How to take interesting self portraits

Welcome to another of our weekly photography workshops. 
This week we will be looks at how to take portraits using shadows in an interesting way.

In this weeks kit list is:
Camera - Canon 80D 
Lens - Canon 24mm prime
Tripod - Manfrotto Compact Entry Pod 
Lights - Aputure AL-528S Amaran LED Light

Creating a dark studio

The first thing you'll want to look for is somewhere you can make completely pitch black. 
I had to wait until night time for some of my shots but you may have a room you can blackout using a blind or sheet. 
We have a great trick for blacking out a room using tin foil which I will do a video about in the future.

We are aiming to create a lighting setup that reveals you only when you step into shot. the rest of the time you should be in complete darkness.

Once you have your room darkened it's worth taking a few test shots to make sure there are no small light sources still sneaking into your image. 
Once we took our test shot we discovered a small blinking red light from a TV was still visible in the shot so we had to move. It would have been unfortunate if this had made it into our final shots!

The light setup
How that we have a dark enough room we can begin to play with our lights to find the mood that we want for our portraits.
The angle of the light will play a huge part in how your subject looks in the final image.

High angled light
​This light will cast big shadows from the brow of the forehead, nose and chin causing features like eyes to be concealed in shadow. This can make your subject seem quite sinister.

Low angled light
Will highlight all the features of the subjects face. These can be lighter, friendlier images.

Side light
This is more of a neutral light and will illuminate one side of the face and cause the other to be completely lost in the shadows.

You will want to tweak your lighting around and play with each of these setups. Perhaps even find a halfway point between a low/side angle to see what effect that creates.

Time to play
Now that we've played with the light to see how it affects the image we will now want to begin changing our body to match the mood of the image we are trying to create.
I played with entering the frame from the side, rising up into the shot from below and emerging from the shadows at the back of the shot.

Using colour
​Another way to add mood to the images is the addition of colour.
I used gels on my lights so that I could match a colour to my photo's mood. Reds, Greens and Blues all have a dramatically different impact on the final result.

Stencils, Gobos, Snoots and Grids...Oh my!
To anyone else Stencils, Gobos, Snoots and Grids are just ways that photographers control light either entering the camera or being cast onto the subject.

Stencils & Gobos
A gobo is a stencil or template placed inside or in front of a light source to control the shape of the emitted light.

Snoots
A snoot is a piece of equipment that fits over a studio light or portable flash and allows the photographer to control the direction or area of coverage of the light.

Grids
A grid is a honeycomb metal insert that goes in front of your reflector. Grids help a photographer control the quality of light and the area of coverage on a set

For my images I used a colander and placed it in front of my light. 
The effect created a circular pattern across my face that again really changed the mood of the image.
If you have a more specific shape in mind then another trick would be to create a stencil by cutting out your desired shape from a length of cardboard and holding it over the light.

Thank you for reading this article. If you have an suggestions or requests for future posts please let me know in the comments below.

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