Simple Outdoor Portrait

[Shelby Lane]

Posting for the outdoor portrait newbies out there: if you choose the right time and location, you can photograph people outdoors without a lot of equipment or post production fixing in Photoshop. I shot this at about 9:30 yesterday morning out at the McNay Art Museum in San Antonio. It was very, very busy on the grounds, even for a Saturday morning, and the sky was mostly cloudy with the sun peeking out occasionally. If we'd started the session any later the light would have gotten too bright, too fast, so our portrait areas would have been more limited.

I chose this spot on the museum grounds very carefully, looking for good portrait light first and THEN background interest:

-- the overhead light was blocked by a tree (to get rid of "top light," which causes shadows under the eye sockets, nose and cheeks, giving you "raccoon eyes" and usually making the facial features look a little dirty and distorted)

-- there was still open sky (over my right shoulder instead of straight in front of her, to give some direction to the light so you can see the contours of her face -- notice the catchlights in both eyes). The open sky is important because if your subject is facing into the shade, the light in their eyes won't be good and you'll run into some other exposure/lighting problems as well.

-- the brightest sunlight was behind her (to give her that nice rim/hair light and, again, to keep the light on her face softer and more controlled)

-- there was some background interest (the pop of color from the bushes and the curving lines and texture of the steps) but where we would not have problems with people or other major distractions in the bg

It's not a perfect image... her skirt is a little too hot in the back. But it does help demonstrate some things you might want to look for when doing outdoor portraits. There is no supplemental reflector in this portrait, because we didn't need one -- the light was already directional and soft enough, and putting a reflector on the shadow side of her face would have made the light flatter than I wanted.

Nikon D200, 100ISO, Nikkor 50mm 1.8 (f/3.2 @ 160/s)

[RKEnnis]

Very nice shot.

And thanks for sharing your thought process for choosing the spot for this photo. Very helpful.

[danchez]

I wish my thought process was so well thought out before I start pressing the shutter. HA HA HA. Seriously though, thanks for sharing and a very nice picture.