STICKY:  How to photograph a high school Senior

pridash does some master compositing... he may have some great tips

that "pellepano" guy in glamour & nude.. is also skilled.

ConverseMan wrote in post #14495791
This is my cousin - a senior for this upcoming school year. Decided to go out and have a practice shoot with him on Saturday. Had a blast!

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …/51837486@N03/7​282528160/
Image4-2 by converseman88, on Flickr


Image2 by converseman88, on Flickr

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …/51837486@N03/7​282531364/
Image1-2 by converseman88, on Flickr

Believe it or not, he does smile - just not in these pictures.

Question for you all though....is there a gel that I can use with a PCB Beauty Dish? Having a hard time with the white light from the BD and the sunshine mixing and looking badly. Any suggestions?

These are fabulous! Great lighting, nice relaxed posing....that first one is gorgeous! I would suggest a tiny bit of skin retouching though. Just a smidge.

Senior Portrait . Nikki

All this talk about compositing has me referring back to a book that I got not all that long ago, well nearly a year ago now.
Light Science and Magic: forth edition

It really helped me to understand how to manipulate light to my advantage and with composite type photos the book really helped me to understand how to use light to my advantage a lot more. It's a pretty cool book.

This one works great to, I like to leave it on one of the tables when I have people coming over to interview. It's almost a guaranteed pick up while you are chatting and then they get all excited and start point at photos they like and they want to do this and this for their shoot. It works like a charm, I'm slowly using the photos as a result to create my own version of the book to leave out for people to look at:
500 Poses for Photographing Women: A Visual Sourcebook for Portrait Photographers

I know I've been a little absent from this thread for a long time... Since I had my surgery last year I've been mostly concentrating on my recovery and getting my foot/leg back into shape while also working on expanding my photography as well.

Great shot Phil!!!

Thanks for the critique Tiff. So appreciative of that. Made me smile! I will have another go at the retouching - there does seem to be some more work that could be done.

..... back to photoshop.

Nathan, that first shot is killer. Great job.

PhilF wrote in post #14497364
Senior Portrait . Nikki

Nice Phil. Huge fan or your work

umphotography wrote in post #14486984
Aaron-- no color treatment on her at all. Thats all tanning booth. I didnt touch her. Had to color treat the room to get it up so it looked like sun was shining through. Room was almost blue in color.

I have just started this technique and understand about the learning curve associated with it. So if you have some suggestions it would be much appreciated. That being said, photographers will be the worst critics of this tehnique because they know the ends and outs of the science and what is appropriate for lens and looks. So far, all the kids that we have done this for love them and they have no clue as to whats right or wrong technically. They just like to cool look. As i do more and get more comfortable, I will pick up the technical side as well as get it to where I will be able to fool the better photographers that do this. I enjoy this, its something new that Im working on so I thought I would share. I will get better at the perspective of placement but so far its going pretty good.

Mike,

These composites are starting to look great. I hope you don't mind me giving my opinion.

The thing that stands out most to me is the composition. The senior seems to be a minor part of it and the background is really competing for attention. Think about when you are shooting on location (and I've seen some great stuff from you) and you compose the shot to make the background compliment the senior. In these composites, your senior seems to be small and in the middle of the frame. This is not typical of your on-location shots. I know the senior has to fit the perspective and everything, but maybe the background should be cropped tighter or something along those lines. I just feel like the background is just as important as the senior and I'd like to see the senior getting the attention.

Just my thoughts.

Scott

PhilF wrote in post #14496905
that "pellepano" guy in glamour & nude.. is also skilled.

Hi Phil

That certainly is an understatement

I recently had a senior session on the North Shore near Lutsen, MN. She is a dancer, here is one from the session.

Lighting was an AB800 with a 32x40 softbox.

Appreciate everyone advice on the composites. Gonna keep on trying and I will post a few more as i get them done. The one with the girl in the tunnel is going to get trashed. Full standings are definitely the hard ones with the set ups and backdrops i have. The 1/2 shots are much easier to do and better results for now. I think you guys will really like what I'm going to put up in the future. I spent some time with a guy that really got this technique going and he sells his custom stuff to many of the top dogs in the industry. SO I'm very stoked and will continue on with this process. Stay tuned.

scobols wrote in post #14499857
I recently had a senior session on the North Shore near Lutsen, MN. She is a dancer, here is one from the session.

Lighting was an AB800 with a 32x40 softbox.

Scott

Way to go Scott. that's the set up i use a lot. Works better with a 1600 on bright days so I always take both strobes with me...works pretty trick doesn't it,,,,get some flex TT5's and get prepared to get blown away with faster shutter speeds and hypersynch

When those of you shoot near larger bodies of water, do you like to use a CPL or ND filter. I think I could benefit from a CPL at least, but just wanted to see what others prefer. Thanks.

Tom