[gatorguy]

And shots 3 and 5 (four was identical to three). All but one of the five was pretty well spot on focus with her left-most eye. I tossed one of her toys into the kitchen to get her to turn her head for that second one so after that game over, LOL.
I really don't have much issue with the slower shutter speeds for relatively non-moving live subjects.

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[gatorguy]

Yeah, see, if like the water shot above you had speedlights, she would have been chewing and the motion would have been frozen, it would be completely sharp.

You wouldn't need to choose this keeper by good fortune, and throw away two others.

IMHO, that's what this is all about, we choose the equipment to go with our photography. And it need not be expensive.

I didn't toss away two. Only one of the five in the series was perceptibly out-of-focus, the first, which a pretty good keeper rate for a live subject who won't follow instructions. Dang dog...

Point taken that chasing her around the room needs a whole lot more than 1/90. I would certainly not choose to use as slow a shutter speed for an animal sitting or not as I did for this, but I did want to show that it works for sitting subjects if push comes to shove. In truth I still had plenty of headroom if I chose to use ISO600 which won't affect either noise or detail. Seriously Clackers, if your technique and setup is good constant lighting is a very viable choice for the studio IMHO. It works for me.

[clackers]

Point taken that chasing her around the room needs a whole lot more than 1/90. I would certainly not choose to use as slow a shutter speed for an animal sitting or not as I did for this

Nor would you choose to do a paid portrait session outdoors shooting the client at 1/90s, it could be a frustrating game of hit and miss. People don't have patience to deal with re-taking a shot after we've chimped. Even if they're polite, this will show in their facial expressions. The fourth shot might be in focus, but they're now grimacing, and that can carry over for all the subsequent shots, it's altered the mood of the session.

The only reason you shot at 1/90s is that those lights constrained you to such a low speed. IMHO, to go to 1/400s, you'd have had to raise the ISO to compensate. You were already hitting ISO 400, 560.

[bertwert]

So the portrait session scheduled for this evening is moving to tomorrow. She wasn't happy with her makeup artists work. So I found another model, but don't read too much into my choice.

Just wanted to give F8 a go to show it's a viable selection with constant lights in a studio setting. 300W at left key, one meter, and 100W kicker at 75% right and also at one meter. Of note any ISO under 800 on a K1 is indistinguishable to me, tho I prefer 200 (even over 100) just because. Opened in DxO and exported as JPEG with no adjustments.

If you're going to shoot at F8 there, it's not more lights that you need, but rather an iron as the wrinkles in the backdrop are no longer hidden by thin DoF

[clackers]

If you're going to shoot at F8 there, it's not more lights that you need, but rather an iron as the wrinkles in the backdrop are no longer hidden by thin DoF

(Laughs)

Well, it's also a blessing in other ways. In the fashion world, you don't want just the left eye of the model in focus, she's not paying you for the picture, it's product not portrait photography.

The makers of the dress want to see it crisp from top to bottom, front to back, so f11 is maybe what's required.

And yes, certainly for e-commerce, a blank background is used so there aren't distractions.

I do prefer a background to give some drama or context, and yeah, then you have to play with positioning, and sure, aperture, to get the balance of emphasis that you want.

[gatorguy]

If you're going to shoot at F8 there, it's not more lights that you need, but rather an iron as the wrinkles in the backdrop are no longer hidden by thin DoF

ROTFL! No joke. I was shooting at 5.6 last evening which is my preferred aperture in the studio. I saw the wrinkles immediately the first shot of my dog at F8. Yup, getting out the steamer, glad I did these tonight.

And yes Clackers, my settings tomorrow will be 1/125, and ISO 400 with both an 85 and 50. We'll see what she has in mind there, but the current plan is upper body only. If full body I'll mount up the AD200's as you would suggest, but I normally use my small studio to stay out of the wife's way and it doesn't accommodate full body shots anyway with anything wider than a 50mm, and 50 is still a bit tight. Really no benefit there. The living room is necessary for this one because of some larger props (product on a table for example) my client wants to include for a few of them, and the studio won't allow for it.

[gatorguy]

(Laughs)

Well, it's also a blessing in other ways. In the fashion world, you don't want just the left eye of the model in focus, she's not paying you for the picture, it's product not portrait photography.

The makers of the dress want to see it crisp from top to bottom, front to back, so f11 is maybe what's required.

