Just got done a really fun shoot with Béke Beau and Dar Clinton where we had beautiful, late afternoon sunshine streaming through the studio windows … for about 6 straight hours! “Joe, surely you jest! Even we folks in Southern California never get that kind of sun!” Well, we sure don’t, either. As a matter of fact, there is still a foot of snow on the ground and no sun to be had at any time today. However, with the help of a couple Speedotron power packs and some ingenuity …
I already have windows in my studio but the sun rarely comes in and certainly not today. So I went outside with my Speedo, er, Speedotron 2403 power pack and a 2400 ws head and blasted it at full power toward the studio windows. I jacked the pack and the ends of the power cords up off the snow with a crate and packed snow around the light stand for stability.
Here is a view looking toward the windows. I moved the light source several times before I got the effect I was looking for.
Meanwhile, back inside I shot tests to work out my camera position and where the light fell to tune in everything.
My modeling light was useless with so much ambient light so I placed Stephanie into the scene to further fine tune the angle of the light. This shot revealed shadows falling right across her face so it was back into the snow to move the strobe.
Success! Now I have plenty of time to scrutinize while the models are getting hair and make-up.
Turns out that the shadow side was getting a little lost so I added another strobe to the right of the set with a Photoflex half-dome and a grid attachment to control spill.
I had the main light set to full power while the kicker with a grid was set as low as it would go since it was so close. This allowed me to shoot at 1/125 sec at f5.6-1/3. I warmed things up in-camera by manually setting the white balance to 7600K.
