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Chris Adval's picture

Lighting Tips on a serious attempt to the Cinematic Headshot?

I am going to do a serious attempt this Sunday. I don't have an octabox yet so I can't get the same lighting, so I was thinking either both my rectangle softbox or/and trying a shoot-tru umbrella.

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10 Comments

Got any examples of the look you're going for?

the cover photo of the group is a perfect example

Who said you need octabox? I shot that headshot by umbrella on right side and flash disco on left ( but it didn't fired sic! ) and I used my sigma 200mm sigma lens. That it ;) Keep it simple!

Well no one said you needed one, but Dylan Patrick whom is known for the Cinematic Headshot uses a octabox for lighting his subjects on his Cinematic Headshots.

Shoot through umbrella, and a regular softbox are totally usable for this style, it more about getting the light in close so you get a nice soft light. The octa is nice simply because it's a cross between a soft box and an umbrella....it's more flexible and has more light wrap than a standard softbox but is more controllable than an umbrella, but certainly you can use any number of light modifiers, just get them in close, and at a good angle for fill bounce from the reflector, but low enough that you still get some good catchlights.

Check out my attempt. Note I did learn some things by attempting it. I have to find a very diverse color background objects. For me it was difficult as the best I could find was 2 cars (1 blue and 1 red) parked on a busy main street in my city and sadly it was a bit too far to get much of the colors in the shot especially at f/2.8 so I did bump it to f/4.5 to get some more details on the colorful cars to add more colors than just the lack of colors of the sidewalk. I didn't have enough time due to lack of an assistant to hold my softbox (fairly large) even weighed down it was swinging around the box itself with 10-13mph winds. So here's my first serious attempt sample.

That's a really good effort. I like the framing and the light on him. The light background works well due to his darker hair.

Chris. I think your shot is a fantastic headshot. Definitely a shot that would get a second glance from any casting director. cheers.

Thanks Bruce!

Here is my first attempt using 2 Canon 600EX RT Speedlights mounted on Rapid Duo Octabox by FJWestcott. The 600EX were both set to full power. BTW Dylan Patrick is going to have a presentation at a local Photography chapter in my area. Can't wait to meet him.