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Carrie Becker | all galleries >> Life's Simple Pleasures >> animals2 >> chico2a > Why Is White So Hard?
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22-NOV-2007

Why Is White So Hard?

Well, here you go. "Our" dog. Chico. He was ever so kind in helping me last night in my "studio". I want to try to get high key images, but I don't fully understand the concept. When I took these portraits of Chico, the white turned out kinda grey. Why is that? I was able to salvage it in Photoshop, but I would much rather not have to do a whole lot of post processing. I also think that I need to get a nice seamless paper background. I had to patch the wrinkles out, they weren't flattering to my idea of the image.

Also, how do you get the wonderful lighting that makes the subject seem almost 3-d? A pbase friend, John Buffin http://www.pbase.com/image/89345727) does it so well. I know alot of it has to do with a hair light, key light, and a background light, but what if you don't have all of those things? I have a total of 4 lights. only two of them are variable. They are all strobes, but ARGH!! It's so complicated!

Anyway, that is my question, for now. Is how do you make white, white, the first time, and make the image pop?

Suggestions are welcome. Thank you.

Olympus E-300
1/160s f/8.0 at 20.0mm iso100 hide exif
Full EXIF Info
Date/Time22-Nov-2007 19:31:08
MakeOlympus
ModelE-300
Flash UsedNo
Focal Length20 mm
Exposure Time1/160 sec
Aperturef/8
ISO Equivalent100
Exposure Bias
White Balance
Metering Modecenter weighted (2)
JPEG Quality
Exposure Programmanual (1)
Focus Distance

other sizes: small medium large original auto
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comment
snootydog27-Nov-2007 04:14
Hey! I just saw Kevin's comment. That's flattering!
snootydog27-Nov-2007 04:13
White can be really hard unless you are a really proficient hi key shooter which I am not. You really should like the background but you can also bounce two umbrellas at your subject slightly above their head. I shoot a lot of dog photos in the studio and the frustration is that you can't really set your lights the way you can with a human because just as you get the light set, the dog moves enough to throw off your brilliant lighting scheme. So, when shooting hi key dogs I tend to go with a very traditional two bounce umbrella set up with the umbrellas about a foot higher than the dog. You can also light the background.

One other little tip that I've found when shooting dogs, particularly male dogs, is to have them sit a bit more sideways and have them just turn their head towards you.

But you've got a great shot here. I'm just throwing out ideas because you asked a question on my favorite two subjects (studio lighting and animals).

I'll shut up now.
Guest 25-Nov-2007 01:39
Hi Carrie,

I remember asking someone the question once about the white background as I too like this style. I was told that you have to light the background. I typed into google "how to get your background white" and came up with this link for youhttp://photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00GwcB
Hope it helps. There seems to be some good pointers if you sift through it all.
Take Care,
Vera
Guest 24-Nov-2007 04:32
A great person to ask about studio work is Snootydog. She is a pro's pro--especially with animals. I think this is great! V