Reflections on face in flash photography

[Digital]

Is there any ladies' beauty products that I can use to reduce the reflections on the nose, and forehead in portrait photography?
It seems I should know the answer to this question: however, at the present time, it remains elusive. Not that I am an authority on women's beauty products.

Bruce

[Shadowman]

Is your light positioned in front of your model?

[Digital]

John, the light is bounced on the ceiling from behind the camera. The flash is mounted on the camera; however it is bounced off the ceiling, as stated previously.


Bruce

[pendennis]

You can still get reflections off the nose, since when the light is bounced, a camera-mounted flash will still be a source, and often light does not completely diffuse. The camera mounted light needs to be obscured completely, not just rotated 180 degrees.

You can use face powder to take down shininess on the skin, whether the nose, brow, chin; any area which will reflect light. Like any facial makeup, it needs to be evenly applied.

[Digital]

Thank you Dennis for the information.


Bruce

[Shadowman]

John, the light is bounced on the ceiling from behind the camera. The flash is mounted on the camera; however it is bounced off the ceiling, as stated previously.


Bruce

It would be good to see a sample of what you are experiencing, it sounds like you have direct reflections or hot points directly in front; I assume the reflections are on the tip of the nose but strange if the light is being bounced off the ceiling. You could position the light further away from the model, you could diffuse the light, or you could reposition your lights. Are you trying for a high key capture? One other thing to consider is the height of your subject to the reflected surface, if the subject is too close then the angle of the reflections might bounce parallel to your model's features.

[Digital]

John, I am not trying for a high key photo. Per your request, I an sending you an example of what I am talking about. Bruce

[Shadowman]

Bruce,

Have a look at the works of Peter Hurley.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLxNYLDWGmE

[Manfred M]

Your flash is too "hot" and that is the main cause of the hot spots. Powder will help diffuse issues with oily skin, but the main issue with this shot is the lighting. As your subject has dark skin, this issue is exacerbated and the hot spots are more noticeable. You are also not getting the light into the right places as the eyes and the areas under the neck are getting too little light. You need to get some fill light into those areas of the subject's face too.

Have you tried aiming the light into a corner of the room, rather than the ceiling? That should get you some light coming back a bit lower too.

Try using flash exposure compensation on your camera to dial back the amount of light to see if that helps any.

I personally would not use bounce flash for this type of shot, but I am quite well equipped with lighting equipment, so I don't shoot bounce light unless I am in a "run and gun" type of shooting situation.

[Manfred M]

Bruce,

Have a look at the works of Peter Hurley.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLxNYLDWGmE

Hurley shoots in a studio with some very expensive continuous lights. While some of his posing tricks are good, the lighting he uses is not at all applicable to what Bruce is trying to do. One can get similar results to what Hurley does with studio lights and soft boxes; not with bounce lighting.

Bruce if you want to get a really good book on bounce flash, look at Neil van Niekerk's book "On-Camera Flash - Techniques for Digital Wedding and Portrait Photography".

https://www.amazon.com/Camera-Flash-...ds=van+niekerk

[Shadowman]

Hurley shoots in a studio with some very expensive continuous lights. While some of his posing tricks are good, the lighting he uses is not at all applicable to what Bruce is trying to do. One can get similar results to what Hurley does with studio lights and soft boxes; not with bounce lighting.

Bruce if you want to get a really good book on bounce flash, look at Neil van Niekerk's book "On-Camera Flash - Techniques for Digital Wedding and Portrait Photography".

https://www.amazon.com/Camera-Flash-...ds=van+niekerk

That particular video was linked because it was an example of handling specific skintones as well as a brief discussion on light modifiers some of which can be DIY rigged in the home. The video was only a brief of a series, I didn't expect the all the answers to be in just one video. I've seen more of Hurley's work done outdoors as well as the studio.

[Digital]

John, thank you for you comments, and suggestions.

