“Capturing Alaska”
with Wayde Carroll






Outdoor Portraits



  
  Lately I’ve been taking a lot of outdoor portraits for various reasons and I thought I’d go over a few relatively simple techniques that can help to make nice “people” photos.
  Most of us visit the outdoors with friends and loved ones and invariably we end up taking the obligatory “Look, I was here!” photo. How many times have you seen the grand scenic with this speck in it and your friend claims “That’s me!” and how often do you see the uninspiring image of someone standing in the exact center of the composition? Mmm Hmm..
  Well, let’s work on that!

 I know this is "Capturing Alaska" and most of these images are from California,but these techniques will work anywhere!
  The first thing I always look for is a great background that will give you a sense of the place you’re so happy to be. You can give a feel for a place just by showing a small portion of it. You don’t have to show the entire grand canyon to show you were there. Take the beautiful landscape shot, but for your portrait search for something that represents the scene.
  The next thing I look at is the lighting. Lightly overcast days are great because the sky acts as a giant softbox and you have nice even lighting everywhere. The light just before sunrise and just after sunset is beautiful. You can get a nice soft, warm, light and your subjects aren’t squinting.
   Obviously we can’t always wait around for the perfect time of day so the next thing I look for is open shade. If my background is in shade, that’s great. Then all the light is even. I’ll usually add some fill-flash to my subjects to warm up the skin tones and put a highlight in their eyes. If you can get your subject in the shade but your background is in bright sunlight, it takes more effort but you can still get a nice photo. In this case you need to set your exposure for the background and add light, via on-camera flash, external flash, or reflector, to bring up the exposure on your subjects. An off- camera flash cord works well here because you get a more interesting lighting when the flash is up and to one side. A direct flash creates a very flat look.
  The most dreaded scenario is having direct, mid-day sunlight straight overhead creating deep shadows in the eye sockets and causing serious squints. You can add fill-flash but the squints remain. If everyone insists on wearing their sungl**** then no worries, shoot away!
  Then I think about composition. The dead center of your frame is usually (though not always) the least interesting position for your subject. Experiment with different compositions and see what excites you.
  Above are four recent portraits. The top was taken here in Alaska but the others were taken in California last week. Spring has sprung her but we haven’t caught up to the Outside yet!
  The first image was taken at Kincaid Park. We don’t have much greenery yet but I thought we could still get a nice outdoor feel by placing the couple amongst the aspen trunks. I had the couple meet me just before sunset so I could get a little highlight from the sun but still have nice even shade to work in. They really wanted an outdoor photo so I made sure to make them part of the environment. This was taken with natural light, no flash.
  The second image is from a wedding in Auburn, California. I had taken several nice fill-flash photos with this background earlier but just before sunset I noticed a beautiful golden glow and rushed to grab the bride and groom and get this photo. This is natural light as well. It’s my favorite photo of the day. It pays to keep an eye on the light and take advantage of it!
  The third image was taken in the American River Canyon in the early morning, just outside of Auburn, California. This couple also wanted to be photographed in the outdoors. I scouted this location the day before and new exactly where I was going to shoot. The combination of the shade, foreground and background wildflowers, and river in the background made this a perfect spot. For this photo I used a little fill-flash, with my flash mounted on a bracket, to reduce ugly shadows, and set to –1 stop so it just adds some warmth and catch-light in the eyes. I also used a split neutral density filter at an angle to keep the sunlit river from being overexposed.
  The final image was taken in the middle of the day. As you can see the contrast from the shaded areas to the sunny areas is extreme. To avoid harsh light on my subjects I brought them into the shade and used my flash to bring their exposure up to the level of the bright sun. I have a small photographic umbrella and a mount that allows me to shoot my off camera flash through it and create a softer “studio” light.