Photographer: Damien Lovegrove
Model: Sigrife
Location: A cabin in the forest of Sweden
Styling: Damien and Sigrife
Camera: GFX50s on a Novo tripod
Lenses: GF 32-64mm f4, GF 110mm f2
Lighting: Lupo 1000 dual colour fresnel, Amaran COB 60x
Modifiers: Scattergels, silver umbrella, standard 18cm Bowens mount reflector
Objectives: I set up this shoot to establish if Sigrife is going to be a good fit for my 2023 workshops in Italy. I also used it to test out a new, tiny light source that when combined with a brolly makes a very easy unit to travel with. I am happy to say that on both accounts everything worked out extremely well.

01. The Lupo fresnel spotlight gives that fabulous retro look that can’t quite be replicated with a light without a lens. For this shot and the ones below I used the Amaran on 17% as a backlight/ kicker.

02. I used a crunch Scattergel on the Lupo to create the dappled light used for these pictures. This is a signature look that I’ve used for the past fifteen years or so, you can see some more similar shots in this gallery. The jewellery for this shoot was made by my friend and neighbour Emily and I pulled together the clothing items from Claire’s accessories and ASOS.
The system: Part of the process of running my workshops and adventures is to select top models. I’m looking for new faces, fun personalities, creative people to blend with my existing group of models. I always like to employ people that I’ve worked with before and found to be suitable. This reduces the risks and improves the consistency of my events. Each year I organise fully paid ‘test’ shoots with new talent throughout Europe to establish a core of new models to work with. I had my September 2023 events in Italy in mind when I set up this fun shoot in Sweden. I’m moving further south in Italy next year and I’ll be out there for a three week recce in April to finalise my locations, our accommodation and the schedule. You can be kept informed of my plans for italy by signing up for notifications or my newsletter here.

03. I used the Amaran 60x to light these shots. pumping continuous light into a brolly lifts the whole room plus gives a definite direction to the light. I love to shoot into the light where possible for my high key work. Sometimes I have to tuck a light into a corner and a small unit really helps.

04. Because the Amaran COB 60x is really small, it doesn’t block much of the light coming back out of a reflective umbrella. It has a clever dial switch that can control the correlated colour temperature and the dimmer. It can also be controlled remotely by an app on a smartphone. The LCD display (not shown) is really easy to read at a distance and is well laid out. The supplied reflector delivers a tight, 15° spot of light but the fitting is the Bowens mount so there is no shortage of modifiers available. The Amaran COB 60x light can be powered by mains or various battery options and I like it a lot.

05. We had glimpses of sunlight during our shoot. The November sun remains low in the sky and reaches deep within the room. I use a tripod for every shot and I keep the back of the camera upright to avoid having to straighten verticals in the post production process.
Managing the contrast: I use a combination of camera settings and accessories to establish the look of my images at the taking stage. It has to be done in-camera as that is my way of working. For the past 6 years I’ve shot with the GFX50s and it has a lot of dynamic range. Even so, I still use ways of reducing the contrast in my files. Just so that I have a good LCD image to work with I set the camera to the Pro Neg S film simulation, the highlight tone to -1 and the shadow tone to -2. This gives me a flat image to work with that shows me exactly what shadows and highlights are recorded in the files. With that information I can set the lighting contrast and camera exposure accurately. As I was shooting mainly black and white for this shoot I switched away from Pro Neg S to Acros G.
Filters: For the majority of this shoot I used a ½ strength Tiffen Black Pro Mist filter on the lens to lift the shadows and that in turn let me sit the exposure to hold the highlights. In bigger spaces, I love to use a haze machine or my smoke machine to keep the shadow tone raised and to give the illusion of greater depth in the shots.
When I wanted an obvious dreamy softness plus shadow lift I used a homemade filter made with pink Moroccan gossamer silk. I’ve had this filter since 1988. See the top left shot in panel 8 and you will see exactly the effect this filter creates.

06. It’s not often that I get to shoot high key, softly lit photographs because I love working with crisp hard light. This shoot was a lovely opportunity to shoot a more delicate style for myself.
Post Production: I use Adobe Lightroom Classic to edit all my images in colour despite having black and white selected in the camera for this shoot (Acros G). Once the colour is correct I create virtual copies of all the shots and make my black and white set using Acros G in Lightroom. I then go back to some of the colour images and make further virtual copies and apply a LUT to give the shots a ‘look’. The three shots in panel 6 above have had a LUT applied. It is IWLTBAP C-8300-STD.

07. The GF 110mm f2 lens is my go to lens for intimate headshots. When I’m shooting for me I’m happy to let the focus drift in and out through the frame. It has a romantic delicate look that I love.

08. Top Left: This shot was lit with the Amaran light in the silver brolly and I used my Moroccan silk filter on the lens. Top right: I used the same Amaran light in the silver brolly but this time I used the ½ Tiffen Black Pro Mist filter. Bottom: As the sunlight moved across the cabin I decided to use it for this shot. I will be painting from this shot in January, my art month.

09. I lit Sigrife with the Amaran light in the silver brolly. I slid the brolly shaft to the tip in the light and this gave a lovely diffused spotlight to work with.

