Industrial Portrait Lighting

[Pichead]

There are instances when I take self portraits with a well defined theme or message. This is not one of those instances.

I had taken my gear in to work to take portraits of some co-workers. After the day ended, I drug my gear out back to an industrial environment on-site and set up for a quick portrait. I thought a wide angle shot in an unusual environment, with the strobes/umbrellas actually shown, would be interesting.

I set my D700 on the tripod and placed it about 15 feet from where I would be standing. I then set up one shoot through umbrella (with SB-600) slightly in front of my mark, raised as high as possible and pointing downward. The power on this strobe was eventually set to 1/2 power. This acted as the main light.

Behind me and to the right, I placed another umbrella and SB-600. This one however, was covered with a black cover and acted as a reflected light source instead of a shoot-through one, as in the main light. This gave a little light to the opposite side of my face and a slight rim. To keep this from competing with the main light, I backed the power down to about 1/8.

In order to bring out some of the ambient light being put off by the strip lights running along the ceiling, I had to set the shutter to 1/25th of a second at f/4, ISO 200. And, I shot at the widest angle I have available, which was 24mm on my 24-70 f/2.8 Nikon lens.

The strobes were controlled on-camera with the D700's CLS.

After sending this to one friend, the response was, "so, what's the point?" My answer? I don't have a clue.

[erincarter]

I am waiting for my 2nd SB600 to arrive...very excited about it. Any 2 strobe set up tips are appreciated...so thanks for posting

Would love to see the resulting image you took with this set up

[Pichead]

Originally Posted by erincarter

I am waiting for my 2nd SB600 to arrive...very excited about it. Any 2 strobe set up tips are appreciated...so thanks for posting

Would love to see the resulting image you took with this set up

While you can do quite a bit with a single strobe, the second one really gives you significantly more options. I'm thinking about a third...

In this particular instance, I didn't even take a portrait. The shot was intended to be just as you see it. However, I did take some with a similar lighting setup which I'll try to post soon...

Thanks.

[IABoomer]

I think as a "this is how I setup the shot" it works well. As an actual portrait, I think the strobes plus everything else really detract from the person as the subject.

It's a cool environment and with a little different framing, it could be a good environmental portrait, but I think you have to get the lights out of the frame and narrow down the amount of shop shown for it to be a worker in his element.

Venturing offtopic a bit, what is the machine camera right with the huge angle plate on it?