Ok, first, for those who don’t follow me on Twitter or Facebook… literally the same day as my last post (March 2nd), we had a major medical crisis dumped in our laps. My wife went in for a doctor’s appointment that same afternoon for a cough and shoulder pain.. and by 6:30 that evening, we had a very worried doctor on the phone telling us there was a large mass in her chest. Almost 3 weeks later now, and we have found out that it is a lymphoma.. a cancer of the lymph gland. The doctors are telling us that it is “curable,” so we are running with that until we hear otherwise. She had her first chemo treatment this week and is suffering the effects of that.. we’ll hopefully know more soon.

This is why the promised update of my headshot setup has taken so long and why I haven’t posted a picture of the week since then… but I’m trying to get things back to some semblance of normal, so here we go now.

Someone on Twitter asked me to post a picture of the back of the DIY light.. so here it is:

Pretty basic.. the light switch collects the wires from the bath bar through a hole drilled in the back of the flower box.. and connects them up with the power cord. Flip the switch and the lights come on.

Now, here is a shot of the headshot setup I use.. this is shot from where the background usually sits, looking back to where I stand (next to that window):

Again, pretty basic.. one might even call it “ghetto,” but I am a minimalist and a strong believer in using what works. That is an 8 x 3 1/2 foot piece of sheet metal on the floor for a reflector.. a white wall down camera right and pieces of white foam core taped to the back side of my prop shelves on camera left (camera position is from the windows, remember). My DIY light sits on a stool immediately to camera right… this and the window gives the catchlight and dilates the pupils. Above the chair (where the subject sits), are two of those paper lantern lights like you can get at Pier One or Ikea (they are like $5) with daylight white balanced compact fluorescent bulbs. This adds a hair light and helps separation from the background. I will also add a remote flash to go off and light the background from time to time.. depending on the situation.. but not always. The flash only lights the background, so there are no color balance issues.

Here is another shot of the lovely Katharine with this light setup..

EXIF: 1/100s, f/2.8, ISO200, 160mm

Keep experimenting and you may find your own simple setup that works for you. Remember, it doesn’t have to be expensive to be a good light. Light is light. Its what you do with it and how you shape it that matters.

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