Manfred, I believe we had this same discussion a year or so ago. I am going to purchase this book you suggested. Also I am going to revisit bouncing the flash in a corner of the room; however I plan to place the flash in manual mode, and experiment in toning down my hot spots on the face. I shoot with my camera in manual mode when taking portraits. Believe I am relying on automation to much.
Thank you for your comments, and suggestions.

Bruce

[rpcrowe]

While, I agree with Manfred that the lighting is very likely the culprit in your example, the low-tech equipment, I always have available is a pack or small box of facial tissue (AKA: Kleenex). Its amazing what a wipe will do to help cleanse the skin of oil....

[Digital]

Richard, thank you for your suggestion.


Bruce

[Manfred M]

While, I agree with Manfred that the lighting is very likely the culprit in your example, the low-tech equipment, I always have available is a pack or small box of facial tissue (AKA: Kleenex). Its amazing what a wipe will do to help cleanse the skin of oil....

A gentle blotting action, rather than wiping is important here. Wiping can easily smear the makeup. Reapplication of makeup may be necessary if the makeup application is damaged during the cleanup operation.

[William W]

Is there any ladies' beauty products that I can use to reduce the reflections on the nose, and forehead in portrait photography?

Typically:

> First – Skin Coloured ‘Foundation’
> Then – ‘Blush’ or ‘Toning Powder’

Powders come in different ‘finishes’ (basically the name will describe their reflective ability):

> ‘Matte’ Foundation and Blush are generally used for more oily skin types, or when shooting under conditions or in situations which encourage perspiration;

> ‘High sheen’ Blush is rarely used for any Photography.

The application of Make Up for Photography is not to be entered into unadvisedly – have a good practice before you go ‘live’ with it.

***

. . . I am going to revisit bouncing the flash in a corner of the room; however I plan to place the flash in manual mode, and experiment in toning down my hot spots on the face. I shoot with my camera in manual mode when taking portraits. Believe I am relying on automation to much . . .

I agree with Manfred that the main two causes of the hot spots on your sample Image are:

> Bounce coming in from above (and not enough splay/spread of the Flash Bounce because the travel of the light is too short

> The flash exposure is too much

If you are choosing to use BOUNCE FLASH, then I think that bouncing backwards into a rear corner of a room will benefit.

Also using the Flash Exposure Compensation will assist – you could instead use Manual Flash the outcome will be the same: I find FEC is an easier function.

I think that I might have encouraged you to bounce backwards, into a corner before, in any case here is an example which is similar to your shooting scenario.

The LH image is the JPEG SOOC. The RH image has the hot spots toned down a bit using Post Production and a bit of the red de-saturated.

The point of these samples is to note that when the Hot Shoe Flash is turned backwards and bounced from a corner comprising two walls and the ceiling there is a big ‘spread’ of light but it still has enough directionality to create some modelling – and (importantly) that modelling is side to side across the face and not top to bottom down the face.



WW

[dem]

A quick solution I would try is to offer the lady a chair. This will double the distance the light is travelling and will make the lighting softer.

There is no catch light in the example shot. Most flashes have a small piece of white plastic that you can pull out to through a bit of light straight at the subject. I would use that.

[Digital]

A quick solution I would try is to offer the lady a chair. This will double the distance the light is travelling and will make the lighting softer.

There is no catch light in the example shot. Most flashes have a small piece of white plastic that you can pull out to through a bit of light straight at the subject. I would use that.

The subject was seated. The particular flash I used does not have a bounce card. I am not sure that, given the flash head was bounced behind the camera position, how much of an effect that a "fashioned" bounce card would have had on this particular shot.

Bruce

[Pippan]

A probably dumb question from someone with almost zero portrait experience: wouldn't a polarising filter dramatically reduce reflections and hotspots? Or would it create other problems (aside from the obvious absorption of 1 1/2 or so stops of light, for which I assume light sources can be adjusted to compensate)?

[dem]

I think we might be trying to solve a wrong problem here. The hot spots might be produced not by the reflected/bounced light but by the direct light from the flash.

Does your flash have focal length adjustment of how narrow the beam it makes? If it was set too wide to say 24 mm, setting it to 90 mm might help.