I had a chance to dust off the camera and head out to the park on an invite from my friend and fellow photographer, Erick Shriver. He and photographer/model Roberta Snyder dreamed up a fun concept based on the Snow White story, so we all got together to see if it could be translated into a good set of images. Roberta took the role of the witch, and her friend Claire Bryan donned the Snow White outfit.
The distance from the car to the shoot location was far enough that going minimal felt like the best option. I toted one Einstein light and a heavy-duty stand that could handle terrain that is uneven in some areas. The 22" Mola Demi beauty dish (with and without grid) was the light modifier of choice. Apart from being easier to handle on uncertain terrain, the smaller dish, particularly when the grid is attached, illuminates a smaller area than larger modifiers and casts harsher shadows. That fit well for the dramatic lighting I wanted on this shoot.
In addition to the beauty dish, I brought along a snoot from a Westcott Skylux light. It's designed to be attached to a Bowens S Mount, but will work well enough when clamped onto the front of a Paul Buff light. That's exactly where the snoot ended up -- attached to the front of Erick's AB1600 light for the purpose of illuminating the green liquid in the syringe in some shots and providing a very small fill light to brighten Roberta's face when her cloak hood was up.
We shot 4 setups in a small area of the park. The first spot took advantage of the sun's position, with the models placed back to the sun and face to the camera. An un-gridded beauty dish provided the key light, with a few shots including a second light using only the 7" reflector for accent. The second setup was the "sleeping" portion (see header image for this blog entry), which was mostly in shade with the odd sun beam poking through the trees here and there. A grid was added to the beauty dish to tighten the pool of light and the light with 7" reflector was set to camera right for a little bit of accent lighting. The third setup was on a rugged path, shooting into a stand of trees. Available light was used for most of that segment, though a few shots included some long-throw fill from the AB1600. The final setup of the evening was conducted with the trunk of a tree as a close-up background. The grid went onto the beauty dish for the first handful of shots, then it was removed and a sock added. The dish was suspended pointing straight down and the light was moved slightly forward of Roberta and just above her. In some shots, the green liquid in the syringe was illuminated through a snoot on the AB1600 from camera left.
We had a great time and everyone was pleased with how the images turned out.
