times to work in your favor also. If you want to shoot with strobe, use the kids nap time to dial in light. Use a stuffed animal as a stand in so there is no guess work once the clock is ticking. All parents understand that good behavior in children is basically equity that can be depleted, so wasting it is generally not wise.
This family Christmas portrait took tremendous planning and testing, all of which was done before the kids ever got in the shot. Even so, we still had to just put Hannah to bed and then bring her out while asleep. Sometimes they just don't want to cooperate.
As an aside, here’s another pro tip that is planning at the macro level. Give your kids the bedroom that gets the best light in the house. Seriously. Your kids are comfortable in that space and will open up and you can get some incredible photographs right in their own bedroom.
See what I'm saying about the room with the best light? Shot on film: Kodak Portra 120mm, Yashica 635
Routine
By routine, I don’t mean it should be a daily or weekly occurrence that should be treated like bath time or church. I mean do it often enough that it’s not out of the ordinary. And when the camera comes out, don’t make it a big deal. Just have it there, engage with your children, and snap a few frames. Making it an ordinary part of your life does two main things for you:
1. It desensitizes your children to the camera and your behavior while shooting. This will allow them to be more comfortable and act natural, allowing for more opportunities for those delicious candid moments.
2. It increases the likelihood that you will get something really magical, just because you will be shooting more often.
Since Dad always has a camera, Hannah just goes on about her business.
Playfulness
Just play with your kids. Have your husband or wife play with your kids and when they run away from you, or toward you, or turn to pour tea into Banjo’s teacup, lift the camera and snap your shot. No fuss, just be present, be playful and occasionally snap a frame or two.
Remember: You’re a parent first, and photographer second. Don’t sacrifice their desire for your attention in order to get the shot. They will reward your patience (that word again!) with cooperation and candidness that will result in images you will cherish for the rest of your life.
Rocky laughs at silly Daddy
A Few Final Thoughts
I promised a few technical tips, so here you go:
- Get down to their level, or lower. There are very few interesting shots of kids from an adults perspective
- Don't ask them to smile or say cheese. Make them laugh instead. Kids do weird things when you ask them to smile.
- Use strobes aimed at the ceiling in two or more corners of the room for indoor shots, if you are short on light. This will create a natural looking boost in the overall room light.
The light in this room was boosted with 2 LumoPro LP180 manual speedlights in opposite corners aimed into the corners.
Finish strong.