Thoughts on Head Shots
If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
I’ve been thinking about updating my head shot. If you’re observant, you’ll notice its copyright date is 2004. I like that it’s black and white. I may do that again. The photographer who took my head shot, Greg Schreck, is known for his black and white work, and I liked the head shot he did for another local artist.
This time, I’m thinking of buying my own lights and having my husband, a gifted ametuer photographer, take the head shot.
Any excuse to buy more equipment, right?
Here are the lights I’m thinking of getting:
with the clip-on diffusers:
or perhaps the beefier kit with umbrellas:
For a backdrop, I’m looking at the ones at Set Shop. Part of the reason they have some that are amazingly affordable, is that they are small, certainly big enough for one person for a head shot.
Would you have thought you could set up a mini portrait studio for so little?
cool stuff, but seems like a lot to spend for just one photo? or will your photographer husband get more mileage out of them, perhaps?
You know, IMHO, I really think you should skip doing it indoors and do it outdoors in natural lighting. It’s free, and if done well, it can look better than the staged set up a lot of times. I’ve done some natural light portraits, including self-portraits, that turned out really well.
I’m a black and white gal myself, so my preference, even for outdoors, would be that vs. color.
What you show though, is basically the lighting setup I have for my jewelry photography.
Marco, sure, we’ll get more use out of the lights. Hopefully having the lights will mean I’ll update my headshot more than once every 4 years!
Tamra, yes, outdoor can be great, I’ve done those too. There’s a park in the Chicago area where a lot of wedding parties go for their outdoor pictures — I go there.
It’s harder to schedule the time though, to wait for the nice day, then rush over to the park, you know? I like to have lights for jewelry and people, so that I’m not dependent on the weather, especially where we live!
Elaine