This little girl is cute and full of attitude!

Got a call from my sister telling me that my great niece Kieley (sp) wanted to come over and do some pictures in my studio. She is only 8 years old but she poses like a seasoned model! I never even had to direct her during the posing process.....all I had to do was keep her in front of the lights....I also got a few shots of her little sister but she has no patience for the whole photography thing being only 2 years old. Anyway here are a few of the many shots I got...C & C is always appreciated and encouraged!
#1

I see now that I missed a lot of spots on the background in the 2nd and last one...I will clean those up tomorrow.

You are getting a lot of blow back from the background lights, resulting in a loss of contrast on most of these. Almost like sunflare shots. To fix that, you need to flag your background lights with something to stop the light from kicking back on to your subject. Some people use white bifold doors on each side of the backdrop or tall sheets of white foamcore, split into a "V" formation. The light isn't consistent across the image either, it is hotter in some areas than in others. You'd need a light meter to remedy that EASILY. Creating even, white whites on backdrops is its own drama and has its own learning curve. Regardless, that little girl is quite the diva, for sure! She seems very comfortable in front of the camera. My fav is the 3rd one, with her hands on her hips and her saucy, sly sideways glance. Very cute!

I appreciate your feedback and agree with your comments. I am flagging my BG lights with cardboard cards to try to kill the light spill but perhaps I need bigger flags? My studio is VERY small and thus limits me from moving my subject too far from the BG which may also be part of my problem. I assumed that I was getting the light reflecting off the bg onto my subject..is that a possibility? I have a light meter but I just set my lights by eye this time. I am lighting my BG with a bare 430ex and a 580ex as I haven't got all the alien bees I need yet. I think some modifiers might help even out the light on the bg. I am getting some white seamless soon so I can stop cloning out the floor to wall seams and save some time. Thanks again for any comments and advice!

Have you tried dialing down the power on your speedlights? If you are shooting on full power, go to 1/2 power and so on. you mentioned you are lighting your background with a 430 and 580. what are you using to light your subject? Or did I misunderstand that?

I have 2 alien bee 800's to light the subjects....one with a fairly large rectangular softbox and the other with an octogon softbox. Perhaps I should use the AB800's to light the BG and the speedlights to light the subjects?? I had the speedlights set at around 1/2 power on the BG. Thanks for the replys!

good work

I have a question about your light set up. Are you using a light meter to measure out your exposure or are you taking pictures then adjusting as you go?

I've done both, but I have the most success using my light meter. If you don't have one or aren't using it you'll be able to get good results but it takes time to set the shots up when you move the subject.

When I am too lazy or my battery has died in my light meter I shoot the background without a subject until I get the exposure I'm looking for. In this case you are trying to blow out the white, but it looks to me like you've overdone it a bit.

After you get your background dialed in get something in place of your subject or if your subject is willing and able to sit through some trial and error adjustments use them for best results. Dial in your light on your subject and then you're ready to shoot.

White is hard to shoot against and it's tough to get it right, using a color or marbled looking backdrop always is easier for me, but your experiences may be different. Other than some adjustments in my RAW conversion I try to get the lighting ratios correct so I don't need to burn or dodge to get my lighting ratio right. It makes processing much quicker but also the photos have a more realistic look to them when the lighting is done correctly.