M

aking your client look her best is a sincere form of
flattery. And I always go by the “face first” rule:
there’s nothing more important to her than her pretty
face. To quote the late Dean Collins, “People, especially women, like two
things: they like to hear their name and they like to see their faces looking
thin.” Remember that, especially the last two words. And to make faces thin,
remember two more words: short light (sometimes called narrow light).

Angle of Main Light to Subject.

When discussing lighting, we begin with the main light. Where this is posi-
tioned in relation to the subject will determine to a great degree the mood
of the portrait and how your subject is represented.
Short Lighting. Short lighting means posing your subject and position-
ing your lights so that the shadowed side of her face is closer to the camera
than the highlight side.

Broad Lighting. The opposite of short light is broad light. Quite sim-
ply, broad lighting means posing and lighting your subject so the highlight
side of her face is toward the camera. This can be quite beautiful. In fact,
you’ll see it in a lot of old advertisements, particularly from 1900 to the

38 MASTER GUIDE FOR GLAMOUR PHOTOGRAPHY

3. FLATTERING FACES AND FIGURES.

SHORT LIGHT BROAD LIGHT FASHION LIGHT SPLIT LIGHT

Here, you can see the position of the main light

when creating the major lighting setups.