June 21, 18
Sooner or later, I think every photographer thinks about having his own studio.
In his own space, where he can plan and control every step of the picture making process.
For the studio photographer is a different breed.
He doesn't stand passively on the sidelines, recording events as they happen, like say
a photojournalist does.
No, the studio photographer stages his own events, and he does it from scratch.
He starts with an image in his imagination, then using his techniques and tools, he carefully
and deliberately recreates that image on film.
And he does it in an environment which is designed for one thing only, making photographs.
We're in one of the oldest photographic studios in North America, the Peter Britt Studio,
located in a little mining town of Jacksonville in southern Oregon.
In 1852, Britt loaded an ox cart with hundreds of pounds of cameras and supplies and walked
from Illinois to Oregon.
It took him six months.
He opened a photo gallery and produced literally thousands of images, capturing the last days
of the American frontier.
I'm Brian Ratty.
In this half hour, we'll look at the studio, especially at lighting for the studio.
To start with, we'll cover some general principles of studio design, and we'll see how a basic,
all-purpose studio should be laid out.
Next, we'll look at studio lighting and the equipment used to control and manipulate light.
Then we'll cover still life and small product photography.
And finally, we'll deal with some special studio challenges, the problems of photographing
highly reflective surfaces like silver and glass.
Ask any photographer what's the most important thing in a studio, and he'll probably tell
you it's space, plenty of working space.
Chances are he'll also tell you he'd wish he had more of it.
But how much space do you actually need?
Well, of course, that depends on the type of photography you're doing.
A photographer specializing in automobile ads would need a space as large as this, with
high ceilings, a reinforced concrete floor, and wide street-level doors.
On the other hand, a photographer specializing in tabletop shots of jewelry can get by in
a studio no bigger than your breakfast room at home.
But most of us have requirements that fall somewhere in between these two extremes.
What we need is a layout that's adequate for general purpose photography, still life
subjects, small product shots, as well as portraits.
If that's the case, here's a quick way you can roughly calculate the amount of working
space you'll need.
Let's say you know you're going to want to take a portrait shot like this one, a waist-up
portrait against the seamless background, shot with a 35-millimeter camera and a 135-millimeter
telephoto lens.
And let's say you know the 135-millimeter lens is going to be the longest focal length
you'll be using.
The worst case, now we have a starting point.
It's not hard to figure out that for the kind of portrait we're talking about, using a 135-millimeter
lens, you'll need a minimum throw of at least 12 feet between the camera and the subject.
Then you'll have to add a couple more feet for working room behind the camera for your
tripod and yourself.
Then you'll need at least four feet between the subject and the background paper, so you
can control the shadows and have room to put in the background light.
And since background paper comes in nine-foot wide rolls, you'll have to go at least that
wide.
And of course, you'll need space for the background paper itself and the stands or brackets that
hold it.
Then you have to figure in space for your lights and light stands.
You want them clear of the background, so add another couple feet on each side of it.
Even more if you plan to use umbrellas on your lights.
And there are other things to think about.
Out of the way storage space for light stands, tripods, reflectors, and backgrounds that
aren't in use.
And if you're using a dark room, you'll have to figure that in.
And maybe a small office to keep your picture files, a light box to edit on, a desk, a telephone,
and so on.
And if you're going to be doing fashion photography or model portfolios, you'll have to add a
changing room with a makeup table.
It all has a way of adding up, and it can get pretty expensive.
Not all of us can afford the luxury of designing and building a studio from scratch.
But studio photography is more than just space and equipment.
It's an attitude, an approach to photography that can be made to work successfully almost
anywhere.
For example, a simple temporary still life studio like this one can be set up in a spare
bedroom at your home in about a half hour.
A standard roll of seamless background paper suspended between two light stands draped
over an ordinary folding table creates a continuous backdrop or cove.
An inexpensive 500 watt photo flood bounced off a low white ceiling creates a soft, almost
shadowless light source for our still life.
A piece of white cardboard reflects some of the main light back to fill in the front of
our subject.
And a piece of black cloth cuts down on the bounce light spilling onto the background
behind the subject, creating a graduated background effect and giving the picture a sense of depth.
There are a couple of other common principles of studio design and they apply to studios
of any size.
First you should have an adequate supply of power with plenty of outlets, especially if
you're using continuous light sources like quartz halogen lamps.
And if you're using these kind of lights, you'll want to be able to block out any daylight
or artificial light.
That way you'll have the ability to build your fresh lighting designs from scratch.
Finally, neutral surroundings are important to avoid the unintentional reflections from
studio lighting that can ruin a shot.
Walls and ceilings are usually painted black, white, or neutral gray.
Black is the most efficient because it adds nothing to the lighting, but working in a
black studio can be a little claustrophobic.
White on the other hand helps fill in the shadows, whether you want it to or not.
The effect of all these preparations is to create a kind of blank sheet for the most
important element of any studio, the lighting.
The photographer who works mainly on location and outdoors generally learns to treat light
as a condition.
He learns to make the best out of any given lighting situation.
But in the studio, lighting is not a given condition.
A good studio photographer approaches each setup as a completely fresh situation.
He recognizes the potential of lighting and uses it in ways that suits the needs of his
subject.
He decides what lighting effect he wants, then he constructs it step by step.
And since lighting is the major photographic ingredient that studio conditions offer, the
choice of lamps, fittings, and accessories is greater than for any other category of
equipment.
Photofloods provide a continuous light source.
They're the least expensive type of studio lighting.
Their disadvantage is that they generate a lot of heat.
The color temperature of the light they produce changes with age, and they usually have a
working life of no more than about 10 hours.
Quartz halogen lights are more expensive, but they give a more consistent light than
photofloods, and they last longer.
Quartz lights, like photofloods, are rated in watts, but they come in a much greater
power range, from 200 watts up to 4,000 watts and beyond.
But the higher the power, the higher the voltage requirement.
Generally, lamps rated above 1,000 watts can only be used on a 220-volt circuit.
This 1,000-watt quartz floodlight works on ordinary 110-household current.
