# Shooting portraits in a snowy environment -- tips?



## JonA_CT (Dec 8, 2017)

So I have a portrait session scheduled for Sunday, and the plan is to do it all outdoors, even if we do get a few inches of snow tomorrow.

I was ready to show up with some speed light gear, but I was mostly planning on using human-powered reflector.

Snow reflects everything. Anyone have any tips or suggestions? What should I be thinking about to make sure I get a good file and good lighting?


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## cgw (Dec 8, 2017)

Spot meter faces and/or incident readings done by blocking reflected light on the subject's face with a hand under the incident dome. Above all, be ready to add exposure to any meter reading.


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## Braineack (Dec 8, 2017)

I like snow cause that tends to mean overcast, so you don't have to compete with the sun, which means you can bring the exposure on the BG down, and the light can fill the subjects well -- even with wide apertures and faster shutter speed.


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## Destin (Dec 8, 2017)

I have a few similar shoots planned for the near future so I've been researching the same problems. I last tried this a few years ago and struggled with it pretty hard. Things I've found so far:

- Be careful not to blow out the snow. It's very easy to blow it out without realizing it so watch your highlights/histogram. 

- Because the snow is so bright, fill light on your subject is critical. It's nearly impossible to expose for the subject without blowing out the snow unless you're using some sort of fill light. 

I'm interested to see what the more experiences members have to say.


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## Braineack (Dec 8, 2017)

yeah I like purposefully underexposing the environment by a good stop, then adding fill.

these were shot at f/3.5 and 1/800sec: Belle in Snow Wild Virgina Snow Leopard


These were shot in the middle of a bright day -- but overcast.  used the SS to knock down the exposure with the f/stop I wanted to use, then added fill to match the real exposure (1 stop above environment)  7" reflector.


no idea how well it'll work on humans


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## smoke665 (Dec 8, 2017)

JonA_CT said:


> Anyone have any tips or suggestions? What should I be thinking about



Wear warm clothes. Hard to get a good shot if you're shivering LOL


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## waday (Dec 8, 2017)

smoke665 said:


> JonA_CT said:
> 
> 
> > Anyone have any tips or suggestions? What should I be thinking about
> ...


Just use a fast shutter speed?


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## SquarePeg (Dec 8, 2017)

I recommend those hand warmers for your pockets and for your clients.  Also, don’t take too long - no one looks good with red runny noses.


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## jcdeboever (Dec 8, 2017)

A pint of schnapps


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## ronlane (Dec 8, 2017)

SquarePeg said:


> I recommend those hand warmers for your pockets and for your clients.  Also, don’t take too long - no one looks good with red runny noses.



Hey @SquarePeg, got an even better idea for that one. Get you some athletic wrist bands and put those hand warmers on palm side of the wrist and hold them in place with the wrist bands. That is where the blood flows through and it actually keeps the hands pretty warm. (I use this for shooting football at the end of the season and sometimes for soccer in the spring.)


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## snowbear (Dec 8, 2017)

Move everyone indoors.


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## ronlane (Dec 8, 2017)

snowbear said:


> Move everyone indoors.



What??? a snowbear suggesting to go inside out of the snow??? lol


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## snowbear (Dec 8, 2017)

ronlane said:


> snowbear said:
> 
> 
> > Move everyone indoors.
> ...


But I'm not the one shooting . . . advise for everyone else (except, maybe @limr)

One of the things I found with shooting snow, is, if it dominates a scene, you have to overexpose by a stop or so to keep it from being grey.


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## smoke665 (Dec 8, 2017)

@JonA_CT Something I noticed today while shooting in the snow. The light was changing so fast that I finally shifted over to P mode, locked the ISO, and still I was having to go from a low of -2.5 to a hight of +2.5 EC. The other thing I noticed is that the during the snow fall/overcast period, the colors (as seen by the naked eye and the camera) were very desaturated, requiring significant adjustment in post to bring them back. I'm wondering if the extreme "gray overcast" conditions, might have been the cause of that?


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## Destin (Dec 8, 2017)

smoke665 said:


> @JonA_CT Something I noticed today while shooting in the snow. The light was changing so fast that I finally shifted over to P mode, locked the ISO, and still I was having to go from a low of -2.5 to a hight of +2.5 EC. The other thing I noticed is that the during the snow fall/overcast period, the colors (as seen by the naked eye and the camera) were very desaturated, requiring significant adjustment in post to bring them back. I'm wondering if the extreme "gray overcast" conditions, might have been the cause of that?



Absolutely. The camera is trying to make everything 18% gray so your colors and exposure will be way off if you have any auto controls enabled.


