your lights and taking forever to set up your shots frustrates your subjects
and ruins the atmosphere of the session.
Indoor Lighting.
Photographing the subject with indoor studio lights should look or appear
as natural as possible unless you are going for a harder look. I’ll discuss
several examples of my common lighting setups and techniques.
All of the glamour/boudoir sessions that I do show beautiful lighting,
and some soft effects are done in Photoshop. We use Nik Software Inc.’s
plug-in filters (see Appendix F) to create a much softer look than what we
produce for our seniors, children, and families. Years ago, I used Tamron
soft focusing filters as well as old Norman filters on my larger-format film
cameras. On occasion, I’ll use one of my old film filters screwed onto the
This is my standard studio setup. I can quickly move or adapt my lights for any sit-
uation. Note that my main camera room is 30x22 feet.
54 ELLIE VAYO’S GUIDE TO BOUDOIR PHOTOGRAPHY