Lighting martial arts students

[kevingeary]

I don't want to do boring light for a martial arts shoot coming up. Here's what I was going to experiment with a few days prior to the shoot...but please give me any ideas or if you know it's not going to work well, please say so:

Two strip lights (AB800s) slightly to the side/behind subject.
ABR800 ringlight on camera.

I want good rim lighting to separate subject from background and I want somewhat even lighting on the subject so I'm not throwing lots of shadows around.

I'll have a spare AB800 that I can grid to throw on the background or to use as a hairlight.

If you want to suggest a setup...here's what I have available...

3 AB800s
1 ABR800
Large Octabox
Two Strip Boxes
22" Beauty Dish
10-40 Degree Grids

Shooting 80 martial arts students of various heights along with some small group shots against a background (probably white or grey).

[Rentham]

You are probably familiar with him, but Dustin Snipes does great sports portraits. I've seen some of his work using pretty much the same set up you have.

Dustin Snipes | Photographer

[kevingeary]

I haven't heard of him. Thank you. Does he post any of his lighting setups?

I looked over his blog and there's some talk of lighting setups but he hasn't posted to the blog since 2009

[Rentham]

This is the shoot I had in mind:

70 basketball portraits in in two days | Dustin Snipes

Tutorial: Photoshop for 70 basketball portraits in in two days | Dustin Snipes

[kevingeary]

Thanks. I think that will really help.

So do you think I should use the ring light for front fill or just use one of my AB800s in an octabox?

Oh...and do you typically use a light meter--I love your studio portraits.

[Rentham]

I don't have any experience with a ring light, so I'm not sure I can offer much there. I would give the beauty dish a try as the main, with the other ABs as rim in either the stripbanks or gridded. That might give you some nice, punchy light. Otherwise, the octa will definitely work.

I didn't have a light meter until recently, but I love mine for the time savings alone. Especially in the middle of a shoot when you don't want to have the subject standing around while you dial lights back in after moving them.

Let us know how the shoot turns out. I'm interested to see them.