It throws a broad, even beam, which can be used direct or bounced.
This one is called a total light.
It is a smaller, more portable version of this 1,000-watt lamp.
This 750-watt spotlight produces a narrow, more concentrated beam.
It has a focusing adjustment, which allows you to vary the amount of the light's concentration.
This little 200-watt spotlight is called an inky-dink.
It's used direct to accent a particular area within a scene.
High-powered strobes like these have become the standard of most professional studios.
Although they're expensive, they have some real advantages.
They're fast and cool, and their output is consistent over a long life.
Since the duration of the flash discharge is no longer than 1 one-thousandths of a second,
these units can freeze most regular action, such as rapid movement of a fashion model
or the splash of a liquid.
Their low heat output is a big plus, not only because it makes for more pleasant working
conditions in a small studio, but because it allows you to safely enclose the lamp head
inside different kinds of diffusion material.
It is also a advantage for many subjects, such as food, which are damaged by heat.
This unit has a central power pack or capacitor, which stores a charge rated at 2,000-watt
seconds, and it distributes it to up to five separate lamp heads in adjustable ratios.
Each lamp head has an auxiliary quartz light or modeling light, which can be adjusted to
the same power ratios as the strobes themselves.
They allow you to preview the effect of the strobe and identify potential problems like
hot spots ahead of time.
They also act as a continuous working light that lets you see what you're doing.
All of these studio light sources have been designed to work with additional fittings,
and basically they fall into three categories, equipment to diffuse the light, equipment
to concentrate it, and equipment to reflect it.
Of the three, diffusion is the most important.
Its function is to increase the size of the light so that the source is effectively larger
and therefore softer.
Generally, the more opaque the diffusion material, the more even the area of light and the softer
the shadow.
An ordinary shower curtain stretched over a frame makes a very effective diffuser.
On the other hand, a wire screen called a scrim over a spotlight makes for effective
diffusion.
A soft light or area light suspended above a product table is standard in most still
life studios.
And here, the product table itself provides diffusion.
A single piece of translucent plexiglass can be backlit as well as lit from underneath.
Cones or snoots create a spotlight effect by masking off all but a central or circular
beam.
They're usually used to direct the light towards a specific part of the set.
Burn doors can be adjusted to mask off light, keeping it from spilling onto the areas of
the scene where it's not wanted.
They also create an adjustable shadow edges on all four sides of the light.
Flags like these, also called gobos, do much the same thing.
They control light spill and they're often used to keep direct light from hitting the
camera lens.
Light reflectors come in all shapes and sizes.
Large rolling flats like this are commonly used for fill light in full length portraits.
They can be used to reflect back a direct light coming from the opposite side of the
subject or to bounce a second fill light placed on the same side.
Umbrellas are by far the most common studio reflectors.
They're efficient, lightweight, and portable enough to use on location.
They come in a variety of fabrics, each with different reflective properties.
White is the broadest and softest in effect.
Silver the brightest and most concentrated.
At first glance, this enormous variety of studio lighting equipment and attachments
might look like pure gadgetry.
But the fact is, the lighting quality from all this equipment is different.
Even though these distinctions are sometimes very subtle.
The differences are in the degree of diffusion or concentration, the shape of the light as
it falls, the sharpness of the shadow edges, the evenness of the lighting pattern, and
other subtle qualities.
That's why a full selection of lighting equipment expands the range of subjects that can be
handled in the studio, as well as the number of ways an individual subject can be treated.
Let's look at one of these subjects now, the classic studio still life.
You know, I think every photographer should be a still life photographer for at least
a while.
Not only is it the best way to really learn how to do lighting, but it's probably the
purest form of studio photography and the most challenging.
A portrait photographer can depend on the fact that the personality of his subject will
play a major part in the success of the picture.
But the still life photographer works with inanimate objects.
He doesn't rely on the subject to make the picture interesting.
He relies on himself.
This is especially true in advertising, where the photographer is often expected to create
maximum visual interest out of ordinary objects that aren't interesting to begin with, like
coffee pots and cereal boxes.
And that's the challenge of still life.
The success or failure of the picture depends entirely upon you, your imagination, and the
techniques and the choices you make, the type of background, the angle, the way you arrange
the subject, especially your lighting.
This tea set is not exactly a cereal box.
It has good color, interesting form, and the elegant curves that repeat and harmonize.
In other words, it's visually interesting on its own.
So I want to take a simple approach to the subject.
Instead of adding unusual lighting effects or distracting detail to the background, I
want to isolate the subject from its surrounding so that nothing will detract from its fine
design qualities.
First I've chosen a neutral background, a single sheet of black plexiglass.
It has no color of its own and will accentuate the subject's color.
The black will absorb any of the distracting shadows caused by the light, and the shining
surface will reflect some of the subject's color and form, creating a mirror effect that
will add to the composition.
Mentally at this point, I already have a rough idea of where I want to put my camera.
I want a fairly high angle looking down.
That way I won't have to deal with a horizon line that will distract from the simplicity
of the composition.
The high angle will also show off the oval lines of the cups and saucers to their best
advantage.
But I don't actually set the camera up yet, because the lighting comes first.
To emphasize the subject's strong natural forms, I want to build a fairly directional
lighting plan, almost a portrait style lighting, with the key light coming from above and one
side.
For this light, I want plenty of diffusion, so the light appears to almost wrap around
the subject, creating a very soft transition from the lit to the shadow areas.
By raising or lowering the key light slightly, I can control the shape and position of the
reflections in the plexiglass.
But I'll do that later when I'm looking through the camera.
Now for the fill light, but a second light source for fill would tend to flatten out
the nice three-dimensional modeling of the subject and introduce a confusing new set
of highlights and reflections in the plexiglass.
Therefore, I'll use this white reflector card.
The reflector does the job, and I can adjust the key to fill ratio by moving it in or out.
There.
Finally, I want to add a back light to create a subtle highlight around the outside edges,
separating them from the background.
I don't want it too strong, but I do want it direct, so it will create specular reflections
to accent the rims of the cups.
