Black background portrait question

[madplower4]

A friend of mine had a portrait down of his kids (film days) in which everything but the kids faces and hair is black. How would you achieve that type of shot digitally. I am not a photoshop ace, but his portrait was done before photoshop even existed. You can't even see shirts in the picture, it is just of the three girl's heads. It was a group photo though, as there was no cutting and pasting. I think it's a beautiful technique, and would love to do the same with my kids. Advice?

[MikeMcL]

Shoot black on black and drag the levels a bit until the blacks fade together. This is very easy. alot of times if you are careful with the light youwont have to touch it in PP... as long as the blacks are a bit underexposed, all will be well.

[madplower4]

Thanks Mike, that is exactly the look I want to get. I will fiddle with it this weekend. Any chance you can shoot me some exif information for the pictures posted?

[PhotosGuy]

Any chance you can shoot me some exif information Too many variables & it's not going to help? Start with f/8 ISO 100 & work from there.
You really should kick in some light from the back & top to separate the hair from the background.

[MikeMcL]

Yah I normally get them that tone at about f10 and 1/200th. (iso 100)

These ones are dark, but when I am shooting, i bracket them a bit to get a variety to work with. I chose a couple of extra dark ones for you because that is what you were asking for.

The first one was a single light, a bit high so as not to spill onto the BG, and the second was 2 lights at broad angles, so the light spill is far to left and right of the center of the bg that I am shooting.

I shoot with a shadowbox on the first, 2 brolly boxes on the second.

[Tixeon]

Subjects at least 4 ft from the background (darker preferred but not necessarily black) and barndoors (old term) or side blinders on the lights - no background light of course. Feathering the lights slightly away from the background to keep out stray light also helps.

Tim