A Reflection

Posted by James - Sunday, 2nd March 2008

I am currently in the process of updating my mother-in-law’s business website. She runs a colour analysis consultation service and her existing site requires a complete overhaul. One of the weaknesses I noticed is that there are currently no photographs. Images are an extremely important ingredient when trying to successfully communicate with your customers; so I suggested a photo shoot!

I planned to make three pictures:

• A simple head shot so that potential customers can get an idea of who they are dealing with
• A product shot or two of the items the customer will receive
• An overview image that shows the consultation ‘in action’ so the customer knows what to expect on the day

For this shoot write-up I’m going to talk about the last of these images; the ‘consultation in action’ shot. The final image is shown below; please continue to read the article below for an explanation of my set-up.

A few days before the shoot I sketched out a plan for the shot in a note book so that I was properly prepared. The consultation involves the draping of material over the customer whilst they sit in front of a mirror – I planned to capture this process via the reflection in the mirror.

I recently purchased a new Manfrotto short ‘Backlite’ stand (MN 012B) specifically with this shoot in mind – I planned to hide it behind the table to evenly backlight the white background.

My main source of light was from a softbox raised as high as the ceiling allowed (around 8 feet) pointing down and towards the subjects (and camera). This meant that the back and shoulders of the standing subject would be in shadow and therefore not a distraction. To provide even illumination of both subjects’ faces I placed a reflector just out of the frame to the left of the subjects to bounce some of the light back.

Something I had failed to consider when planning the shot prior to the shoot was that the mirror would (of course) reflect the opposite wall (complete with distracting wall covering, picture rail, etc.) I only own one background support system so a kind helper (thanks Kenny!) held my black muslin whilst standing on a step ladder. This resulted in a clean, distraction-free reflection.

I angled the mirror slightly towards the camera, positioned myself just out of view of the reflection and took the shots. An overview of the set-up is shown in the diagram below:

I was quite pleased with the resulting shots and actually chose to combine two images to create the final picture; one that framed the subjects’ backs just as I intended, with one that reflected better expressions on the subjects’ faces!