Once I've got my lighting plan close to the way I want it, I move the camera in and fine-tune
the image on a viewfinder.
I'll make my finished shot of this on a 4x5 transparency film, but before I move the view
camera in, I like to use the 35mm to actually plan the shot.
It gives me the freedom to move around quickly so I can see the best camera angle and choose
the right lens.
Many objects like this silver set have always been a special challenge for the studio photographer.
The problem is these highly reflective surfaces act like mirrors.
They reflect back images of their surroundings, and in the studio that can include a lot of
things you don't want in your shot, like your camera, your lights, even yourself.
The basic principle of photographing these kinds of surfaces is to treat the reflection
itself as part of the subject.
In other words, the surroundings that will be reflected in the surface must be anticipated
and controlled.
Fortunately, in the studio there are ways to do this.
For this shot of the silver set, I have built a light tent out of white foam core.
It blocks out the surroundings, creating a neutral environment for the silver to reflect.
For the lighting, I'm using a single source aimed at the ceiling of the tent.
It scatters the light reflecting it off of all five sides, and that's the effect that's
mirrored in the silver.
Looks good, but I want to add a little bit of color to the highlights.
And since the silver mirrors its total environment, it will pick up some of the reflected powers
of this gold card.
It adds a pleasing gold accent, reflected in some of the surfaces.
Here's a variation in the light tent idea, and a good one for photographing small, shiny
objects like these pins.
Mounting the camera on a copy stand, I took a large piece of tracing paper and rolled
it into the shape of a cone, leaving a hole at one end just big enough for the camera
lens.
Once again, I'm using a single light source, but this time it will be direct.
Without a light tent, the reflections cause some real problems.
But now I'll place the tracing paper in place so it surrounds the pins and diffuses the
light coming from the outside.
Just as reflective objects mirror their surroundings, transparent objects, like these brandy glasses,
show their background.
In both cases, a photograph always takes in more than just the object itself.
And with transparent objects, there's extra complication because their surfaces are often
reflective as well.
The classic solution, a full backlighting.
And that's what I've done here.
I've placed a single broad light behind this translucent table so the light source itself
forms the background, and the subject in front of it is defined by the shadows and the edges
created by the backlight.
But here, the edges themselves, because they're curved and transparent, tend to blend in with
the light and disappear.
I can fix that by adding a black card to each side.
The card reflects back into the highlight areas around the edges, defining them with
a nice kind of black line, which separates the objects from the light background.
And that's about it.
We haven't had time to cover everything, but I think you've seen that in the studio,
the photographer has the creative and technical means to put onto film almost any vision he
might have.
But with this freedom comes a certain amount of responsibility, because there are very
few happy accidents in the studio, and there are no excuses.
The photographer is responsible for everything that appears in his picture.
The results are his alone, for better or for worse.
And that's why a good studio photographer is a careful photographer.
He plans his shots, he takes his time, and above all else, he concerns himself with the
quality of the image.
As in the studio, it's the results that count.
35mm SLR.
And it's no wonder there are a lot of good reasons why 35mm photography has become so
popular.
A 35mm system goes anywhere.
It's fast, flexible, affordable, and easy to use.
A great way to learn to see and record the world around you.
In fact, for many kinds of assignments such as news, action, sports, and travel photography,
35 is the only format that makes sense.
But as you begin to really master the possibilities of your 35mm system and become fully aware
of just what it can do, chances are you'll also become aware of what it can't do.
You begin to slowly realize that there is a whole different world out there, a whole
world beyond the limits of 35mm photography.
Maybe you become first aware of it when you see the superb technical quality of a print
by Edward Weston or Ansel Adams.
Or you might wonder how fine advertising photos are made, where kitchen floors appear sharp
from the immediate foreground to the farthest edge.
Or you might glimpse that world in an architectural photo where the sides of a tall building
appear perfectly parallel in the finished print.
I'm Brian Ratty and that world out there is the world of large formats.
In this half hour, we'll take a good look at large format photography.
We'll start by looking at the classic view camera, the lens, shutter, and all the components
that make up a versatile large format system.
Next we'll look at the proper ways to handle and load sheet film for the view camera.
Then we'll go step by step through the operation of the camera, focusing, composing, and exposing
the film.
Finally, we'll work with the view camera's unique shifts, swings, and tilts to control
perspective, sharpness, and even shape.
You know to me, the view camera is the classic camera.
Its basic design goes back to the earliest days of photography.
In fact, this modern 4x5 really is a direct descendant of the original pinhole camera.
It's just a considerably more refined version.
Instead of a pinhole, today's view camera has a lens that emits light to the film and
forms the image, a shutter mechanism for accurately timed exposure intervals, and an iris diaphragm
to control the amount of light hitting the film plane.
But it has no automatic features at all.
And let's be honest, it's a cumbersome and bulky camera, a machine that must be operated
slowly and methodically.
Because it has no viewfinder, it can't be handheld, it must always be used on a tripod,
and of course, this makes it totally unsuitable for any kind of dynamic subjects or situations
requiring speed and spontaneity.
So why then is the view camera more popular today than it's ever been?
Why is this camera the camera of choice for so many professionals?
Simple, when it's applied to the right subjects, the view camera can be an instrument for taking
photographs of unsurpassed quality.
The logical first choice for anyone specializing in landscape, architectural, industrial, interior,
or commercial product photography.
There are two reasons for this, and the first one's obvious, image size.
To make an 8x10 print, a 35mm negative has to be enlarged over 8 times its original size.
A 4x5 negative has to be enlarged only one time.
All things being equal, a print from the large negative will be sharper, have more detail,
less apparent grain, and fewer problems with dirt.
It will also be easier to control it at the printmaking stage.
The second reason is not as obvious, but it's the view camera's most outstanding feature,
image control, optical flexibility.
All parts of the view camera's structure are movable in three dimensions with respect
to one another.
We'll see how this works a little later, but first, let's look at the basic components.
The monorail or track is the primary support structure.
