We’ve talked about some lighting techniques, like back lighting and lighting coming from the side of a subject, at a 90 degree angle to the camera. Now, on to the subject of portrait lighting. In lighting a portrait, you want to create a pleasing light to the face, and bring out the characteristics and personality of your subject. To do this, set your main light at a 45 degree angle to the camera. This will create a sense of depth due to the modeling effect of the highlights and shadows.
This is only part of portrait lighting, since we now need to “open up” the shadows on the side of the face opposite the main light. Similar to opening up your lens, we need to allow more light onto the shadow side of the face. To do this, we may use a fill light next to the camera (or on-camera flash), natural light coming in from a window, or light that is reflected from something (like a white piece of cardboard).
By adding a background light, you can separate the subject from the background, and make a nice portrait. You can add additional lights, to further highlight the subject’s hair and such, but this is the basic lighting situation for a portrait. If you only have two lights, you can use light coming in through a window as a background or fill light. If you only have one light available, try to get it off camera, since light that falls on the subject from the front appears flat and boring.
The other thing we need to consider when shooting a portrait, is the height of the lights and the camera. You want to set your camera height level with the subject’s eyes. Adjust the height of the main light until you see a small triangular patch of light beneath the subject’s eye (on the side opposite the main light). You may also have to adjust the distance the light is from the subject.
Typically, you will set your main light about 6 feet from the subject. Experiment, though, and find out what works for you and the light you have available. By the way, the main light should be on the side opposite to the direction the subject is looking. In other words, the subject shouldn’t be looking into the main light.
This is the basic lighting setup for a portrait. When taking the actual photograph, focus sharply on the eyes, and use an f-stop setting that produces an appropriate depth of field.