All language subtitles for 06 Natural Light Reflectors.mp4

All right?

So we're on location here with the new
model.

My man Kurt today here at the beautiful
Falls of Ohio on the Banks of the Ohio

River.

We're going to still focus on natural
light today, but we're going to

introduce a tool, we're going to
introduce reflectors, and we're going

to introduce diffusion.

So what this is going to allow us to do
is still use the sun as our main light,

but give us a little bit more control
over our shot.

So let's get to work.

We found this awesome piece of
driftwood right near the shoreline.

And I put Kurt here because there's a
lot of interesting leading lines.

And it also is now in this really nice
Rembrandt lighting that we went over in

our last lesson.

So I haven't really touched on
composition or subject matter or

anything quite yet, just because I
wanted to get the fundamentals of light

down first.

So by now you should have some sort of
general understanding of hard, harsh

light and shooting in it.

So now I want to cover the thought
process of composition

and leading lines.

So I'm going to grab a shot just
standing here, just to show you what it

looks like.

So as you can see from the shot, I'm
shooting down on the model, and the

background is simply just mud and
water.

And so I'm not really utilizing the
amazing background that we have here.

But if I get down and I get low, then
suddenly things start to open up.

So in this shot, we're getting there.

We've now opened up the background a
little bit.

We're getting a little bit more of this
awesome scenery, but there's no

separation from the model in the
background at this point.

So I need to get lower just to really
bring curt out in the frame.

So before his head was really just in
the water and sort of blended into the

water.

And now that I've gotten lower and put
its head in the sky, it really brings

them out, and it becomes more dominant
for the frame.

So I'm really, like, in this
composition, I really like this image.

But as you can see, the shadow density
is really dark.

And so one way to do it would be in
post, bring up those shadows.

But there's a way to do this in camera,
and that's introducing a reflector.

So first we're going to introduce a
silver reflector.

And silver isn't something that I
normally use, but we're going to give

it a shot.

So I brought in my assistant Lewis
here.

I'm going to show you what it looks
like.

And so what you can see here is that
it's not looking too natural.

It's a little bit too much light on
those shadows and filling that area a

little bit too harshly.

So some photographers might actually
prefer this look.

But for me, I like images that feel
natural, they feel real, and they don't

look lit.

So what we're going to do now is swap
out this silver reflector and bring in

a white reflector.

So now we're introducing

this guy it's a basically a white
diffusion disc,

a five in one reflector from westcott.

And this is going to be a little bit
more subtle on the model's face.

So this disk is actually somewhat
transparent.

You can use it for a lot of different
methods, including cutting the sun.

But in this case, we're just going to
bring it to the model's face and use it

to bounce a little light and fill that
shadow density.

So this white is going to bring these
shadows up

without that silver highlight punchy
look.

Or at least I'm going to have you bring
this reflector in and out so you guys

can see this subtle change in the
shadows.

And I'm going to take a shot.

It's really up to you to decide how
much fil you want to introduce into the shadows.

But for me, I really like it to be as
subtle as possible

and really just

slightly filling these shadows.

And another thing to consider here is
that

now that you've introduced a tool,
you're going to have to rework your

frame a little bit, because the
reflector is going to be in your shot

otherwise.

So bring this back a little bit Lewis

a little this way,

perfect,

come in with it.

And the reason why I asked him to move
his chin this way is because we really

want that nice highlight on his cheek,

really within the Rembrandt lighting
technique that we taught yesterday.

Excellent.

So instead of

having your hands like this, just go
like this.

Yeah, because I feel like

if it's like this, it's a little
unnatural if his hands were just cupped

like this.

But if his hand is over his wrist, it's
just going to feel a little bit more

natural, it's going to feel a little
less posed.

Sometimes moving his arm here actually
looks more posed.

So in that case, I ask the model to
basically reset

to just either stand up, sit back down
or just do what he wants to do.

And just like that, just by resetting
and asking Kurt to

do whatever he wants to do, he's
already in a more natural position,

bring that foot around this way,

come out with it.

There you go.

Perfect.

So I think we got a great look at shot.

Here, Kurt is looking very natural.

The composition's nice, the shadows are
filled perfectly,

and I think it's a win.

So on an average day in my editorial
work, I'm often shooting in a vertical

format.

But in this case, I love the background
so much that I made a creative decision

to shoot horizontal to really capture
this beauty you have here in the Ohio River.