It allows the other parts to rest or move.
The front lens standard is a Y-shaped frame mounted on the monorail, which can be moved
and locked into any position.
It consists of various mechanisms to support the lens and adjust it in three dimensions.
The back standard works exactly like the front standard and can also be adjusted in three
dimensions.
It holds a spring-mounted ground glass viewing screen, which moves out to accept a film holder
and hold it in place.
The bellows is a flexible, light-tight tube mounted between the lens and the back standard.
It allows the two standards to be moved closer or further apart for focusing or to accept
different focal length lenses.
And the lenses themselves are completely interchangeable.
This one's my normal lens, a Schneider 210mm.
It has roughly the same angle of view as a 50mm in a 35mm system.
This is my wide angle, a 90mm Fujinon.
It's mounted in this recessed lens board because of the shorter lens-to-film focal length needed
to focus a wide angle.
A view camera's lens is really a total unit.
It contains an iris diaphragm, a leaf shutter located between the lens elements, and a sync
connection for flash.
The diaphragm is open and closed manually with this little external lever.
This lens has a maximum aperture of 5.6 and stops down to f-45.
The shutter speed is controlled with this lever.
It can be set to speeds from 1 400th of a second down to a full second as well as time
or bulb.
This control cocks the spring which activates the shutter.
And this one will fire the shutter.
But I don't recommend you use it this way.
There's a little attachment here for a cable release which I always use to avoid the possibility
of camera shake.
One more thing.
This little switch here, it's called the blade arrestor or press focus button.
It opens the shutter and holds it open while you compose and focus an image on the ground
glass.
Let's talk about that ground glass for just a minute.
It's mounted here on the rear standard and it's one of the really unique features of
the view camera.
In one sense, it makes this kind of camera a pleasure to work with.
Because of its size, you can examine and control details within the picture that you couldn't
even see if you were working with a smaller camera.
It gives you a degree of precision and control that no handheld 35 can offer.
But in another sense, the same ground glass can cause frustrations bordering on paranoia.
Why?
Because the image you see on the ground glass is inverted.
It's upside down and backwards.
So what you have to do is actually to learn to work backwards.
If you want to move the subject, it must be in the opposite direction of what you see
on the ground glass.
If you want to manipulate the camera controls, they must also be moved opposite from the
way you normally would.
I've been a photographer for almost 20 years and I still catch myself trying to stand on
my head in order to fully understand the details in a complicated setup.
But because the ground glass is flat, there is a much greater distance from the lens to
the corners than from the lens to the center.
When you're using slow lenses or when you're focusing with the lens stopped down in order
to judge depth, the image can get pretty dark and hard to see, particularly at the corners.
To compound the problem, the shiny side of the ground glass, the side that faces you,
will reflect any light that happens to be behind the camera.
The image gets washed out, making it almost impossible to see.
To get around this problem, you'll want to use one of these, an opaque piece of black
cloth which you can put over your head and the back of the camera.
It forms a little light-tight tint, which makes it easier for focusing.
And here's one more accessory you'll want to use, a little magnifier, which is called
a loop.
It's really useful for checking detail, both in terms of sharpness and for composition.
You'll hold it directly against the ground glass surface while you're focusing and composing
the image.
A little later, we'll go through the whole process of focusing, composing, and exposing
the film, step by step.
But before we can do that, we should take a look at the film itself, how to handle it,
and how to load it.
View camera pictures are made on individual sheets of film, rather than on cassette or
roll-type film used in smaller cameras.
Roll sheet film comes in two popular sizes, 4x5 or 8x10.
Because sheet film is stiffer than roll film, it must be loaded into a film holder before
it can be loaded into the camera.
Each holder accepts two sheets of film, one on each side.
And it is covered with one of these dark slides, which prevents accidental exposure of the
film.
But before you actually take the film out of the box and load it into the holder, you'll
want to do a little preparation.
Each time you use a film holder, you'll want to make sure that it is perfectly clean, because
the smallest particle of dust inside the holder can cause a scratch or a pinhole on the film.
Once you've cleaned the holder inside and out, you're ready to load the film.
But at this point on, the actual loading process is done in absolute darkness.
So let's pretend we're now in a light-tight room.
Before I actually turn out the light, I like to organize the film boxes and the holders
on a clean, flat surface, where I can easily reach them without fumbling in the dark.
Then with the lights out, open the film box.
Then open one end of the foil envelope and remove a single sheet of film, holding it
by its edges.
And this part's important.
Sheet film has to be loaded with a light-sensitive side or emulsion facing up.
And to make sure it is, use your finger to feel for a notch or series of notches on one
of the short sides of the sheet near the corner.
When you hold the film in your right hand like this, and you can feel the notches in
the upper right-hand corner, the emulsion side of the film is up.
And the notches also work as a kind of code.
They allow you to verify the type of film you're loading.
Even in the dark, each film type, color or black and white, positive or reversal, has
its own notch code.
And the codes are printed on the bottom of the boxes and on the information sheets included
with the film.
I save these and tape them to the wall of my dark room for reference.
Now with the notches in the upper right-hand corner and the emulsion side up, use your
left thumb and forefinger to guide the edge of the film into the grooves on each side
of the holder.
Once you've pushed it in completely into place, it's a good idea to slip a fingernail
under the end and try to lift it up.
If you can lift it up, you've missed one of the grooves.
You should take it completely out and slide it in again.
When you're sure the film is secured in the grooves, close this flap at the bottom of
the holder, which holds the bottom edge of the film flat.
Now you're ready to insert the dark slide to make it light tight.
Each slide has a silver as well as a black upper edge.
Insert the slide with the silver side out.
It's another kind of code, which indicates that the film in this holder is unexposed.
The silver side is identified by a row of embossed dots, which you can feel in the dark.
Slip the slide into a slot in the holder and push it all the way into the groove in the
bottom flap.
Then to make sure it's properly seated, try pulling on the edge of the bottom flap with
your fingernail.
If it moves or comes up, you've missed the groove and you should insert the slide again.
