Studio Lighting tutorial movie by Damien Lovegrove
March 28th, 2009
Back in the depths of winter a group of friends and myself descended on Imagist studios near Bristol for a lighting ideas development session. We photographed a very cold Vanessa, our model. The studio was just above freezing hence the electric heater giving off the warm orange glow. I asked ace cameraman Simon Tagney to film the proceedings and here is nearly 8 minutes of the resulting movie.
If you want to join me on my next foundation studio lighting workshop, not just for 8 minutes but for a full day, you can see the details and reserve your place here. The next available session is on Wednesday 1st July (so it will be warm). We will be using lighting kit supplied by Broncolor and we will have 2 lighting set ups, 2 professional models, a make up artist and a ratio of just 4 shooters per model to ensure everyone gets the shots.
I call it a foundation workshop because we get back to basics but we don’t leave it there. By the end of the day we will have shot complicated lighting set ups and you will have the knowledge to recreate and tweak them to suit your style. My goal is to share with you the knowledge and skills needed to make masterful images. Workshop delegates will receive Simon’s full 20 minute movie in HD.
20 Comments Add your own
1. steve | March 30th, 2009 at 10:16 pm
it’s annoying that we have no control to pause the video.
2. damien | March 30th, 2009 at 11:15 pm
Hi Steve, You have a good point. You can download a copy as a Quicktime movie here. It is best to right click and choose save linked file as… You can then play it in the media player of your choice. I tried to embed flash movie controls but they didn’t appear. Sorry for that, I need to investigate further.
Kindest regards,
Damien.
3. luis faustino | April 1st, 2009 at 12:01 am
Cool video Damien!
Like the way you teach!
4. chichichar | April 4th, 2009 at 10:51 pm
great video
wonder if you will produce full video similar to DVD or pay-to-download.
5. damien | April 5th, 2009 at 11:29 pm
Thank you, Luis and Chichichar for your kind words, I will be producing a full length studio lighting video. I was going to shoot it this year but it will probably be 2010 now as we will be producing at least 3 more location shooting productions this year.
It is always hard setting the level at which to pitch a video. The one above in this post is at ‘foundation level’ and uses old, relatively cheap lighting kit in a simple way to ensure the knowledge given can easily be repeated without the viewer taking out a second mortgage. but it could so easily migrate to very advanced lighting requiring the finest of touches to make or break the shot involving lighting with 5 plus sophisticated flash heads. I’ll be doing a lot of fact finding to see what the demand is before embarking on a shooting plan.
Kindest regards, Damien.
6. Simon | April 6th, 2009 at 7:30 am
Hi Damien,
Any chance previous delegates recieving the full 20 min version………??
Pretty please…….
Simon
7. Bill Geisler | April 6th, 2009 at 10:53 am
i am interested in when your next workshop might be.
thanks.
bill
8. damien | April 6th, 2009 at 11:11 am
Hi Bill,
The next available studio lighting workshop is on Wednesday 1st July. All the details can be found here
Kindest regards,
Damien.
9. damien | April 6th, 2009 at 11:27 am
Hi Simon,
Good call! I have just sent all previous delegates of the studio lighting workshop a link to the full 20 minute video in HD. Please check your inbox.
Kindest regards, Damien.
10. Simon | April 6th, 2009 at 11:34 am
Hi Damien…..
Just got it thanks……..looking forward to it……
Tried putting in to practise some of the natural lighting DVD at the weekend……got some nice shots..but lot more practise needed……..
Simon…..
11. Terrence Bibb | May 5th, 2009 at 9:18 pm
Hi Damien….
Is there a way to get a copy of the full 20 minute version of this vid? You are a great inspiration.
Terrence….
12. damien | May 10th, 2009 at 10:58 pm
Hi Terrence,
This vid was for intended as an aid memoir for the attendees and a marketing tool to attract new delegates to the studio lighting workshops.
I’ll be shooting a proper tutorial DVD on studio lighting at some stage but for now I’m focusing on my workshop training sessions. If you come on one of these you can have a copy of the video with my compliments.
Damien.
13. Rasheed | May 17th, 2009 at 3:36 pm
Hi sir, you have done a good job, its very useful for the people who are interested in studio photo and video shoot and who don’t have any idea about lighting.
14. Alec | May 29th, 2009 at 9:52 pm
Hi Damien,
Just because I’m nosey, do you provide diagrams of the various lighting set ups that you use for the tutorial? Nobody could remember all the different set ups.
15. damien | May 29th, 2009 at 11:19 pm
Hi Alec,
Better than diagrams, I encourage the delegates to zoom out to include the lights in the shots for each set up. There’s no better way of documenting a set up than to photograph it.
Regards, Damien.
16. Joseph Adams | November 12th, 2009 at 9:02 pm
Hi Damien,
just found this. You got me interested in a studio course in 2010 now.
I do have one question – I realise this is only 8 minutes, but not once do you mention using a lightmeter. It seems you do a lot of this “by eye” – would that be accurate? (just curious as a lot of other pros live and die by their lightmeter)
17. damien | November 20th, 2009 at 5:41 pm
Hi Joseph, I use the screen on the camera to determine the exposure. It’s more accurate than any lightmeter as it shows me exactly what I have got not what I should have. I can zoom in and see exactly what shadow detail and highlight detail is in the image and exactly how the contrast looks in the final image. It is also worth noting that our Nikon D700 has nearly a stop less exposure according to the numbers than my Canon 5D mk2 for the same image exposure. So the screen is the only shure fire way of knowing for sure. I sold my Minolta meters years ago. Regards, Damien.
18. Jason | November 27th, 2009 at 9:41 pm
Love your work. Very informative.
I know I’d look into your DVD once it’s ready.
19. Vicky | April 11th, 2010 at 11:15 am
Hi Damien,
Great video………but completely different to any of the other tutorials I have seen. We are just moving into studio portraits and have mainly been shooting weddings up until this point. Completely new to studio lighting and first piece of advice from everyone so far has been to get a light meter. Would you not agree with this? Just wondered……..when will your studio lighting dvd be available? Keep up the great work……..you’re an inspiration to us all.
Thanks,
Vicky
20. damien | April 11th, 2010 at 11:23 am
Hi Vicky,
I sold my light meter years ago. You have the best light meter there is in your camera. What you see on your camera screen is what you’ve got in the file. No light meter can compare with that. My Studio Lighting DVD will be out in time for Christmas. We will start shooting it in August when everyone else is busy shooting Weddings. If you want to get ahead then come to my one day studio lighting workshop. It will change the way you think and you will be up and running in advanced studio lighting.
Regards, Damien.
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