Light is the currency of photography. The photographer who can light... and light well... can photograph anything, anytime, anywhere, for anybody.
I had been muddling along, in photography, when I came across a travelling exhibit... at The Boston Public Library... of "LIFE" Magazine photographs, of the 50's and 60's.
Included in this exhibit were the actual repro prints of "The Country Doctor" essay, by W. Eugene Smith. Smith did NOT print these... they were done by the Time-LIFE lab... because LIFE photo editor Wilson Hicks was tired of Smith's refusal to wrap up the project, get back to New York, and make the prints for deadline.
The 11"x14" (!) prints were HEAVILY retouched... extensive airbrushing and spotting were evident. What caught my attention, however, was the Spotone in the eyes of the Doctor, in all the interior pictures (VERY evident in the Suture Baby Picture). The Spotone was covering up the catchlights in the eyes. Smith had *LIT* everything!!
It makes sense... wide-angle lenses were slow... film was slow... and there was so much that needed to be included in each photo. I was awash in wonderment. The pictures didn't LOOK as though they had been lit, but... clearly... they were.
Not long after that, I discovered California photographer Bill Owens... author of the photo-books "Suburbia", "Our Kind of People", and "Working". Owens' black and white pictures were luxurious... filled with all the tonality and detail neccessary to tell us about Owens' subjects.
Owens was kind enough to share his technique with us, in an article for the Fall/1978 "Popular Photography How-To Guide", which was later expanded into his self-published book, "Documentary Photography"... bare-tube and bounce strobe, and 120 roll film.
This gentleman's hobby is mentally "communicating" with people's pets, for theraputic purposes... usually over the telephone. Here, in his home office (with one of his cats being 'helpful'), he was lit by two Graflex bare-tube flashes (like the one in the picture, above).
One is to the left of the camera... one is 45 degrees behind the subject, and to the right of the camera. In the 12' wide by 18' long by 9' tall room, with white walls and ceiling, the two strobes "tented" these guys... giving a nice, wrappped-around look, with strong lateral highlights for dimensional seperation from the background.
The film was 400-speed color negative, the aperture was f/4.5, the camera was an M3 Leica, and the lens was a 50mm f/2 Summicron.
This Museum Exhibit Designer was photographed using two Braun 800 series strobes (now long-discontinued... the 800's were re-chargable 150/200 watt-second units, that were very popular with wedding photographers in The Greater Boston area), on stands, shooting through two small umbrellas... one to the left of the subject, and one on "camera right", high and to the right of the Bhutanese Mask, showering light toward the subject.
I like to shoot through umbrellas... which is pointing the convex side of the umbrella toward the subject, rather than the hollow side... because it's a simple way to spread the light 'way around the area to be photographed. I don't often get to work with an assistant, so I don't often get the luxury of precise placement of where my light goes. I do not want to waste a lot of "face time" with a subject, fussing with the lights... so I Keep It Simple.
The film was 400 speed color negative, the camera was a Nikon FM2n, the shutter speed was 1/60th of a second, and the lens was a Nikkor 24mm f/2.8... set somewhere around f/5.6-8.
This local political figure was photographed against a faux black velvet background, with a 400 watt Novatron strobe fired into a 3'x4' softbox, just to "camera left" of the subject. Fill was provided by a 400 watt Speedotron Brown-Line strobe, with two heads... each firing into a 16"x24" softbox... one to "camera right" of the subject, and one immediately to the right of the photographer, to maintain detail in the dark area on his face.
The lighting was designed not only to seperate the subject from the black background, but also to maintain the tonality of the subject's skin.
The film was Kodak T-Max 400, the camera was a Nikon FM2n, the lens was a 105mm f/2.5 Nikkor, and the aperture was around f/11.
This businessman-turned-pol was photographed at his campaign offices, where he fantasized about running for U.S. Senator against Edward M. "Ted" Kennedy. Inasmuch as he was an extraordinarily dull person, I felt the need to spice up the picture, a bit, with some filtration.
The main light was immediately to the left of the subject (camera right)... a Braun 800, with a warming filter, into a small shoot-through umbrella. Fill was a Vivitar 283, bounced off the ceiling, directly over the photographer's head. A third light... another Braun... with a #25A red filter over the head, was bounced off the floor, behind and "camera right" of the subject... to add some color to the shadow areas.
The size of the office, and the placement of the flag on the wall were such, that I knew there'd be an unavoidable shadow on the wall... so I figured to "jazz it up"... just enough to be interesting. The red was chosen to compliment the red satin on the flag.
The camera was a Mamiya 645, the film a 100 speed 'chrome, the lens was a 55mm (moderate wide-angle), set to around f/8.
I went to photograph this English Teacher at his Merrimack River Valley home. I went in with my tripod, hoping to shoot quick, by available light... but, his very old house (12" wide pine on the floors... 7' ceilings, with old, brown plaster) mitigated against that... nothing was white, everything was dark, or dark and red.
I got out my "mini kit" of Vivitar 283's, and turbo packs. I set out a 283, on a stand to camera right, and shot into a 24" umbrella (positioned the proper way... concave toward the subject. It was a small room, and the smaller pool of light worked OK). Fill was provided by a 283 with a sto-fen "strobedome", positioned next to the subject at camera left, and "dialed down" to about a stop-and-a-half less output than the metered output for the umbrella light.
What I wanted to do was to capture the color and texture of this guy's environment, without it influencing the color of the light falling onto the guy... so, he looks OK, and you can now see how thick the shellac is on the desk, and feel the textures of the old, rag wallpaper and the leather-bound encyclopedia.
The camera was a thumb-wind Nikon F2, the lens was an old 50mm f/1.4 (with a chrome front ring), the film was 400 speed color negative, the aperture was around f/5.6-8.