Then you use the same procedure to load your second sheet of film into the other side of
the holder.
When both sides have been loaded and everything's light tight, you can turn the lights on.
And one more thing, each film holder has two little latches, which can be swung shut over
the edge of the dark slide.
They keep the slide from working its way out and exposing part of the film.
I use them as a visual code.
The shut latches tell me there's film in the holder.
Okay, let's make some pictures.
As I mentioned earlier, the view camera has various specialized adjustments, which make
it possible to move both the front standard or lens plane and the back standard or film
plane in three dimensions.
But we won't worry about these until a little later.
We just want to make a simple exposure under more or less normal conditions.
I've locked these specialized movement controls in their neutral position.
The lens board and the camera back are centered over the monorail and parallel to each other.
The first thing we'll do is position our tripod roughly where we want it, about here.
I'll raise it a little bit and use the tilt and pan adjustments and this little bubble
level to level the tripod head.
Okay, now we have our camera pointed in the general direction of our subject, so we'll
reach around to the front, use the blade arrestor to open the shutter and the diaphragm control
to open the iris to its maximum aperture.
Now we can get under the cloth and begin to work with the image on the ground glass.
Loosen the tripod head control slightly and move the camera as necessary to center the
image on the ground glass.
And remember, the image we're seeing is inverted, so if we want to move to the left, we have
to move the camera to the right and so on.
I want this still life to fill the frame a little more.
Instead of moving the tripod in, I can loosen this mounting screw, slide the monorail forward,
which will increase the image size.
Now I want to focus the image on the ground glass, but with a view camera, focusing works
a little differently.
First I'll unlock these two controls.
Now by moving either the front or the back standard along the monorail, I'll be able
to bring the image into sharp focus.
I'll move the lens board forward until it's sharp.
There.
Now I'll lock the front standard with this knob.
This is always a good idea because once you have an image roughly in focus, it's best
to make additional focusing adjustments by moving only the back standard.
That way the lens to subject relationship will remain constant and the image size will
stay the same.
Next I want to check for depth of field.
I do that by reaching around to the front and slowly stopping down the diaphragm while
watching the image on the ground glass.
By stopping the lens down gradually as you watch, your eyes become accustomed to the
decreasing amount of light being transmitted.
It gives you an extremely accurate degree of depth.
When I get to the f-stop I want, I use the magnifier to check for sharpness on different
areas of the ground glass.
Now I'll use the blade arrestor to close the shutter and I'll set the shutter speed for
the exposure I want.
I cock the shutter.
Next I'll make one final check to make sure all my controls are locked down.
I don't want to lose focus when I insert the film holder.
Then I'll gently open up the ground glass and slide the film holder in making sure it's
firmly seated.
Next I'll remove the slide and slowly count to five to give the camera the chance to settle
down.
Now I'll make my exposure using a cable release to fire the shutter.
Finally I'll replace the slide making sure that the black side is facing out.
That's important.
It tells me that the film has been exposed.
If you forget to do this it's easy to get confused and possibly make a second exposure
on the same piece of film.
Now I'll swing around one of these little locks, remove the holder and turn it around
and we're ready for another exposure.
Well that's about it.
The step by step operation of the view camera.
If you go slow and concentrate on each step individually you'll really find it's quite
simple.
But remember we had all the special movement controls locked in the neutral position.
The beauty of a view camera is what these special movement controls can do in controlling
shape, sharpness, perspective.
Let's go do some of that now.
Let's go on location.
An ordinary camera sees things in perspective just the way we see them with our eyes.
For instance it will record the sharp convergence of railroad tracks as they recede into the
distance.
And it will picture the sides of tall buildings as tapering into the sky.
And in these types of pictures the depth of field of the lens is often not adequate to
cover the entire subject area.
The reason this is so is because the ordinary camera, their lens plane and film plane are
always in a fixed relationship along an axis.
But the view camera is different.
It has adjustments designed to help solve these problems.
Special movements.
They're called shifts, swings and tilts.
And they refer to the movements of the front and rear standards of the camera which make
it possible to change this normally fixed alignment of the lens and the film.
Let's look at those movements.
Shifts are movements of either standard which keep the lens board and film plane parallel
to each other but decenter the lens with respect to the film.
Up and down shifts are often referred to as rise and fall.
Rotations allow the standards to pivot around either a vertical or horizontal axis.
Rotations around the horizontal axis are often called tilts.
Camera shifts are used to reduce or eliminate the normal effects of converging lines in
perspective and they're particularly useful in architectural photography.
The top of this building is further from my camera than the foundation is.
And since distant objects are normally seen as smaller than closer objects, the top appears
smaller than the bottom.
An ordinary camera would record this perspective convergence.
But let's see how we can use the view camera shift movements to correct for it.
But first let me make a key point.
No matter what your setup is, no matter what kind of movement it calls for, you should
always start with the controls centered in their normal positions.
That way you have a fixed reference point from which to start.
Okay, with the controls centered to the normal lens to film axis, I have to tilt the camera
back to get the building in.
I can get the whole building in but the vertical lines converge towards the top just as they
would with your 35mm camera.
Let's see what happens if I tilt down until the tripod head is dead level.
We get rid of the converging perspective but now the top of the building is cut off and
the camera records a great deal of unwanted information in the foreground.
So what we want to do is have our cake and eat it too.
We want to keep the sides of the building parallel but we also want to include the top
of the building.
Right now the back standard or film plane is parallel to the subject plane and if we
keep it that way we won't have any perspective convergence.
But now if I shift the lens board up using a rising front movement I can compose the image
on the ground glass just the way I want it.
As long as the camera back and subject planes are parallel the vertical lines of the building
will be recorded as parallel and if the lens board is also parallel the depth of field
will be adequate to cover the subject.
Let's look at a way we can solve another problem using camera movements.
That white building is in my image area and I don't want it.
Maybe I can get rid of it by picking up the camera and moving it to the right but there
is an easier way.
I'll keep the front and back standards parallel to the building but I want to move the entire
image to the left until the building is out of the frame and once again since the image
on the ground glass is inverted I'll shift the lens board horizontally to the left.
