the
Jaclynn Wilkinson
blog

welcome
friend

In the Studio

May

03

On my mind: Custom Cropping & Exposure.

I’m in the studio almost every day.

I can’t wait to get a model in here. I’m seriously dying. I can’t keep focus from a distance to practice lighting on myself. It takes SO LONG to make adjustments after every shot running to the camera and back. It’s nearly comical…

No. It is comical.

I should probably make a video.

Here, I was using the face of a soft-box as a fill/reflector just a couple feet from my face. I’m excited to get a reflector on a grip so I can use silver for more punch.

I’m thinking in two directions lately.

Custom cropping & absolutely no cropping.

Two of these images have a custom crop and one of them has zero crop.

Can you guess which one has no crop?

Exposure. I need to figure out white point and a calibrated brightness for my computer screen. The Studio’s screen is calibrate color regularly, but exposure is a new monster to me. I don’t even know if my laptop supports white point calibration. We’ll find out soon….It’s driving me nuts.

Also, every time I shoot in studio I wind up pulling my exposure on my custom preset up to +1.7 or so in post. I don’t like that. Preferably, I don’t want more than a 0.8ish on there….but who knows what else an in-camera exposure adjustment will effect. I know some of the things but not enough. I like underexposing but that’s too much. Is it? I need to know how the slider effects my image file and look. What happens if you have to raise the exposure too much in post? Does it really hurt anything? Surly it does…but I must know why and where.

We all know clipping highlights is a shame that results in, most cases, a completely unusable image. Clipping the wrong blacks? Well…that will kill you at WPPI.

Yes, I’m using my histogram. I think the issue might be negated simply by having my own face behind the camera rather than in front of it. I also predict it may be an issue with my preset given the specific shooting situation. Again, we’ll find out soon…

In the Studio

Previous Posts:

On-Call Model Sign-Up

Rein Fire Ranch Wedding

Seattle Commercial Photography

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

THE LATEST

A little family Wellman Update dump. Morning! I’ve struggled coming back in to write lately. I abandoned my last post in tears over the current state of The Studio. My camera bag was stolen about a year ago. Everything I’ve photographed in 2024 has been on rented equipment. Being abandoned with the children with zero […]

Wellman Update

Early October I got to experience an adventurous and romantic Swiss Autumn with my long distance partner. We traveled deep into the Swiss mountains, ate all the yummy food, met old friends, went to a dance party, made some new friends, enjoyed a private sauna with an impressive view, took naps, snuggled, and went on […]

Swiss Autumn

We have to get a little creative here with our PNW Photojournalism. One of the first things you learn as a new natural light photographer is how incredible a big window can make any room look. A tiny corner in the most unassuming place, if sitting close to a window can produce the most magical […]

PNW Photojournalism

Tonight, I took the boys to the Everett Haunted Harbor community event! Everyone putting it on was so sweet and we all had a blast! Thank you to all the boat volunteers! We started with trick or treating at the boats, watching witches paddle board around the harbor, petting all the neighbor dogs, and watched […]

Everett Haunted Harbor