Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Tonality, Exposure and Skin Tone

This is a friend of mine, Basil Charles, who owns the famous Basil's Bar in Mustique.  I photographed him on several occasions, and he is a particularly difficult subject because of his very dark skin tone.  Patrick Lichfield said Basil "sucked up the light."  So, how do you photograph someone and still show tonal quality in the photograph?   The other difficulty here is that he is wearing a white outfit.  The key to this was to have him face the source of light so the visage of his face was evenly lit and the side of his face was in shadow, giving a dimensional quality to the image.  The effect worked on the white clothing, as well.  So instead of being completely blown out, you see subtle texture.  I also positioned his head so it was framed by a lighter background.  




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