First of all, thank you all sooooo much. You have really helped me.

When I am taking pictures indoors (which I have been afraid to do because of lighting), I use a big, north side window. Also a bright light and board etc. My question is do I use my flash? The film that I have already purchased is tri-x 400. If something else would be better, I will go buy it. What do you think?

Also, the little girl is very blonde so I wanted to use a dark back drop right? I have navy already. Should I use black instead?

You told me to use a meter then up a stop. I don't have a meter yet. Should I even attempt this without a meter or should I go ahead and get a meter before I plan on taking her picture?

I don't know if I mentioned that I will be using a 200mm zoom. Will this make any difference?

Is there a certain filter that would be good.

Again, thank you sooooooo much for your help!!!!!!

-- Monica Dotson (mdotson@midamer.net), September 08, 1999

Answers

Hi Monica,

I would not use flash at this time, if you are taking the picture indoors. The problem with flash is, among other things, that you can't see the light from the flash as you are composing the picture. Unless you know how to control & difuse your flash & get it off camera, I would stay away from it.

Some of my favorite portraits were shot on Tri-X. However, some people hate it, don't like the grain structure, etc. I would go ahead and use it. If it doesn't matter, I would also buy some XP-2 and give it a try. Also, I would shoot at least 3 rolls.

I like black as background material & in the case of a blond, I think it would really 'pop' her nicely. Also, when you print the portrait, burn in around the face.

Using a 200mm zoom gets a little tricky. Use a TRIPOD!!!!! Also, remember that your depth of field decreases as your focal lenght increases.

In a portrait the eyes need to be totally in focus. When you compose the image, focus on the girl's eye lids.

When I used the term 'meter' I was talking about your in camera meter. What you do is go up to the face with your camera, or zoom in real close so that only the face shows [it does not have to be in focus], take a reading and open up a stop.

Don't use any filters.

chris

http://members.tripod.com/ChristianHarkness

-- Chris Harkness (chris.harkness@eudoramail.com), September 09, 1999.

As well as what Chris has outlined I would shot a roll of 100-125asa (or 50 if you've got a faitly powerful flash) film with your flash if you can bounce it off the roof. The results won't be fantastic but the advantages I see from doing a few of these are lower grain than Tri-X, you can use the flash sync speed on your camera which may be faster than what you get using natural light (depends on how much light's coming thru the window) and you might gain a f-stop or 2 as the DOF with longer lenses at close range gets pretty small. I'd suggest using your zoomy at around 100-120mm. Not sure if this will work in here... but he's my son taken with a 105mm lense @ f5.6 @ 1/250sec on Ilford Delta 100 with a single flash bounced off the roof. The background it a projector screen about 4ft behind him. He is about 5ft from the camera.

Cheers, Nige

-- Nigel Smith (nlandgl@eisa.net.au), September 11, 1999.