In this video,
I visit a tiny picture palace
and take on another
secret portrait challenge!
Hello I'm Gavin Hoey
and you're watching AdoramaTV
brought to you by Adorama,
the camera store that's got everything
for us photographers
and today we're off to do another
secret portrait challenge
which means Sam
has organized everything
for this shoot.
She's organized the model,
the styling
and the location.
The only thing I know is,
it's quite a drive from here
and we're going to a car park
near Chester?
Okay off we go.
Well so here I am
we are at the location
that Sam's booked. It is the Roundhill Picture Palace.
Let's go inside
and see what's in there.
So it's no bigger on the inside
which of course isn't really surprising is it?
But it is actually beautiful in here.
This is a fantastic place.
I love this sort of vintage cinema feel.
Now whenever I go to a brand new location,
the first thing I always do
is do a quick location scout,
look for the best places to shoot.
That's it locations...
location scouting done.
It's absolutely tiny in here.
This is going to be
a real challenge,
but I guess that's the whole idea.
So let's get a model in,
let's get some lights set.
Let's get shooting.
So Sam's organised everything
including the model and is brilliant
because I've got Fern with me today,
so this is great
and we got this whole vintage
thing going on,
so I kind of get the idea
of where we're go.
So first thing I need to do
is set some lights up
and I bought a whole bunch of different lights
because I don't know what I'm going to do.
I didn't know where I was going to be
so I think let's just start with
a simple softbox with a grid
and just sort of picking Fern out
and try and get some of this ambient
light in and then sort of build it up
from there.
My first shot is going to be
without flash
just to see how I can control
the ambient light.
I'm actually not looking
to get rid of the entire
ambient light.
I'm trying to leave maybe a little bit of light in.
That looks pretty good,
so we've got some light on the ceiling
but Fern I can see her
but she's in fairly dark situation
there so that's where I can use the flash
to pick Fern out,
so let's try that.
Okay here we go,
let's see what we get.
A little test shot first of all.
Okay yeah that's not too bad actually,
I think we can build on that,
so let's let's try
a few different shots like that.
We can just take the front row of seats out.
Okay so part of the problem
of being limited in spaces
could end up the shooting in one spot
for the entire session,
so I'm going to try and move around slightly.
There wasn't that many places to go
but I guess that's all part the challenge.
I'm thinking maybe we should put a light
behind you as well.
Okay so just a little separation on Fern shoulders
just to put a little bit of rim lighting
in here ideally, ideally I put two in,
but I don't think I can get a second light in here.
Owe!
So small,
I thought my studio was small this is crazy,
a second light in here
and get even lighting
and not have it in the picture
so I think just through the limitations
of space I'm going to put one light here.
Yeah let's try that.
So that's on group B
so I can control that independently
and I'm going to put it as low
as it goes,
lowest of the low powers.
I'll try and not frame it in my shots.
Wow even on the lowest power
that's incredibly bright.
Okay so problems.
That didn't work,
so it's time to experiment
a little bit.
Let's try maybe,
I can't make it any lower,
I can't put it any further away.
I could turn this off
actually let's just try turning
the main light off,
just experiment,
see what happens if we turn A off,
the key light off
and just have a backlight.
Let's try that,
okay so this is going to be interesting
because it's going to give us a very
sort of more cinematic look,
so that's interesting
because that now starts
to look a little bit more like,
like we've got a kind
of natural cinema behind you
an actual projector behind you
projecting in,
which is kind of nice.
I like that.
What would make this better
is some smoke.
That would, that would definitely
make it better.
So one of the things that Sam made me bring
for the secret shoot
was my smoke machine
and she's checked with the owners
we got permission to use theatrical smoke
in here so we've loaded this up
with a little bit of light smoke fluid
and I'm hoping that's just going
to add a little bit of extra depth
and dimension to this shot.
I've got it in my little CHAUVET fog machine
and that's great because it can
be really precisely controlled
the amount of smoke that I do
with I can have a tiny little bit
or I can fill the room with one stroke,
so I want to build the effect up.
I need to backlight smoke.
Whenever you have smoke
in your shot you have to
backlight it, so this little light
is going to stay in place
and again that's going to feel like the projector
beaming forwards,
so I'll just put a little bit of layer of smoke
in here nothing too much
because once it's in here,
it's not not going anywhere
and so I reckon that's pretty good
and because we got some smoke thing going on
we got Fern with the fake cigarette.
Marvelous!
Let's try that.
Okay so multiple lights
going on, so let's break
this down one light at a time.
Start with the background
in this case
because that is the brightest light.
Okay so that still looks really bright,
so I'm going to add a grid to this
just to try and make this a little less bright.
That's it
and that should take the the power down
a little bit and give me a touch more control
over the light as well.
Let's try that
and just the background on its own
looks kind of dramatic.
Okay that's pretty good,
so with that set
now I can add in my key light.
The one that's actually no light Fern
and I'm going to do this by eye.
I've got the light stand in the shot again,
I could scream, I really could.
We are short of time
but I have even less time
to Photoshop it later.
Yeah so this feels great.
This has the feeling of a very old school cinema
so Ferns being lit by the the fake screen.
Imagine there's an actual cinema here
with a cinema screen
that, that's kind of the effect
I want that sort of light coming in from the front
but also light coming in from behind
whether this is the right light I'm not sure
because now it's quite flat,
so if I can move the light round slightly.
Now we're getting there.
This is great Fern, love it!
So I'm trying different angles
I kind of like this.
I like this, we have this
little, little projected look
going back here.
I'd rather not see that in the shot.
So I might need to Photoshop out the
the actual start point
because if I back up
even if I just frame it out of shot,
actually it's not too bad,
if I frame it just out of shot that looks pretty good
but now effectively I've got on camera light.
Again it's really, really flat lighting,
so if I moved,
I need to move this light around
to the other side,
to keep that sort of more dramatic edge lighting
that's working so well
and that the difference between
straight lighting and edge lighting
quite significant.
So there you go my time here
at the Picture Palace is done,
so I think we got some great shots there
and it's been a real challenge
just throwing me in at the deep end
but that's the whole point
of these secret portrait challenges.
If you've enjoyed this video,
don't forget to leave me a comment below
and if you want to watch more videos
from myself and the other amazing presenters
right here on AdoramaTV,
you've got to click on that subscribe button
and click the bell icon.
I'm Gavin Hoey,
thanks for watching.