Posing for Portrait Photography

from the subject. Now, I’m sure I’m going to get an e-mail from a

math wizard who wants to explain that my calculations were off.

This isn’t rocket science, and I am not using a calculator to precise-

ly apply the inverse-square law, but it’s close. It provides a consistent

appearance in our lighting throughout the entire studio.

Unfortunately, in many studios, a single light box is used for all

types of portraits. This means that the light on the head-and-shoul-

ders portraits has a different quality (contrast, size of catchlight in

the eyes, density of shadow, etc.) than the light on the full-length

poses. These variations in lighting require the photographer to come

up with variations in posing. For example, as the main light is pulled

back farther from the subject (reducing its apparent size) it will

POSING THE FACE 37

Maintaining a consistent quality of light when
moving from head-and-shoulders portraits to
full-length ones requires the use of progres-
sively larger light sources.

Unfortunately, in many studios,

a single light box is used

for all types of portraits.