Whew, three posts in one week? I almost feel like it’s last summer again! Continuing my portraiture practice with friends before I shoot a full-on wedding, I got some experience with poses of the more feminine variety just yesterday. This time, all of my photographs were made outside on a particularly sunny day, which presented its unique set of challenges to create more flattering light. Luckily, in addition to my triple-speedlighted umbrella, I experimented with both a handheld diffusion panel as well as a B+W 3-stop neutral density filter that I have on hand. The former turns the sun into a soft light source, while the latter cuts down the amount of light that reaches the camera sensor by 8 times, whether flash or ambient.
Some lessons were learned yesterday, however: 1. Don’t buy cheap stuff 2. Try to have as much gear set up on location before you start photographing any subject.. 3. Watch out for wind when using umbrellas outside. 4. Don’t buy cheap stuff. 5. Have a good set of starter poses to work off of ahead of time. Did I mention not to buy cheap stuff? Some critical gear, namely an umbrella and two umbrella holders, has non-repairably broken from the last two shoots. I tried to save a little money in my kit by buying less-expensive gear that still had great reviews. That age-old adage of “you get what you pay for” came back to bite me in the butt because of my poor decision. Nonetheless, we all live and learn, and I have invested in some hopefully stronger gear that comes with its own warranty (yay!) in case of malfunction.
Back to the subject of this brief article, however, my shoot with Ashley yesterday gave me only about 1.5 hours to shoot, substantially less time than I had with Matt Simmons. This sort of pressure to still get a good number of shots may prove beneficial on other assignments with little lead and shoot time. All the following captured with the NEX-7, along with the Zeiss Touit 32mm f/1.8 and Nikon 85mm f/1.4 AI-s, two of my workhorses:
Well that’s all for this short portrait session, guys and gals. I’m feeling more confident in my posing options every day, especially now that I am learning the strengths and limitations of my gear. Hopefully it will only be a matter of time before more strobist techniques will be second-hat to my other photographic skills. We’ll just have to wait and see. 😀
Matthew Durr Photography 
Nice shots- I have a Sony Nex 6 and I am just reviewing other options. I’ve been collecting some of Minolta Rokkor -X lens for some time but find the Nikon AI lens to be a lot sharper. Thanks for the valuable information.
Thanks June! The Rokkor’s do have their own unique look but from the samples I’ve seen, they do not pair up to the performance of good AI-s glass or even some FDn lenses. Pretty cheap, however, so they are a good deal on a budget. 🙂