Pete Souza, she might use a seam-
less backdrop and have plenty of sur-
rounding space in her Washington
studio. But the next day, she may be
taking a portrait of Congressman
Lewis and setting up lights in his
office, which means she needs to take
care not to knock anything over while
putting up a backdrop and position-
ing lights. Then, she may need to
fly across the country to photograph
Giffords in her home, which means
Ottesen may have to explain to air-
port security that the strange-looking
device is actually a Profoto D2 studio
strobe, not a weapon.
For camera gear, Ottesen relied
on her Canon EOS 5D Mark II with
a Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II
USM lens, employing the Canon EF
100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM lens for
tight shots.
For lighting, she’d set up a Profoto
D2 or a pair of Profoto B1s. While she
tended to prefer the D2’s light output
more than the B1’s, the latter is smaller
and more convenient for travel and
shooting in small spaces.
She generally used a transparent
umbrella as a modifier and took advan-
tage of the Profoto Air Remote to adjust
lighting. She’d occasionally position an
additional light between the subject
and the backdrop to achieve more sepa-
ration of the two.
Although she didn’t often have the
luxury of shooting in a studio for this
project, when she did, she shot against
a seamless backdrop. She wanted
the backgrounds to be dark, to elicit
the same general feeling but not be
exactly the same. She had more of a
background choice when shooting in
studio, but for traveling, she packed a
black fabric cloth.
Depending on the space, she draped
or clamped the fabric over a door, using
gaffer tape to attach it to a wall or hang
it from light stands. Dark seamless or
cloth provided “the simplicity of being
able to concentrate on the subject”
rather than a distracting background
that would draw attention away from
the person. And she chose black for
her traveling backdrop because “you
don’t have to light it, and it doesn’t show
wrinkles as much” as lighter colors.
And cloth folds up easily.
Not surprisingly, Ottesen chose
black-and-white for all the book’s pho-
tos. “I love black-and-white, especially
for portraits. You filter out so much of
the [visual] noise, and it allows you to
focus on the person, their face lines,
their eyes, their expressions.”
A perfect case in point is her por-
trait of Lewis. “You can see the worry
line in the middle of his forehead. Youget pulled into the vortex of his mem-
ory; it gives me the chills. It’s one of
my favorites.”
Although she shot everything
in color since the Wa shing t o n Post
generally prefers color, Ottesen con-
verted the portraits to black-and-
white using a combination of Adobe
Lightroom, Photoshop and Nik Sil-
ver Efex Pro.
“There’s too much information in
color. I love the simplicity of black-and-
white and the ability to concentrate on
a person’s face and movement.” DPPHarry Belafonte digitalphotopro.com January/February 2020 | 33