There it's gone.
Seems like magic doesn't it?
But there's a simple reason why the camera is able to do these kinds of things and it
has to do with the covering power of the lens.
With a view camera the image formed by the lens when it reaches the film plane covers
a much larger area than the film itself.
Because of this the film itself can be moved up or down or side to side as long as it remains
within the lenses greater angle of coverage.
The movements we've just used to control perspective and image placement are pretty basic.
So now let's look at some more complex applications.
We'll go back to the studio and we'll see how we can use the shifts, swings and tilts
in combination to not only alter and control perspective but depth of field and even the
shape of the objects we photograph.
If you're used to a 35 millimeter camera you're familiar with the idea that sharpness
of focus extends towards and away from the lens.
In other words there's a plane of sharp focus and since the camera is rigid the only variable
is whether the plane is near or far depending on how close the lens is to the film.
But that's not true with the view camera.
With a view camera the plane of sharp focus can be angled in virtually any position.
There's a rule that explains this and it's named after an old Austrian gentleman named
Slimeflug.
What the Slimeflug principle states is that when the imaginary line drawn through the
planes of the subject, camera back and lens board are able to meet at a common point in
space then the subject plane from near to far will coincide with the plane of sharp
focus.
It sounds complicated but it's not really so difficult to apply this principle in real
life by just using your eyes.
With the controls in the normal position and the camera angle at 45 degrees to the chest
board the plane of sharp focus intersects the subject plane at a point between the near
and far edge.
It's not adequate to cover the entire subject but now if I try tilting the film plane backwards
look what happens.
The entire board comes into sharp focus but the shape of the subject is changed.
With the back tilted backwards the light hitting the bottom part of the film is now traveling
further than the light hitting the top part.
I don't want the image distorted this much so I'll bring the back back up to its neutral
position and tilt the lens board forward.
The shape of the image doesn't change at all and the front tilt brings the board into
reasonable focus although it's not quite sharp from edge to edge.
Now to get the board perfectly sharp from edge to edge I have several options.
One would be to simply move the camera further away from the subject position or I could
increase the depth of field by tilting the back forward again slightly if I'm willing
to accept a smaller amount of distortion or I could simply stop down the lens far enough
to bring everything into focus.
The point of all this is simple.
Although sharpness can be controlled by tilting either the front or the back, back tilts also
affect shape.
So a simple but important rule of thumb for most assignments use the back standard to
control the shape of the subject you're photographing.
Use the front standard to control the sharpness.
And remember these movements can be used in almost infinite combinations.
They're interdependent and interrelated.
Each one affects the other.
Let's see what our image looks like now.
Right away we can see there are some new problems.
First there's the shape.
Because of the angle of the camera the chest pieces appear to lean towards us.
But we'll correct for this distortion by tilting the film plane back until it's more
parallel to the front of the pieces.
There that straightens them up.
Now sharpness.
Since the pieces are at a diagonal to the lens axis only the one in the middle is sharp.
But watch what happens when I swing the lens board into parallel with the plane formed
by the pieces.
There.
Finally I want the image a little lower in the frame so I'll use a rising front move
to shift it down slightly.
Now I can refocus and stop down for depth of field.
Well that's about all we have time for.
And I know some of these special movements might seem a little complicated at first.
Especially when they're used in combinations.
But as you begin to really work with a view camera you'll discover that there's a kind
of flow to it.
Operating the camera itself will become almost second nature.
And before long you'll find that you're able to pre-visualize how the different shifts,
swings and tilts will affect your finished picture.
If you don't already own a large format camera maybe it's time to start thinking about one.
You can pick up a good basic 4x5 view camera with lens for no more than say the price of
a good 35mm system.
Chances are you'll find this small investment will open up a big new world.
The thing about people is they're interesting to begin with.
Other subjects like landscapes and still lifes can be made into powerful and interesting
images through the skill of the photographer.
But when you work with people you're working with subjects that are already interesting.
Because people have character, a million moods, a million expressions.
And when you photograph people your job is not so much to construct an image from your
imagination but to discover and reveal the fascinating things that are already there.
People are the most popular subjects in photography and as far as I'm concerned they're the biggest
challenge of all.
I'm Brian Ratty and in this half hour we'll take on this challenge of people photography.
We'll start with the formal portrait, working with models in the controlled conditions of
the studio.
Then we'll look at another kind of portrait where the people are pictured in relationships
to their natural surroundings.
And finally we'll cover a special occasion using candid pictures to tell a story.
This is a replica of one of the earliest portrait studios in America.
In fact these cameras date back to the late 1800s.
In those days they didn't use a shutter as we think of it today.
Instead they used this lens cap as a shutter and they were dealing with 4 to 40 second
exposure times.
That's another reason why the portrait photographer used a head clamp.
The person having their picture taken would simply put their head in the clamp and keep
it stationary during those long exposure times.
Portrait photography has come a long way since those days.
Today's lightweight cameras and fast films have set the photographer free to concentrate
on those things that make up the essence of successful studio portraiture.
Establishing a relationship with your subject or model and finding a way to reveal the subject's
personality in the finished portrait.
Hi Kim, how are you?
Gee, I'm really glad you could make it.
Oh good, me too.
Sorry I'm a little late.
The traffic was horrible.
It's okay.
Listen, I'm really glad that we have this chance to sit down and chat a little bit.
I've got this client in New York that we're going to be doing this cosmetic ad for and
he needed that real nice fresh blonde look and your name came right to my mind.
I'm glad you brought a lot of your outfits with you because we're going to need them.
The great thing is the shape of your face, I think that with those earrings and the way
your face is shaped, sooner or later people will always show on film exactly what they
are and that's what you're there to record.
That special moment when it all comes together, that instant when the personality and character
of the person comes through, reflected in the hands, the attitude, especially the eyes.
I call it the moment of truth and in order to recognize it and get it on film, you have
to know what it is you're looking for.
In other words, you have to know your subject.
