Saturday 21 June 2008

Portraits using window light

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My camera bag is packed ready for today's wedding so I've been getting my eye in by taking some shots of Emily. Alas the weather forecast from yesterday was not accurate and it looks as if we're in for an overcast day with cool, dull light rather than the sunny intervals predicted. No problem though - a bit of fill-flash will liven things up.

For the shot above (1/100 sec at f/2.5) I used only window light. Since light levels are so low indoors today I had to set the camera to ISO 800 to get a reasonable shutter speed. I used Canon's 85mm f/1.2 lens (often described as the finest portrait lens ever made) which can be challenging to use for child portraiture as focusing is slower compared to other EF lenses and the minimum focusing distance is about 80cm - tricky if your subject keeps crawling towards you! Under these conditions you just have to accept that your hit-rate of pin-sharp shots is going to be lower than normal.

Check out more of my photography here: Kent photographer David Fenwick

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