10. There is always time for a bit of fun on my shoots and we finished our shoot session with a flourish. We then had wonderful conversation over pizza and Prosecco by the log burner. It wasn’t traditional Swedish food but the moments were fabulous. I could get into this ‘cabin in the forest’ life.
Bonus information: In order for the images shot on location to look just like they did in camera once Lightroom has built the develop previews follow these steps. You will never have to touch the noise reduction settings in Lightroom Classic or Adobe Camera Raw ever again. I’m often asked, “how I can do my post-production in 60 seconds for each image?” This is how. I’ve set my camera up in readiness and I get the white balance spot on in camera as this is the only in-camera setting that comes through unaltered to Lightroom. I have Lightroom set up too using the steps below. I hope you find this useful.
ISO adaptive presets – A guide for Fujifilm cameras
- Set up your camera on a tripod inside your living area. Set a wide-angle shot of the scene that includes some dark and some light areas.
- Set the H tone to -1 and S tone to -2, and set Pro Neg S as the film simulation.
- Set the ISO to 12,800 and set 1/2000 shutter speed. Choose a lens aperture to give a correct-looking exposure. Probably f/11 or f/16. Use your eyes to make this assessment. zoom into the shadow areas and see if there is some detail etc. Take a picture.
- Set ISO 100 and take another picture at 1/15th second. Press playback and toggle between the pictures to check that the exposure looks similar.
- Format the card and take a sequence of 8 pictures at ISO 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200, 6400, and 12,800.
- Load just those 8 pictures into Lightroom and then place the SD card back into your camera.
- In Lightroom set the Treatment Profile to Pro Neg S and sync just that setting to the other 7 pictures.
- Press playback on your camera and scroll to the ISO 800 shot.
- Compare the ISO 800 shot in Lightroom to that on the back of the camera.
- In Lightroom set the Shadows and highlights of the ISO 800 shot to match the shot played back in the camera then sync those settings to the other ISO files.
- Set the noise reduction and sharpening for each of the 8 photographs so that they all look great.
- Scroll through the eight shots ensuring that you have a consistent look.
You now have a perfect set of images to create your ISO adaptive preset.
Now follow these simple steps on the Adobe website that explain what to do with your 8 pictures and how to create and apply your custom preset. The links you need are here and here.
Don’t forget to sign up here for my newsletter to be informed about the Italy workshops in 2023. I do hope you join Sigrife and me in Italy.
Damien.
Some great photos here Damien. I really must book on to one of your lighting workshops, cos my knowledge of studio lighting is total shite
Hi Dale,
Thank you for the compliments. Despite running nearly 400 events over 10 years a lot of photographers found my lighting workshops out of their budget. This led me to spend most of last year creating an online portrait lighting course. For just a quarter of the price of a one day workshop you get access to everything I know about lighting. There are over 50 videos and about 50,000 words in the course. Over 200 photographers have completed the course since the launch in January. I’m now retired from running 1 day events and I’ve got my last four day Tuscany workshop this September.
Cheers, Damien
Hi Damien… inspired work as always and love the size of the Amaran 60x! 2023 might be the year of the small light!
Thanks David. It’s a wonderful light. I now have the 200 as well ;)
Cheers, Damien
Lovely stuff, as usual! Interesting light that Amaran! I’ve been shooting some b&w corporate headshots for a company who refuses to let me stop and have been using an LED light array bounced off an umbrella as the key light with a speedlight bounced of a portable middle-grey background (to get it to white). I suspect this Amaran could substitute for the speedlight…hmm…
Hi Mark,
Thank you. I’d stick with your existing set-up as it works well. The Amaran 60x is not going to be powerful enough to replace a Speedlight.
Kind regards, Damien.
While I’ve got you, I just wanted to say that you are by FAR the biggest inspiration to my photographic journey. My level of activity in that sphere varies from weekly to once every few months and, whenever I need to get my mind refocussed, so to speak, I reference the myriad of Lovegrove video productions and blog updates to get me going. So…all that to say, thank you Mr. Lovegrove – you’ve made a significant difference to me (and, I’m sure, to many, many others!
Hi Mark,
Thank you for those epic compliments. I’ll keep shooting and sharing if you guys keep appreciating my work.
Best regards, Damien
Absolutely amazing work, Damien!
Be it known that you’re also the cause by influence and inspiration that has led to my acquisition of a Fujifilm GFX 50R – what a pleasure to use and now I see why you upgraded to mirrorless medium format! Thank you!!
Still have the X-T1 and X-T20 though!
Keep up the good work!
Hi Gordon,
Thank you for your compliments. Enjoy your GFX50r, it a delight to work with the 50mp GFX files.
Kind regards, Damien.
Really want to make the jump to medium format – you make a compelling argument..
It certainly slowed me down and as a result I get to the final frame faster and with less stress. ;)
Beautiful, as always! All the photos are marvelous, but those intimate headshots are really special. xo
Thank you Marie :)
Your are amazing Damien. Lovely art you make.
Thank you Tina, I really appreciate your kindness. I think us creatives struggle at times with self belief and comments like yours really help me. Damien.
Damien, it is always nice to see your pictures. They really jump out as if alive.
Thank you my friend :)
I live everything about them
especially that tone in the colors
Thanks, Marc :)
Wow, just amazing …. as usual ;o)
Thank you Stuart :)
Stunning Lovegrove images. Terrific work Damien. Thanks for your continued inspiration.
Thank you Terry for those kind words of encouragement. Cheers, Damien.
Mind-blowingly beautiful images. I nearly wept, I just love black and white and hard light. Could we adapt those in-camera and post-prod techniques to other systems?
Hi Andrew,
Thank you for the wonderful compliments. Yes you can adapt those settings to other systems. You just need to assign the most natural picture style and then further tweak it using the contrast, brightness and shadow controls. You then need to replicate the ‘treatment’ in Lightroom using the same ‘camera matching’ profile.
Kindest regards,
Damien
Some beautiful captures again Damien! Really love your work…
Hi Michel,
Thank you once again for your continued support and compliments.
Kind regards,
Damien.
Wonderful images, great blog & some excellent tips, thank you very much.
Hi Dave,
Thank you for your praise. Reading feedback like this makes the process worthwhile.
Best regards,
Damien