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Diary of a Fashion Shoot - part 2 of 1 2 3 4 5 6

by Mark Cleghorn Published 01/04/2009

We have four dresses to shoot in the park and lake location, with a time allocation of around 1hr 30mins from arrival to leaving,so time is not on our side - but today the weather is, with bright sunshine and some soft clouds.

Sun can be a best friend or your worst enemy, I just love it, even with a reflective material like a wedding dress, as long as I expose correctly I can record the brightest highlight and the deepest shadow, which will give the subject an almost studio raw and un-softened flash feel, making it very easy to separate the subject from the background by either back lighting, diffusing or simply using a long lens with a wide aperture.

Image - 1 Walking

My favourite Canon lens, which is the 70-200mm f2.8, comes out of the bag on these occasions for almost all of the day. Its ability to throw a background out of focus, even on the brightest of days, allows me to separate the subject from the background, even when the subject is drenched in sunlight. This image is shot at 1/2000 at f4 and demonstrates why it's a perfect lens for full-length fashion - it drops the focus almost instantly to separate the subject.

image 1.
Depending on the client's brief for the shoot, as far as style is concerned it might be a simple open book session, when I am just asked to get whatever I feel suits.

This is rare, however, for this shoot each of the collection dresses has to have a full-length front and back image shot as well as a threequarter image, plus any details, not forgetting the slight changes in the dress accessories. The accessories might be as simple as a belt change, a jacket added, or even a clip in the train.image 2.
When the sun is more of a distraction, or a problem, in the image than a benefit, the quickest thing is to remove it, or diffuse it.

In this case, a large 6x4 Lastolite diffusion screen is placed between the subject and the sun; the twostop diffuser works well here to diffuse the sun, but it also allows me to lift the dark background a little due to the two-stop drop in the light on the subject

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Contact Mark Cleghorn

1st Published 01/04/2009
last update 09/12/2022 14:53:17

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