Hair in the Air!

This has always been one of my favorite head shots, done some years ago at our long lost Dobbs Ferry studio, by the Hudson River. Maggie Hood, the model, is a wonderfully lovely subject, with flaming tresses and a beautiful intensity in front of the lens.

Was teaching recently, and trying to explain how an all flash exposure looks and feels different from one that incorporates available light into the final f-stop/shutter speed concoction. The above is such a slam dunk, all flash, all-the-time type of photo, shot with a large Octa camera right, at 1/250th at f8. Fun to do, and couldn’t be simpler. One light, and her mood and look is frozen through the lens by the power of flash duration. Hair blowing with a studio fan just gets locked in beautiful, flowing waves, as it plays out in the wind. You could shoot like this all day and every piece of the photo would be under your control, chiseled into your pixels by the stopping power of flash. The light has lovely softness, but it also has power and direction.

But, add a little available light, the mood changes, as does the flow of the hair.

The above is still a flash picture, and sharpness in her eyes is retained at 1/20th of a second at f2.8. Again, a fan does its work, but the hair is now being blown backwards into a zone governed by available light. The flash control gives way to the vagaries of the Maggie’s hair literally blowing in the wind. She remains steady, thus sharp. The hair has a will of its own at this point. The light here is V-flat lighting, which is open and soft and has very little in the way of direction. It’s a tribute to Maggie’s command of the camera that she can turn virtually any kind of lighting to her advantage, and make the photog look good. She is doing a lot of acting now, having graduated from NYU with a BFA in Theater. All I can say is, film world look out, as she is up and coming and extremely talented. You can find her over on Instagram at maggiehood4.

Just a quick thing about shutter speeds, f-stops, light, and hair in the air.

More tk…..