First Ever Portraits with Studio Lighting

I'm doing A Level Photography at my school and I'm really interested in studio lighting and portraiture, so I decided to have a go at it for myself for the first time today. I've never used any kind of studio lighting before so these shots are my first ever attempts at anything like this. There was no real preparation for these shots, I just did a bit of research into lighting, borrowed the school's 2 crappy lights, and got a few of my friends and teachers to let me take photos of them. I was going for a dark Jill Greenberg kind of look, hence the rather dramatic lighting. Also, I'm selling various size prints of the photos with optional airbrushing, and the profit's going to be split between my school and a charity (it's part of a subject I have to take called CoPE).

(No PP on any shots, they're all straight out of the camera).

Any C&C greatly appreciated, I'd really like to know how people think I could push this to the next level! Just incase anyone's wondering, we had a halloween fancy dress today, hence the wacky paint and outfits!

All highly experimental!

Looks like everybody was enjoying themselves.

Lol, yeah, we had a good time!

I would consider getting a reflector to bounce some of the light on the far side of the faces. Because the background is black, the shadows on the far side of a few make them blend in and not really POP like I personally would like. Other than that, great first go at it =P

Good set, plenty of variety, and creatively done.

A little PP and I think they would sing, some are a tad soft (particularly around the eyes) so a little sharpening would make them pop.

And if you could drag a little more shadow detail out of the dark areas?

Thanks for the comments!

Believe it or not, lol, I was actually using a silver reflector just off to the subjects' right which did improve the lighting a little, although I'm aware the shadows are still slightly dark for some people's taste, so I'll experiment with it some more when I do my next shoot in a couple of weeks. I did have a go at bringing out the shadows a little bit, but I personally prefer the shots with the dark shadows, as that was the kind of low key look I was aiming for (i.e. as far away from the 'school photo' look as possible!).

Thank you both again for your comments, I'm taking everything you say on board! Any other C&C greatly appreciated, I'd really like to hear what people think!

Very nice for a first attempt. You captured the mood you were looking for. Watch your crops. There are severed hands in a few. I'd like to see a bit more light in the eyes. But, that's very subjective.

I think you did a great job. I have less experience than you but very interested in studio photography.
Helping your subjects relax is the hardest part, I'm envious!

Hope you don't mind, I took my favourite and did a little post. Nothing drastic.
Adjusted the crop.
Slight contrast and brightness increase
Some sharpening.

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Thank you!

And thanks for the edit too, it's pretty much exactly what I'll be doing when I go to sell the shots, so I'm glad to see someone likes the same kind of PP as me! However, lol, the background is the only thing I don't like about that shot - it doesn't fit in with the rest of the series! Lmao, I can see where you're coming from though, it does actually work quite nicely in that shot. To be honest though the only reason it's like that is because my teacher decided to move around my setup for some other photos at lunchtime, and initially I didn't put the lights back exactly where they originially were, hence the curtain in the background being lit.

The only other thing I think I'll do in terms of PP is adjust the colour slightly in the shots of the African and Asian people, as their skin has come out slightly too orangey and saturated for my liking. What do you think?

For the most part these look great.

why were you shooting 1/60?

1. The two lights I was using were in sync with my external flash, so I wanted to ensure that all the flashes were fired within the duration of the shutter speed.

2. For some reason, fast shutter speeds resulted in the flash being fired before the shutter was fully up, resulting in half black photos.

3. The 'true speed' of the shots was determined by the speed of the flashes, not by the shutter speed of the camera itself.