I believe that's the key because a successful portrait is the result of a successful relationship,
a unique and personal collaboration between the photographer and the model.
That's why it's important to start building that relationship before the actual shooting
starts.
It doesn't matter whether your model is a professional you're used to working with or
someone you've never met before.
Take some time to make friends, ask questions, find out what the person's really like and
what makes them tick.
Tell them what it is you hope to accomplish with the pictures, the pose you're looking
for, the type of lighting you're using and the moods and expressions you want to capture
on film.
Let your subject know that he or she is an important part of the creative process.
Above all, build trust.
Study your model's face and features before you start.
Develop a plan for lighting, pose and camera angle that will emphasize the subject's good
features while hiding the features that aren't so good.
When you sense that your model's good and relaxed, you're ready to start.
Kim, great.
I'm really glad we had a chance to sit down and chat a little bit.
Are you ready to give it a shot?
Sure.
Okay, let's do it.
All righty.
I'm going to go over there on the stool and sit right down there.
Great.
Grab my camera.
You turn just a little bit more this way.
Great.
Your hands won't be in the shot.
Okay.
Super.
Super.
All right.
Yeah, that looks fine.
Sultry.
Sultry.
How do you reveal personality and character in a portrait?
First of all, there's the pose.
Find a pose which plays up your subject's best features and plays down the worst.
A person's face reveals the most about them.
The eyes are by far the most dominant feature.
A full-face portrait with the subject looking directly into the camera is the most formal
pose.
It makes the most of the eyes, especially if they're large and set wide apart.
It subdues the effect of a large nose but emphasizes the ears.
It also emphasizes any non-symmetrical facial characteristics.
But if your model has perfectly even cover girl features, it can be a good choice.
Because it reveals the most information about a person's features and it is the only pose
that reveals both ears, full-face portraits are required for passport and other portraits
taken for formal documentation.
A profile is not as personal as the full-face pose but it is often more dramatic.
It downplays the eyes and the ears but makes the most out of a well-proportioned nose and
chin.
A three-quarter view is a good compromise.
It makes the subject appear more natural and relaxed and it shows a good deal of information
about all the features without emphasizing any one feature over the others.
And even if you're shooting only the face, don't ignore the position of the rest of the
body.
For instance, posing your model with the shoulders squared and perpendicular to the axis of the
camera usually results in a stiff and unnatural look.
A shoulder axis of 45 degrees to the camera is a better choice.
It's a lot more natural and usually more interesting.
A low deep chair will make your subject appear to slouch, pushing him back from the camera
and making him seem more distant and aloof.
A high stool on the other hand will make the subject seem more relaxed and attentive, especially
if his feet are off the floor and he's leaning forward slightly.
Some problems have standard solutions like reflections in eyeglasses.
Have your sitter tilt the head slightly down to get rid of the reflections or better yet,
having wear eyeglass rims with lenses removed.
Even folds and double chins also can be minimized by having the sitter lean forward slightly
towards the camera.
The pose is important, but to me lighting is the most important thing of all.
And what's the best lighting plan for a portrait?
The one that best suits the shape of your subject's head.
The one that does the best job of modeling the head and skin texture and clearly showing
the person's characteristic facial expressions.
Possibilities and variations for portrait lighting are just about endless.
But let's look at the three most common lighting plans.
Each one starts with a choice about where you want to position your main light source.
The first one is the simplest and it can also be the most flattering.
The main light source is placed directly in front of the subject's head and at about
30 degrees above its axis.
The camera can be aligned along the axis of the light source and of the subject's head
so that it is also directly in front or it can be placed somewhat to one side.
The main light casts a small symmetrical shadow under the nose and some subtle shading under
the cheekbones.
It makes the subject's nose look smaller and minimizes most skin blemishes.
Because of the shape of the nose shadow, some people call this butterfly lighting.
It's also sometimes called paramount lighting after the film studio because it's often been
used for flattering publicity shots of movie stars.
The second most common lighting plan is a little harder to set up but it's extremely
versatile.
The main light which models the shape of the head is located roughly perpendicular to the
axis of the subject's shoulders with the subject's head turned to one side.
The main light fully lights one side of the face throwing the shadow of the nose on the
less well lit side.
Because this creates a triangle of lighted cheekbone between the eyes and the middle
of the cheek on the shaded side, this set up is often called triangle lighting.
More often it's called 45 degree lighting.
Since the position of the main light creates a high degree of lighting contrast, a second
light is usually placed near the camera axis to fill in the shadow area visible to the
camera.
This fill light should be about one quarter the intensity of the main light.
And often a hair light is placed above and behind the subject to highlight the hair and
separate the subject from the background.
Besides a full frontal angle, there are a couple of other good camera positions you
can use with 45 degree lighting.
If the camera is set near the axis of the main light, it sees mainly the best lit side
of the head.
Only a relatively small part of the shadow side is visible.
With the camera position well around towards the shadow side of the face, the best lit
side is seen as a brightly lit edge against the darker background.
Whatever camera position you choose, remember that the fill light should always travel with
the camera.
Profile lighting, the third type, is almost a variation on 45 degree lighting.
The difference is that in profile lighting the main light is placed at 90 degrees to
the axis of the subject's head so that only one side of the head is brightly lit.
For most portraits it's not as flattering as butterfly or 45 degree lighting, but it
can have a strong dramatic effect when it's used with the right subject.
Super, I think we got it Kim.
Thanks so much.
I really appreciate you coming by.
Listen, I should have proofs for you to look at maybe next Thursday?
I'll be on location tomorrow so call me Thursday and we'll get together.
Super, thanks so much.
See you later.
Of course there's even more to it than just finding the right pose and choosing the best
lighting plan.
For instance, there's your choice of lenses.
Normal or wide angle lenses used in close generally make the subject's nearer features
appear disproportionately large.
A moderate telephoto is more flattering.
It compresses the subject's features and minimizes distortion and it has another major
advantage.
The longer lens to subject distance gives your model a chance to feel more comfortable.
No one likes to have a camera stuck in his or her face.