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## smoke665 (Dec 8, 2017)

Destin said:


> Absolutely. The camera is trying to make everything 18% gray so your colors and exposure will be way off if you have any auto controls enabled



Had the same thought on the image. Now explain why my eyes were seeing the same desaturation in real time.


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## john.margetts (Dec 8, 2017)

smoke665 said:


> @JonA_CT The other thing I noticed is that the during the snow fall/overcast period, the colors (as seen by the naked eye and the camera) were very desaturated, requiring significant adjustment in post to bring them back. I'm wondering if the extreme "gray overcast" conditions, might have been the cause of that?



Cold causes that. You can see the same effect if you iron coloured cotton - where the hot iron has been will be more saturated than where the iron has not been. Colour saturation is partly temperature dependent.


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## Derrel (Dec 8, 2017)

My experience is that at times, ADDING exposure in snow is a good bet. Buuuuuuut....my experince is that new, modern Nikon cameras with 3D, color-aware and also reflectance aware metering tend to produce VERY accurate snow brightness.

As always though, YMMV...

I use Nikon's 60/40 center-weighted metering quite often. Depends on how you meter things. I do not like spot metering much. Do not use it myself, because I can see what the C-W suggestions and the resulting exposure settings look like on the rear LCD's histogram.

Use the histogram, shoot .NEF, and make adjustments as-needed. My tips? Keep your wits about you, don't get flustered, and realize that the new sensors offer pretty good file recover ability.

My feeling is that wide-angle lenses lead to more bad meter readings than do teles or tele-zooms, due to the wider physical scene area the meter reads with the wider-angle lenses.


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## JonA_CT (Dec 9, 2017)

Wow, so many great responses. Thanks to all -- it sounds like a lot of the things that I would do anyway would help, but I'll be double checking the histogram and I'll be ready to use EC liberally.



Braineack said:


> yeah I like purposefully underexposing the environment by a good stop, then adding fill.
> 
> these were shot at f/3.5 and 1/800sec: Belle in Snow Wild Virgina Snow Leopard
> 
> ...



I've never used the HSS option on my flashes. I'll look/play with that today, as it sounds like it'll be very useful.



jcdeboever said:


> A pint of schnapps



I prefer Mr. Boston's blackberry brandy, but I like your thinking. Just need to be careful not to drink the full pint all at once...that stuff will knock your ass to the snow while consuming _and _after.



ronlane said:


> SquarePeg said:
> 
> 
> > I recommend those hand warmers for your pockets and for your clients.  Also, don’t take too long - no one looks good with red runny noses.
> ...



Wow, great tip! That makes a lot of sense, and I would have never thought of it. I'll see if I have some thin gloves, but realistically, I end up shooting sans gloves because my hands/fingers are so goddamn big. The ISO and EC buttons are unusable when I'm wearing gloves usually.



snowbear said:


> Move everyone indoors.



This is a concept shoot...if it were a family shoot, I'd definitely encourage a move indoors. My friend wrote a concept album and recorded everything himself. He wanted some photos to go with it. Lots of things going on in the lyrics, but essentially it's about a woman who was never allowed to make decisions for herself, and is regretting it at the end of her life. The goal is sparse and flat and desaturated anyways, so I think the snow will only help.

The only trick...our ideas mostly involve our model not being clothed appropriately for the weather. She's been awesome and is a good sport though, so hopefully everything will come together. I just won't have a lot of time to get things right.

The location is the kind of place that I feel could only exist in CT. It's a former sanatorium and mental hospital right on Long Island Sound.

The Seaside (Waterford, Connecticut) - Wikipedia

Essentially, it closed in the early 90s and the state tried to sell it to developers, but between the economy tanking and the significant opposition from local residents because it is sandwiched between quiet residential areas, nothing every really happened. In the last couple of years, they decided just to make it a state park, but unfortunately, there is no plan to save the beautiful Cass Gilbert designed buildings at this time. Really, there's no plan to do much of anything there as the state is broke.

Here are some quick iPhone snapshots (I literally never stopped moving as I was walking around it because it was windy and cold AF) that I took this week to send to the model.




Untitled by jwa04, on Flickr




Untitled by jwa04, on Flickr




Untitled by jwa04, on Flickr




Untitled by jwa04, on Flickr




Untitled by jwa04, on Flickr




Untitled by jwa04, on Flickr




Untitled by jwa04, on Flickr




Untitled by jwa04, on Flickr




Untitled by jwa04, on Flickr


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## smoke665 (Dec 9, 2017)

@JonA_CT that's an awesome location! Expecting some great shots to be shown here in the near future


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## JonA_CT (Dec 15, 2017)

So the shoot was moved tomorrow -- who knew that models could be flaky? (hah...I've run into this a bunch in the arts...lead singers are also super flaky)

I have a really quick question that some of you might know the answer to...I couldn't figure out how to ask the question to google, haha.