And yes, certainly for e-commerce, a blank background is used so there aren't distractions.

I do prefer a background to give some drama or context, and yeah, then you have to play with positioning, and sure, aperture.

Ah, now that's a very useful comment. Yes there will be some product placement too so F11 may be more proper. It's usually portraiture where I prefer 5.6 or even wider. I'll get out ahead of that this evening and double-check everything. Thanks a million for bringing that up. I may mount up the strobes for this one after all, maybe not.

EDIT: To allow for some movement (she'll be pouring some wax in two of the planned images) I raised the shutter speed to 1/125, F11 for DoF, and ISO ends up at 800. That's good with me for this type of shoot ( my upper "I'm good with it" range is 3200 and so is DxO's, 1600 for me for portraits). If I need to bump the shutter speed for the wax scenes I should have plenty of headroom.

Edit 2: Just to be way over on the safe side I'll take your advice and use the strobes tomorrow. I'll have time to set lights up, adjust, and test before she arrives after 7. Thanks for all the input Clackers.

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Last edited by gatorguy; 12-08-2021 at 07:26 PM. Reason: added detail

[niels hansen]

I am 79 - from my professionel work I am aware of the existence of false memories but this is what I remember from 1963 where I got my first SLR:
Like many others I like portraits with shallow DOF and the nearest eye in focus. I always use existing light and never give33 instructions to the subject.
From 1963 to 2012 the combo was H1, and spotmatic with a105mm Takumar The focus precision was really good
From 2012 to 2017 the combo was K30 and Sigma 70 mm 2,8 macro with single point AF. I had nothing to complain.
Then the soleonid disaster came and I changed to KP. The first was replaced on warranty after a short while, I still have the second one, but the pdaf is unreliable. I have done what is possible, Af tuning, cleaning the contacts. The pdaf is best when the motive is in a 90 degrees angle on the lens axis, in other cases it is kind of a lottery with many loosers and few winners.
I believe the PF members that report different about the KP, and that makes me ask: Is it possible that it is due to sample variation? In other words a bad quality controle. According to Optical limits in the past Pentax had decentering issues, add the soleonid problems and SDM problems
Today I have substituted the Spotmatc with a Praktica MTL5 because of its brillant splitfield viewfionder
That makes me again want a DSLR with a viewfinder on par with the best SLRs from the 70 and 80ies to make manual focus a realistic option in spontaneus portraiture photographing.

[BigMackCam]

That makes me again want a DSLR with a viewfinder on par with the best SLRs from the 70 and 80ies to make manual focus a realistic option in spontaneus portraiture photographing.

You could always change the focusing screen in your KP to a third party modified SLR screen with split prism, Niels... However, I'd be amazed if manual focusing would be consistently more accurate than AF, unless you're experiencing more than slight back- or front-focusing with the KP. A 24MP sensor with no anti-aliasing filter is quite unforgiving of even the tiniest focusing errors (and any other reasons for lack of critical sharpness)...

[niels hansen]

You could always change the focusing screen in your KP to a third party modified SLR screen with split prism, Niels... However, I'd be amazed if manual focusing would be consistently more accurate than AF, unless you're experiencing more than slight back- or front-focusing with the KP. A 24MP sensor with no anti-aliasing filter is quite unforgiving of even the tiniest focusing errors (and any other reasons for lack of critical sharpness)...

As far as I understand there is no more a quality screen on the market- furthermore the digital viewfinder is rather dark.
Actually my misses with the analogue SLR are not caused by focus errors but subject movement and shaking hands, because 400 ISO cant compete with the digital possibilities. You.. may ask why I dont convert to b&w from digital - the answer is that the film has more beautiful greys. I guess that you some day will see the same if you continue your film experiments, BUT the full potentiel from b&w film you will only get if you enlarge yourself
regards niels

[Nuftur]

So far, I use the spot AF and target the eye. Mostly, it works. Of course, re-composing after focussing bears the risk of losing focus. Also, through the viewfinder, you do not really see whether the camera focusses on the eye ore the eyebrow. You can only verify it after the shot. When my model wore glasses, the AF grabbed the frame as perfect target, it was not possible to focus on the eye. For portraits, there is a clear advantage of mirrorless cameras with eye-AF. They can also handle moving targets, with focus following the eye, while Pentax can handle only static portraits.