Creating a gritty portrait with Photoshop CS5 and Color EFEX Pro

Over the last few months my son Ben has become quite an accomplished guitar player. For his 18^th birthday he bought a Charvel Desolation Single Cut DS-1 Floyd Rose guitar in Flat Black. It’s a spectacular guitar and I thought it might be nice to shoot a portrait session with him and the guitar.

I wanted to create the impression that he was being lit by a spotlight whilst maintaining the detail in the guitar. The lighting needed to be subtle but at the same time strong enough to bring out any detail.

I tried several different lighting set ups but finally settled on the one below.

I set up two speedlights. The first was a Nikon SB910 set to manual at ½ power. It was stood on a lighting stand through as 24” shoot-through umbrella. The light was positioned directly in front of him slightly higher than his face.

The second was a Nikon SB600 with a 22.5 degree grid. This was set on a stand and aimed directly at his right hand, set to manual and reduced to ¼ power.

Both speedlights were controlled using the pop-up flash on the D300s in commander mode.

I took a few test shots so that I could establish the optimum position for the lights to create the effect I was after. Shooting in RAW I decided to slightly underexpose the shot so that I’d have some room for movement when I got the image in Adobe Camera RAW.

Below is the start image in ACR. As you can see the effect is almost there. It just needed a few adjustments to bring out the detail.

Initial Image in Adobe Camera RAW

I lifted the exposure and also added a little fill light. I increased the blacks slightly and also added some clarity and vibrancy. The final ACR image is below. 

Adjusted Image in Adobe Camera RAW

After launching it into Photoshop CS5 it was now time to give it an edgy, gritty look. I decided to do this using Nik COLOR EFEX PRO4. There were a few filters I could have chosen but the one that gave me the look I wanted was the Bleach Bypass filter. Using the pre-sets I selected the one that I liked the look of and used it without any further tweaking.

Color Efes Pro 

Once back in CS5 the one thing I did notice was that the filter had exaggerated some of the defects in the wall behind my subject. I eliminated most of the larger defects using the spot healing brush but I chose to leave some a the smaller ones to add to the gritty look.  Lastly I added some Film Grain just to give it a final edge.

Final image adjustments in Adobe Photoshop CS5

This is the final image which came out pretty much exactly as I wanted it to. Very Pleased as was my subject. 

Final Image

Shooting a Ladybird in Macro

Hi All,

The other day, whilst in the garden, I spotted (pardon the pun) a Ladybird on a bush. On closer examination I noticed that there were two of them, one under the other. I decided to have a go at photographing them so quickly ran inside the house to grab my gear.

Normally when I try to do this the subject either moves or leaves the area altogether so it was imperative that I moved quickly.

I set up my D300s with my Sigma 50mm macro lens and set the front of the lens as close as I could to the Ladybird without disturbing it. Unfortunately in order to get a good view I had to place the camera in such a position that the body cast a shadow on the subject. I tried a couple of exposures but it soon became apparent that some additional lighting was needed.

I set up my SB910 speed light on a tripod and manoeuvred is in to position just to the rear of the lens (shown below). Connecting the flash to the camera with an SC20 sync cord I set both the flash and the camera in manual mode and took a few test exposures. The ladybird didn't appear to mind, in fact the only reaction I got was that it repositioned itself slightly further along the branch then settled down again.

Camera and flash setup

Naively I hadn't realised just how shiny and reflective a ladybirds wings were. On examining the test shots on the monitor I found that the exposure was reasonable but the flash head could be seen quite clearly on the wings.

I fastened a diffuser dome to the SB910 and took a few more test exposures until I reached a compromise between reflection and exposure. I also noticed that whilst the speedlight was causing a reflection it was also bringing out some of the detail on the wings which was a good thing. After a few more exposures I settled for f22 @ 1/60 second, ISO100 and the flash set at 1/4 power.

My favourite shots of the set are below.

The rest of the images from the set can be found in the Nature gallery on my website at www.carrington-imagery.co.uk