Shooting skills of low-light portraits in the early morning

To ask the secret of making a good work, the answer may be to spend other people's sleeping time on photography! Still complaining about being robbed of time and not getting enough sleep. It is better to get up and take pictures! On a cold winter morning, how to use the weak light at dawn to express the cold atmosphere in the morning? Photographer Rou 7 takes the home work "Haizhu Bridge at 0℃" as an example to explain the secret of shooting!

First, the preliminary preparation

It is estimated that many portrait photographers rarely take pictures in the morning, because this cannot be implemented unilaterally, and models, makeup artists and others must be considered. So before shooting, be sure to find a colleague who is willing to accompany you crazy.

This time when I was filming this group of films, the difficulty suddenly increased a lot, because it happened to be the coldest days in Guangzhou, and 5 or 6 o'clock was also the coldest time of the day. Moreover, I woke up in the middle of the night for fear that I couldn't get up, so I stayed up all night, and it was very uncomfortable to stay up late. Friends who watch the ball should feel it.

Preliminary preparation

Therefore, coffee is essential, and it is not too much to ruin your life occasionally.

Makeup process

I finished putting on my makeup at 5: 30 in the morning.

Second, use street lamps to decorate the picture and distribute light.

I chose Haizhu Bridge, a landmark in Guangzhou, as the shooting location. There are many people and cars during the day, so it's difficult to shoot well, so that's why I want to shoot at dawn.

Lighting layout of shooting scene

At 6: 20, the sky began to light up and the horizon in the distance was pink. At this time, there is basically no ambient light source, so the model's face is black and can only be filled with street lamps. Street lamps belong to overhead lamps. If people's faces don't tilt up, this light source has little effect, because everyone knows that people's faces will be extremely ugly when photographed by the top light.

Thirdly, the faint natural light shows the cold atmosphere in the morning.

At 6: 30, the distant sky was illuminated for only 10 minutes. At this time, the street lights were turned off, and there was no artificial light source, so we had to use natural light to shoot. Why not use a flash? Because shooting in this environment is the pursuit of early morning light, artificial flash will only destroy this natural atmosphere. The Pearl River below serves as a large background to reflect the morning light. Set off the atmosphere of dawn at that time.

At that time, the temperature was only a few degrees, and the model naturally felt very cold, so she let the model run a little. Take a picture of the moment when you accidentally turn around, and you have this film. The shutter should not be too fast, and the light should not be set too fast, which is a bit dynamic. Headlights at the back and a large area of pink in the sky indicate that the shooting time is in the morning.

Fourth, telephoto framing highlights the sense of picture extension.

As I said before, to keep the atmosphere rather than the flash, you need a large aperture lens in low light. I used the telephoto end of Xiaobai to compress and blur the background to make the characters stand out in the picture. When I was composing a composition, I noticed the extension of the lamp above, which made the painting more interesting.

Fifth, use the backlight of the rising sun to show softness and warmth.

Sunrise at 7: 20. Sunlight comes from the gap behind the building, so I decided to directly reverse the light and let it rush into the lens, because the light at this time is directly into the lens, but it is not so strong, so the light ratio is still very soft.

Shooting scene

We must hurry up when shooting at this node. The sun rises quickly, and it will rise completely in about 4 or 5 minutes. We must hurry up!

Sixth, the large area of the sky shows that the blue sky has become brighter.

Shooting scene

At 8 o'clock, I took a telephoto under Haizhu Bridge. At this time, the sun has risen, but it is not very high. The sun is behind the side, so I took this photo with a half-silhouette exposure, highlighting the outline of the figure. Pay attention to the gradual change from bright white to light blue, and accurately explain the time and environment.