Because it's going to be cold (maybe 35? Maybe.) and my model isn't going to be wearing much clothing for that kind of weather, I'm really tempted to go TTL for my flash. My question is about EC -- when I adjust EC on my camera, is it the same as adjusting the EC on my flash commander? Say I set EC to +2 on the camera to get the scene metered the way I want...will it try to use the flash to get the exposure there, or will it adjust the ambient reading? (which is what I want...)


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## Braineack (Dec 15, 2017)

what does the amount of clothes have to do with TTL?  the time potentially saved on adjusting power?


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## smoke665 (Dec 15, 2017)

Personally I would go LPG. As in Shop Remington 16,000-BTU Portable Propane Tank Top Heater at Lowes.com these things put out a ton of  "directional" heat.


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## JonA_CT (Dec 15, 2017)

Braineack said:


> what does the amount of clothes have to do with TTL?  the time potentially saved on adjusting power?



Yes. I don't want to have to mess around with adjusting those settings in vastly different lighting situations we will be in (full sun vs. full shade and like many things in between). 

Yes, I need to buy a light meter. But upon further reflection...I could just meter/adjust with her coat on. I was being silly and over thinking the obvious answer.


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## JonA_CT (Dec 15, 2017)

smoke665 said:


> Personally I would go LPG. As in Shop Remington 16,000-BTU Portable Propane Tank Top Heater at Lowes.com these things put out a ton of  "directional" heat.



I might buy one of those for when I'm brewing beer outside, haha...but it would melt the snow and look weird in this situation.


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## smoke665 (Dec 15, 2017)

JonA_CT said:


> but it would melt the snow and look weird in this situation.



Not necessarily as the one I have is an infrared meaning you feel the heat but it doesn't heat the surrounding area and it would be no different in situating it than a light stand


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## vintagesnaps (Dec 15, 2017)

I'd 'adjust' the concept to indoors with fake snow like Smoke's kid and dog portraits!

I'm kidding, I think... but yeah, that's a good idea to get set while the model has on her coat. Have her or you guys bring blankets and allow for a break or two or a few in the car. You might be doing good if she isn't shaking and shivering and unable to hold a pose, I would be!! lol but then I'm someone behind the camera not in front of it. 

Of your cell shots I liked the one of the tree. And I think that brick round tower looks interesting, maybe either of those with the ocean in the background and the car warming up in that circular driveway...

Aren't you shooting Raw? or am I missing something? (Which is entirely possible.) I haven't shot JPEGs in a long time but it seems like that's when I had to mess with EC. I mean, if you shoot Raw you can do a certain amount of adjusting later. You sure picked something tricky to try! lol All I can say is you better work fast, she can't stand there freezing waiting for you to putz around with your camera.


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## Braineack (Dec 15, 2017)

read the manual on how your camera handles EC with TTL flash if you really wanna use it.

Check you d600 menus too, there's a setting to change how EC with flash too.

if youre shooting manual, then it's pretty much pointless -- but you can dial up or down the EC on the flash itself...


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## JonA_CT (Dec 16, 2017)

Model flaked out again. JFC. 

I think we’re onto Plan B or C or D now.


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## smoke665 (Dec 16, 2017)

JonA_CT said:


> Model flaked out again. JFC.
> 
> I think we’re onto Plan B or C or D now.



Do any of those alternate plans include another model? LOL


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## JonA_CT (Dec 16, 2017)

All of them, yes, haha. The concepts are different and more complicated though. So we may give her one more shot.

Her complaint? Too cold. Which I get 100%. But the forecast hasn’t changed all week, and we confirmed twice, haha.


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## vintagesnaps (Dec 16, 2017)

It sounds like she doesn't really want to do this (not out in the cold anyway). Is she an actual working model or one of the proverbial 'found on craigslist' types? I'm thinking if it was a friend, she might be up for trying it and willing to stand there freezing. If it's paid (and well paid) I imagine similar shoots have been done with accommodations made for the cold to insure the model's comfort.

Since you have more time, maybe you and your buddy (if you haven't already) should go thru this step by step. Like, we'll do a couple of shots over by this one thing, hop in the car to warm up, then go to this other thing, hop out and get a couple of shots, back in the car to warm up, etc. 

I've done sports where you learn to work fast, but it took a good bit of practice and learning and years of being a photographer prior to doing sports to be able to work fast as things happen where you can only grab a shot or two or three. 

I don't know how soon your friend needs these photos but maybe it's going to have to be one more try then figure something else out (and at this rate probably after Christmas), or maybe let her know you're going to not going ahead with this due to the weather and holidays etc. and thank her for being willing to model, etc. and instead of trying to schedule with her just move on. To Plan Z at this rate! lol


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