best lighting for wrinkles

What lighting setup do you find best for people who have deep wrinkles? I've found that most women do not want to see crow's feet or wrinkles on their cheeks when they smile. For whatever reason wrinkles on men just make them look more distinguished. I'd like to see better results straight from the camera and less post processing.

harlo wrote in post #11857688
What lighting setup do you find best for people who have deep wrinkles? I've found that most women do not want to see crow's feet or wrinkles on their cheeks when they smile. For whatever reason wrinkles on men just make them look more distinguished. I'd like to see better results straight from the camera and less post processing.

SUPER soft light... large light source. A large softbox and the Lastolite Trilite is a great combo to fill in the deep shadows.

Hope this helps.
Hatch

If one side is worse than the other, put that side in the shadows, whether you're using broad or short lighting. I large, diffused light source is going to provide softer lighting. And a little cleanup in post can work wonders!

soft yeah, but also flat. Light (the wrinkles) from straight on, not from the sides

Okay, thanks for the reply's.
How big a softbox are we talking about? I have a 36" octo. I'm taking half body to bust type portraits. Is the 36 large enough? Also, what distance from the subject would you set the lighting?
I've several lights and reflectors to work with. And, I'm assuming the longer the focal length the better? Flattening the image as opposed to a shorter focal length.
I'm very comfortable taking portraits... However, I'm really struggling with this scenario.

The bigger the light source the softer the light.

This also means bringing it in real close. The further the light, the smaller it becomes to the subject.

I do find that light tends to settle after a certain distance though, i was using a bare/reflector with no diffusion from about 20+feet or so, and it was about as soft as a SB would of been couple feet away.

Personally, i don't really like hiding wrinkles. If you're old youve earned them, show em off. I see them as marks of character, experience and wisdom. They make your picture so very different from every other portrait.

Do a BD high at the side with a Grid.

You can try moving the 36" octa in real close and using a fill light or reflector in tight as well. I don't like flat lighting, even in situations like this, but I will go for less of a contrast ratio (like 2:1). I experiment with exactly this sort of thing quite a bit because my wife and her friends are that age where they are not yet comfortable with the idea of earning those wrinkles and prefer to mask them as best they can. I'll ask my wife to pose for me after a long day of work and without applying fresh makeup, just to see what I can do with lighting for the most flattering light possible. You may laugh, but in my last experiment, I used the 74" octabank as my key light and 60" octa for fill! It was actually not as flattering as I had hoped, and I'd show the results, but then I'd have to sleep with one eye open for the rest of my life. Next I'm going to try the 39" DO on a boom with deflector disc and two layers of diffusion with the Lastolite Triflectors to see if that's more flattering.

If the wrinkles are part of the character or the shot then that's great but let's face it.. most people that are getting older or have lines and wrinkles on their faces don't want to be photographed accurately and don't want super sharp images with high contrast. It's not flattering and unless you're the Marlboro man it's probably not desirable.

If they do happen to want the wrinkles or think it's characteristic then you can light the subject any way you'd like but if the idea is to hide or conceal some of the skin texture then not only do you want a large, soft light source but you want nice soft, even fill.

Adding even fill will lift all those shadows that are in the nooks and crannies and valley's, thus reducing contrast and giving a smoother and softer appearance.

Stay away from hard lighting and strong side lighting. Keep the main light closer to the lens' axis than you normally would and use the largest fill source you can, coming from camera position.

Again, thanks for the replies! I now have several things I'm anxious to try. And yes, my wife is one of those persons who does not like the idea of the photo being so detailed as to show her ever so slightly aging but beautiful features...

but then I'd have to sleep with one eye open for the rest of my life

It sounds like that this imposes too many restrictions on lighting variation. Maybe the best way to go is to do more pp.

No restrictions. It's no different from knowing how to shoot someone that is heavy or has a large nose.

The lighting and composition are designed to suit the subject and the shot.

We create large soft light sources all the time. This is no different. Just ramp up the fill to really act as fill. No drama, no more than about 1/3 or 1/2 stop difference between main and fill.

And Robert's suggestions are pretty much what I tried in my experiment. With my small studio, using the 74" octa for main and the 60" for fill left me a pretty small space to shoot through! My key light was as high as I could make it with 7.5' ceilings and angled down from camera left. My fill was straight on and slightly to camera right. I used a gridded BD for a hair light. The lighting was definitely soft, and it was flattering...just not as flattering as I hoped. The 85L at f11 is pretty damn sharp, and I still needed to do some skin smoothing and healing in post. The wife still wasn't too happy with the pictures! I assume that's what she meant when she said, "Oh my God. Is that how old I look to everyone else?"

We all know that if we take a piece of paper and lay if flat and light it evenly it will be featureless.

So, take the piece of paper wad it up into a ball and then smooth it back out so its nearly flat again.

Now use it as a subject and work on the lighting scheme to get some features (wrinkles) but not the hard raking light that accentuates the crinkles in the paper. That should give you a close approximation to the light that will give you skin with character rather than wrinkles.

TMR Design wrote in post #11863746
No restrictions. It's no different from knowing how to shoot someone that is heavy or has a large nose.

The lighting and composition are designed to suit the subject and the shot.

We create large soft light sources all the time. This is no different. Just ramp up the fill to really act as fill. No drama, no more than about 1/3 or 1/2 stop difference between main and fill.

I'm definitely not experienced enough to say too much. But you sounds like just doing some word play. According to your, and others', opinions, the situation of the OP requires very soft light and light from certain angle. Also, the contrast cannot be too big. And probably close-up on the face is not recommended. Aren't these restrictions?

colormaniac wrote in post #11864336
I'm definitely not experienced enough to say too much. But you sounds like just doing some word play. According to your, and others', opinions, the situation of the OP requires very soft light and light from certain angle. Also, the contrast cannot be too big. And probably close-up on the face is not recommended. Aren't these restrictions?

Word play? Not at all. Almost all lighting, to some degree, is about problem solving. You always have a set of circumstances you work with and you can either see those circumstances as limitations and throw in the towel or understand how to problem solve and create the lighting you want and need for the shot.

We create soft light all the time. We create large fill sources all the time. We reduce contrast all the time. We work a light source close to the face and feather it to avoid having the hot spot strike the center of the face. We avoid or control specularity.

The point is that we do all these things all the time regardless of whether we have a 16 year old doing junior portraits, a 50 year old bank executive or a 90 year old woman.

I'm just not seeing any of this as a restriction.