Photographing Models by Phil Lister 2008 Update!

After looking at many auction photos on okay, I've seen many sellers make the same mistakes. The first is, shooting dark models against a white or light colored background. You may automatically think that that is the right approach. However, since cameras meter for the lightest area within the frame, your photos will gee out showing your model as a black blob. Use a black or dark gray background. Light your subject properly. After all, if you're trying to sell a build-up, shouldn't it look good in the photos?
The best lighting set up is called 3-point lighting. This method uses1. KEY or main light. (about 100W) 2. FILL light (40-75W) (fills in the shadow areas) and finally 3. BACK or rim light (100W). The key light is placed at about a 45 degree angle to and elevatedslightly higher than the subject.The FILL light is placed on the opposite side and adjusted to fill in the shadows. The BACK light is placed at about a 45 degree angle slightly higher than and behind the subject . With the exception of the backlight, diffuse the lights by placing some sort of difussion material like tough-spun or even a sheet of white paper over the lights. If your budget allows, buy a nice 3-light photo set up. You can get those with 2 "soft boxes" and an open-faced light for about $300.00. It's a worth-while investment for taking professional photos.
The idea of the back light is to outline or "rim" the subject which sets it off from the background. Hollywood uses this set up all the time. Remember "Glamour Shots"? (Who's sister didn't go there and hand out the photos as Xmas gifts?). The one difference was, Glamour Shots used a heavydiffusion filter, which was supposed to make even 90 year old Aunt Clara look great!
The other problem is getting as close as possible to the model. Use a wide angle-lens. If you have to, get a diopter set (close-up lenes) for getting those CU's. Also, make sure your photos are in sharp focus. Shoot several photos and bracket your exposures. Then simply select the best ones! By taking the time to make your photos look good, you may sell more build-ups. Finally, if the photos need to be "tweeked", you can use an image editing program like Adobe Photoshop to further refine your photography. If using a digital SLR, shoot the pics in "raw" format. Raw is considered as a digital negative and can be manipulated more than a jpeg file. You can then "save as" a jpeg file and preserve the original raw file.