And camera angle is important too, for a head and shoulders portrait an eye level angle
is usually the best.
Too high an angle, often a problem in photographing children and seated subjects, can make the
head loom and foreshorten the body.
Too low an angle can result in an overly predominant nose or chin.
In a full length portrait an eye level angle makes subjects appear shorter than they actually
are.
A portrait taken from a squatting position indicates height more accurately, while even
lower angles make a subject seem taller.
And your choice of backgrounds is critical.
Even in a close facial portrait the background has to relate to the subject.
It's an important design element in the picture and the photographer has to choose the proportion
of the picture area it occupies.
Its tone, texture and often its color.
Generally the more neutral the background, the more regularly it can be used.
For maximum tonal control and to be able to separate it visually from the subject, you
want to be able to light the background separately.
The point is all of these things are interrelated and they're all directly under the photographer's
control, the model, the pose, the lighting plan, the choice of lenses and the camera
angle, the choice of backgrounds and setting.
And there's one more thing, the moment.
Choosing that one instant when your subject's personality comes through, when he reveals
to your camera not just what he looks like, but what he is.
Focus on the eyes and if it all comes together you won't be just taking a picture, you'll
be making a portrait.
How many times have you seen shots like these?
The typical instamatic pictures people bring back from their vacations.
And they're always the same.
There's always someone standing in the middle distance posing for the camera with their
back to whatever it was they went on vacation to see in the first place.
Here's Betty standing in front of the White House.
It's not a good shot of Betty because it's not a portrait and it doesn't do much for
the White House either because it's not really a realistic picture of the White House.
Sure, shots like this prove that Betty was actually at the White House, but other than
that they're dull because they're a compromise.
That's why they end up in albums.
The point is when you're shooting people on location in a natural environment, you have
to plan your shots.
You have to make some choices.
First, you have to decide which elements you want to emphasize.
Do you want the background to say something about your subject or do you want to use your
subject to say something about the natural surroundings?
Each of these photographs is essentially a portrait.
The subject predominates, but in each the natural surroundings are an important element,
adding information and interest and affecting the mood.
Here the woman's surroundings tell us that she's a waitress in a hotel.
In this shot, the woman's flower basket and her weary look tells us that she's a street
vendor.
Here the little girl's doll completes the composition and adds interest.
In this portrait, the gray overcast sky isolates the subject from the background and its diffused
light softens the old woman's features.
While here, the deep blue of the sky along with the modeling of the direct sunlight creates
color contrast and depth.
In this shot, a long lens and large aperture were used to throw the flowers in the foreground
as well as the trees behind the children out of focus.
But in this one, the camera pans with the action at a shutter speed of a 15th of a second,
blurring both the foreground and the background and creating a sense of movement.
In these pictures, shot with a long lens, the people are really in what would normally
be background.
They're much further from the camera and they occupy a relatively small portion of the frame
in relationship to their surroundings.
But they still dominate the scene because they're centered in the composition and their
faces are visible to the camera.
But pictures like these have a completely different feel.
Although the people are still the focal point, they don't dominate the scene.
Instead, they're actually a part of the scene, acting as an important visual element in the
overall composition.
This travel picture, for instance, is not about the gondoliers.
It's about Venice.
The gondoliers are an element in the composition.
In this series of glamour shots, the model as well as her shadow and footprints become
an important part of the overall natural scene.
Here's an important thing to remember when you're photographing people, especially people
you don't know.
Personal privacy is a well-established legal right in the United States and in most other
countries.
So just because you find people interesting, that doesn't give you an unrestricted right
to photograph everyone that you see, no matter what the situation.
So protect yourself legally and avoid giving offense.
It's always a good idea to ask permission before photographing anyone.
Chances are you'll get it.
And if you plan to publish pictures of people, or even if there's the slightest possibility
of publication, ask them to sign a model release.
You can pick up standard model release forms at most large camera stores.
There's going to be more
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Let's see, look right here.
All right.
See how it knocks it?
Looks like the soccer team to me.
Look right here. Look at the camera here.
Okay, great. Thanks a lot.
Thanks a lot.
The official group portrait.
You get everybody together,
find a spot where the lights even,
and then you line everybody up in an organized pose.
And when you got them looking straight into your camera,
you shoot the picture.
And if you're smart, you shoot several,
and hope you get one where everybody's eyes are open.
What's wrong with these kind of pictures?
Nothing, really.
In fact, these formerly posed group portraits
are important because they're a kind of history.
A history of ourselves and our society.
A permanent visual record of what we look like,
and what our families and friends look like
at some point fixed in time.
And this one won't be any different.
It's the official group shot of the employees
at the annual company picnic.
So it, too, will become a kind of history.
But do pictures like this really tell the story?
What I mean is, sure, they may record some visual facts
about the events of this picnic,
but can they capture the actual experience?
Can they show what it was actually like
to be at this picnic?
Of course they can't, because they're posed pictures.
But let's approach it in a completely different way.
For instance, let's say you wanted to put together
a slideshow about the company picnic,
or a two-page layout for a newspaper.
In other words, you wanted to tell a story.
You'd do it with candids.
How do you tell a story with candid pictures?
Well, first of all, a story has angles.
High angles.
Low angles.
Normal angles.
Weird angles.
So look for angles.
Look for a good wide-angle shot.
Then move up.
Move down.
Move in.
Keep looking.
Move around to the opposite side and shoot a reverse angle.
Change to a telephoto.
Then move back to the side where you started
and see how that looks through a telephoto.
Keep looking.
Your subject isn't just what's in front of your camera.
It's all around.
So move within your subject.
Move in three dimensions and look for themes,
because a story has visual themes.
Action, reaction, interaction, and inaction.
People making friends for themselves.
People making fools of themselves.
People just being people.
And a story has its moments.
Look for moments.
And when they happen, be ready.
Set your shutter speed and your f-stop ahead of time.
Pre-focus.
Be ready for the moment, the emotions.
Look for atmosphere.
Look for detail.
And look for an ending, because every story has an ending.
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