Day 7: Maribeth

When I first started playing with flash I realized that, when shooting indoors, it's possible to eliminate all ambient light and control everything with strobes. I've found that it's really hard to get something natural looking when doing this.  Often you get a look like a spotlight on a stage, so part of this project is to learn to make natural looking lighting.
There is a shoot through umbrella three for four feet to her left, and a gridded speedlight about 6 feet in front of her and to her right.  Both of them are visible in the catchlights.  The idea was to set the power of the umbrella flash to slightly underexpose her, and dramatically underexpose the background, and then have the grid provide a spotlight to bring the exposure up on her face.
It kind of works, I think. Umbrellas do such a good job of spreading light that I think they're better suited to shooting groups than individuals.