SLR outdoor portrait photography skill video

What are the skills of outdoor portrait photography? What should I pay attention to? Below, I have compiled a skill video of outdoor portrait photography for you. Welcome to read the reference!

Outdoor portrait photography skills

Carry a gray card and check the normal white balance.

Generally, the problem of white balance will be encountered, mostly in indoor shooting. Due to different light, the color temperature of the picture is abnormal. Faced with this situation, many cameras now have corresponding white balance modes to choose from to alleviate the abnormal color temperature, although not every time. In addition, you can also find a white object at the scene as a reference standard. After shooting the RAW file, you can use the eyedropper to edit and adjust the software, and draw the white place in the picture in the form of custom white balance. More particular ones will use gray cards instead of white objects as reference.

Gray card, gray card, so people may directly think it is gray cardboard, just like black card. In fact, the general gray card usually uses the gray with the concentration of 18%, which is closer to the white that people see. In addition, the white types of various white papers are different, and some may add fluorescent agents and other influences. In contrast, 18% gray is the standard.

Some photographers may think that there is no white balance problem in outdoor shooting, but it is not. During the day, the sun will pass through different illumination angles, and the color temperature will also change. A serious photographer will take a gray card every time the sun changes to ensure the accuracy of white balance.

Learn to deal with strong light and strong light.

Photography itself is the art of light and shadow, and it is certainly the same in portrait creation. Different light can produce different portrait effects. Usually people shoot outside, so I suggest you avoid it when the sun is strong at noon. Not only is the weather hot and sunny, but the tough top light effect is often poor. However, if we really want to take action under such circumstances, there are corresponding countermeasures. You can choose to shoot in the shade to avoid strong sunlight directly on the subject's face, forming a strong contrast between light and shade. At the same time, we should also pay attention to whether there are cracks such as trees that will produce strange spots on the subject's face. For more portrait shooting methods under strong light, you can refer to some tips here.

In addition, you should be very careful when shooting portraits in cloudless weather in Wan Li. It is best to carry a soft light plate or reflector, which can replace clouds to create the effect of soft sunshine.

Pay attention to the light and shadow on the subject's face.

I don't like taking pictures in bright light. It is precisely because of that tough light that the light and shadow effect is not soft enough, and it may even reflect unnatural light and shadow on the subject's face. In fact, as long as you shoot in a scene with sunlight or other obvious light sources, if you don't pay attention, a similar situation may occur. For example, you can leave shadows of other objects in the scene, such as street lamps, shade trees, eaves, etc. Part of the subject's face, because you are standing in the wrong position and facing in the wrong direction. Even if the contrast is not so exaggerated under strong light, it will still affect the visual beauty.

Make a reflector or soft mask with the materials at hand.

With the improvement of portrait shooting level and the deepening of research, reflector will become one of the indispensable accessories in shooting. You don't have to buy ready-made reflectors, you can also DIY with some white plastic foam boards. If you need a reflector temporarily at the shooting scene, but don't bring it, you can find similar white walls, mirrors, etc. Fill the light for the subject. Facing the strong sunshine overhead, you can also try to use the old white sheets at home (the large size used by two people is better), plus the clothesline and clothes rack, and cooperate with the trees, street lamps and other pillars in the venue to build a huge soft light cover by DIY. But remember to fix the hanging edges of the sheets, otherwise the wind will probably lift them off or float them into the picture.

Clear back 16 rule.

I believe many friends prefer to go out to shoot on sunny days. When you don't use an exposure meter or a gray card to measure light, you can better judge the metering situation as long as you remember the rule of sunny day 16. Do you remember what the 16 rule is in sunny days? In a sunny shooting environment, if the aperture is set to f 16, the shutter speed required for correct exposure at this time will be the reciprocal of ISO sensitivity. For example, on sunny days, under the premise of f 16, the ISO value is set to 100, and the shutter speed should be1100s ... If it is cloudy, the reference aperture value should be f8. Of course, if you have an exposure meter or a gray card at hand, the exposure effect will be more accurate.

Attention to detail.

No matter what subject you shoot, if you want to make your work by taking it to the next level, you must pay more and more attention to the details of the picture. When taking a portrait, pay attention to the subject in your painting. In order to let the audience know your subject at a glance, try to avoid other things that may sneak into the picture. Sometimes in the face of messy background, we can also blur and highlight people through shallow depth of field. In addition, we should also pay attention to the details of the subject, whether the clothes are in a mess, whether the makeup is flowery, and whether the hair is a little messy. Although some flaws can be edited and adjusted later, if they can be done in one step, why not?

Select the focus manually.

When shooting in autofocus mode, is it customary to choose the focus for the camera? It may not be a big problem to do this when shooting general scenery, but there may be some out-of-focus situations when shooting portraits. In the autofocus system of a general camera, several focus points are often judged by the close-range objects or occlusion with obvious contrast between light and dark, and then a point is selected as the focus point by calculating the average shooting distance. But sometimes the focus of its judgment is not necessarily the part we want to focus on, so the accuracy of manual selection of single-point focus is higher.

Focus on the eyes

In portrait photography, especially in portrait photography, eyes are a very important element, often the soul of the whole work, which can vividly convey the inner feelings of the subject. In addition, the eyes are also the sharpest element on the human face, and the recognition degree of focus judgment is also relatively high. When shooting with a large aperture lens, focusing on the eyes will have a better effect, because the effect of shallow depth of field can even soften the facial skin of the subject.