So we haven't really touched on camera
settings at all.

So I want to talk a little bit about
depth of field.

So I see a lot of photographs out
there, and a lot of photographers love

to shoot wide open 1.228

with really shallow depths of field,

because it really brings out the
subject of the foreground.

But in my work, and a lot of work that
you might have seen, I like shooting on

a deep depth of field because I feel
like it's a little bit more natural and

a little bit closer to the human eye.

But for this shot in particular, I'm
shooting at f 56 because I really want

to display this awesome background that
we have.

I'm usually shooting between 56 and f
eight because I really want to see that

background.

I feel like it's a little bit more
natural and it's a little closer to the

human eye.

So now that you understand the use of a
reflector, both silver and white,

let's take this into post and take it
up a notch.

Here's clay's favorite shot from this
lesson.

I've already gone ahead and done the
capture one processing and the healing.

I'm going to cycle that on and off for
you

so you can see just what I've done.

It's not anything crazy.

You can see in the capture one process,
I warmed it up, fixed the exposure a

little bit.

And in this healing layer, I just made
some very small fixes.

Nothing crazy at all,

removed two distractions to the
background and a few things in the

foreground.

In the last lesson, i'll tell you guys
how to dodge and burn.

We're going to use that technique in a
different way to accentuate features.

Instead of smooth transitions,

let's go ahead and set that up.

We're going to hit command, shift n for
a new layer.

We're going to name this global dodge
and burn.

Set the blending mode

to soft light

and make sure that filled with soft
light, neutral color is checked.

We're going to go to our brush by
heading b on the keyboard.

Our settings are still the same as last
time, where 100 percent opacity, ten

percent flow with airbrush on,

transfers on with pen pressure for both
opacity

and flow jetter.

But remember, that's only if you're
using a wakecomb tablet.

We also have build up check down here

for the last shot.

We use dodge and burn to smoother the
transitions in our skin.

For this shot, we're going to be using
dodging burn to contra parts of his body.

So let's start by making our brush a
bit bigger.

And what we're going to do is we're
going to paint white

wherever there already is light

and black, wherever there are already
shadows.

We're going to make it a little bit
bigger.

And we're just going to paint

where that light is already on his face.

We'll paint a little bit on the top of
his head.

We're just going to keep following

the natural lines of this light

as I go down his arms

on his shirt,

even

all the way down his pants.

Now let's switch to black, and we'll
paint where there's shadows.

And this really just darkens the
shadows of it.

Now let's see what we have as an end
result for this

it's subtle.

But as you toggle that layer on and off,

it's a very selective contrast that
you've manually painted in,

and it draws the eye towards the
subject a little bit more.

What we're also going to paint on

is this tree that he's sitting on.

We're just going to paint white

along the highlight of it

to bring that out a bit more.

It's going to follow the natural
lightlines,

just like we did with his arms and legs.

We'll switch to black,

the shadows on this tree a little bit
darker.

Now let's see what that effect gives us.

And it's just a little bit more
contrast that lets that tree pop out

from the background.

The last thing that I'm noticing that
we can take care of, what this layer,

is, there is some slight vignette up in
the sky.

In the very edges of the corners are

a bit darker.

So we're going to switch to white so we
can brighten it.

We're going to make our brush

fairly large.

We're just going to lightly paint

on those corners

to even out those vignettes.

Keep in mind that this is a very simple
example of how to contour using dodge

and burn.

Later on in this tutorial we'll be
getting a lot more specific with this

technique, especially when we're in the
studio and we're wanting to contort our

model's faces.

Let's send this image over to clay and
move on to our next one.

I just received this retouch back from
Jordan.

It's looking really awesome.

There's a few things that we need to
take care of and analyze before we

start color grading.

And the first thing is, because Kurt
has a bald head here it's shaped sort

of strange, and there's distortion in
the lens is causing this weird shape in

its head.

So we need to resolve that by going
into lens correction

and correcting the distortion in this
lens.

So in order to remove that lens
distortion, we first need to do a

couple things.

First, we need to create our base
layer.

We do that by hitting command, option,
shift and error.

Then we're going to go up to filter,

and we're going to go to lens
correction.

Once we're in lens correction, we can
do some automatic processing here,

but we want to go over to custom,

and then we go to remove distortion.

