Last night Brence and I spent some time tidying up the home studio and putting up a new dark background I made of navy blue fabric. I fired off some test shots of Brence to see what it looked like – and it looks pretty good and works well in colour or b&w.

We started out with a basic two-light setup using two softboxes powered by SB-26 flash units. Main (high camera left) on 1/4 and fill (low camera right) on 1/16.  After a few shots we added a third snooted SB-26 as a  kicker behind and to camera left, also on 1/16. You can see here it gives a highlight on Brence’s right-hand side, adding a little more pop and separation.

This is a great example of how to get nice, simple studio shots without having an overly elaborate setup. The 2-light setup is perfectly good for creating nice portraits with highlight and shadow definition. The 3-light setup of main, fill and kicker is simple to set up and adds extra pop, and works especially well when you’re shooting against a dark background like we were here.

About the Author

I'm a freelance photographer in Christchurch, New Zealand who does promotional & editorial portraiture, and commercial & advertising photography.