Old fashioned studio portrait required.
Andrew Denny
spotlights and fill-ins, backlighting, low depth of field and all the other
touches of 1930s/40s portraiture, using a 5x4 camera preferably. Are there
any portraitists left who work like this in the UK (especially in the
Midlands or East Anglia), or do they all work with studio flash, silvered
brollies and eerily accurate colour?
Regds
Andrew Denny
Stewart Pinkerton
Why do you want it on 5x4?
--
Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering
T P
I often shoot black and white portraits and have occasionally
experimented with a 5x4" camera. However, there is no way I would
choose "spotlights" (I believe you mean "photofloods") because I don't
like to see the subject's perspiration running down their face!
I suggest you contact a local professional wedding/portrait
photographer and ask what they can do for you. Black and white is
enjoying renewed popularity and you will find that old-fashioned
techniques such as selenium or sepia toning are also popular.
It's just the lighting I'm not sure about, although I feel sure that a
competent photographer can get exactly the effect you want without
making you melt. ;-)
Good luck.
Stewart Pinkerton
>"Andrew Denny" <ne...@grannybuttons.com> wrote:
>
>>I'm looking to get an old-fashioned b/w studio portrait done. One with
>>spotlights and fill-ins, backlighting, low depth of field and all the other
>>touches of 1930s/40s portraiture, using a 5x4 camera preferably. Are there
>>any portraitists left who work like this in the UK (especially in the
>>Midlands or East Anglia), or do they all work with studio flash, silvered
>>brollies and eerily accurate colour?
>
>
>I often shoot black and white portraits and have occasionally
>experimented with a 5x4" camera. However, there is no way I would
>choose "spotlights" (I believe you mean "photofloods") because I don't
>like to see the subject's perspiration running down their face!
You can substitute normal domestic lightbulbs if you don't mind
working at 1/4 to 1/30 second. After all, you'll have the lens wide
open to give shallow depth of field and a little softness to the
image. Note also that low voltage halogen spots often have dichroic
'cool light' reflectors, so subject melting is less of a hazard!
Naturally, colour balance is not an issue.
Andrew Denny
old Gandolfis and English-made lenses all manner of lighting equipment I've
forgotten the names of. I drifted out of it from a work point of view (I
was a photojournalist at heart), and drifted out of photography altogether
eventually. But I wanted to get a couple of family portraits done the other
day, and checking out a few photographers, I was disappointed that the old
art of studio portraiture, with very short depth of field and careful
spotlighting, seems to have died. Certainly all the dozen photographers
I've approached said they could do it, but none could produce any examples
to prove it. The examples I did see had all the hallmarks of modern studio
photography.
One can't blame the photographers of course - it's what the market expects
now.
journalist-north
"Andrew Denny" <ne...@grannybuttons.com> wrote in message
news:bcqp1t$ul2$1...@news6.svr.pol.co.uk...
I've been around a bit longer then you - about 45 years in this game. Well,
for those that have never seen that kind of period studio work here are some
examples from the 1920's to the 50's. Most are good, a few are EXCELLENT,
and a few show the pitfalls. Click the links and enjoy.
Gary Cooper (actor) ca late 1930's early 1940's
http://themave.com/Cooper/galry/port6.jpg
http://themave.com/Cooper/galry/port8.jpg
http://themave.com/Cooper/galry/port20.jpg
http://themave.com/Cooper/galry/port26.jpg
Shirley Temple (actress) ca 1930's early 1940's
http://www.geocities.com/~childactors/images/stemple/shirley18a.jpg (early
years)
http://www.geocities.com/~childactors/images/stemple/shirley20a.jpg (middle
years)
http://www.geocities.com/~childactors/images/stemple/shirley19a.jpg (later
years)
http://www.geocities.com/~childactors/images/stemple/shirley6a.jpg
(excellent one on a set using an overhead key light and really tight light
control on her)
Lillian Tashman (silent film actress) ca 1920's style studio portraits -
Lillian died in 1934 so all pictures predate that year.
http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Studio/5217/LIL16.JPG
http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Studio/5217/WITHHAT.JPG
http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Studio/5217/lt1.jpg (lit from overhead
and back)
Gypsy Rose Lee (ecdysiast / stripteuse [did you even know THAT was a word? -
:-) ] ) date unknown - probably ca 1940's
http://www.hollywoodlegends.com/images/gypsyBW.gif (lit in spotlight only)
Rod Serling (actor - writer) date unknown probably ca 1940's
http://www.hollywoodlegends.com/images/serling.gif (watch the background
lighting fall off to the top of the image - very tight lighting control on
the face - may have been burned-in while printing)
Jack Webb (actor - writer) date unknown probably late 1940's early 1950's
http://www.hollywoodlegends.com/images/webb.gif (high degree of light
control on the background - but light control on him leaves something to be
desired - his face is really quite underexposed compared to the image as a
whole while his L shoulder and L hand seem, at the same time, overexposed -
probably should have been corrected in the printing but it wasn't)
Journalist