And you're going to drag this slider

to about negative four or negative
five.

But one thing to be cautious about is
that horizon line.

When you're removing distortion, or
even adding distortion,

you need to be very cautious of all the
lines in the frame, especially

horizontal lines, because they'll bend
and create weird lines that might throw

off the entire composition.

So you need to be very aware of that.

In previous lessons, I've showed you
that you can use the camera raw filter

to desaturate, add clarity.

But in this case, we're going to add
the vibrance adjustment layer,

which is going to desaturate the image
just like we did in a camera.

But this time we're in, we're going to
do it on an adjustment layer.

So we're going to go up to vibrance,
and we're going to desaturate the image

with a vibrance

by about

negative fifteen.

Next we're going to add, just like in
all the other lessons,

a curves adjustment layer.

We're going to change the red channel

and we're going to push the reds back
into this shot

by grabbing that center point in line
and pushing towards the top left corner.

Next, we're going to go down to the
green channel.

We're going to create a slight s curve
here.

So pulling down the greens, adding
magenta in those shadows,

and pumping a little bit more greens

into the highlights.

Next, we're going to go to the blue
channel,

and we're just going to zap out some of
these blue is.

We're going to drag out some of these
blues that are left in this shot to

make this shot really, really warm.

So we're going to drag down the
shadows, and we're going to drag down

the highlights,

so we have a nice brown, warm tone to
this shot.

So I'm renaming these layers to
vibrance and color contrast.

Next, we're going to deal with the
midtones and the color to go to color balance.

And we create a new adjustment layer
from here.

We're going to dabble with these
sliders a little bit until we get a

nice balance of color where it's not
too warm and not too cool, sort of

right in the middle and play is within
this warm tone.

We're add a little Sion,

perhaps little magenta.

So we've dragged a little bit more cyan
into the shot to negative five.

We've taken out a little bit of that
red to balance us out.

We've added a little bit of green,
taken out some of that magenta,

and finally added some blue.

And the one thing you'll notice that's
different in this shot than the other

shots, is, now I have this preserve a
luminosity clicked.

I have it checked.

Once you start adding blue and adding
darkness into these shadows,

what this is going to do is preserve
that luminossi.

So it's going to maintain the
brightness of the entire shot.

If this was unchecked, that luminosity
would change as you adapt and change

these sliders.

I think we have a pretty strong shot
here.

It looks really balanced, everything's
looking really good.

So I think I'm going to move into
sharpening now.

So I'm going to stamp all these layers
back down, just like in the last

lessons, using command options, shift e
or control alt shift e.

And then I'm going to go into
sharpening.

I'm going to duplicate this layer using
command j,

and then I'm going to group these
layers together

using command g.

I'm going to call this

sharpening.

I'm going to change the group blending
mode

to overlay.

And I'm going to grab this first layer
here and change this

blending mode to vivid light.

I'm going to invert this top layer,
hitting command I

or control I,

and then I'm going to go up to filter

blur

and surface blur.

Let's keep that radius at ten pixels.

In the threshold at eight pixels that's
going to give us a nice

sharpened image

with a lot of detail.

So let's select this group on
sharpening, and they're going to bring

back the opacity a little bit, so it's
not overboard or overcooked.

And the last step

is that we're going to hit command
option, shift e to stamp these layers

back down again.

We're going to add noise

and make some final adjustments here.

In camera, raw,

we go, filter

noise,

add noise,

keep it at two percent.

Then we're going to get a filter camera.

We're going to make some final
adjustments here.

So obviously, like in the other shots,
we want to add some clarity.

They can't fifteen clarity,

maybe even less.

Maybe ten clarity

looks good.

And then we could play with these
temperature sliders a little bit, just

to maybe put some final

little color on it,

but

I'm liking where it stands is.

And the last step

is, we're going to use that technique
that I showed you earlier

with Maria.

We're going to stretch these pixels a
little bit.

So we're going to select this layer and
hit command t for our transform tool.

We're going to hold down, shift and
drag this image up

to really extend these pixels.

And what this is going to do is a
longate kurt's face, that's going to

longate his body and make him appear
taller and peer stronger, and the image

really pop out and stand out.

And once we elongated kirt's face here
using a free transform tool, I think we

have a wrapped image.

I think this is a great shot, a great
result.

And, you know, say this out and move on
to the next shot.