DAY 87

FASHION & BEAUTY

Essential Light Modifiers

THE BEAUTY DISH

When shooting close-up beauty work, a photographer can make a stunning image by using a single beauty dish as the key light.

This shallow reflector is unique in the fact that a small circular disk is suspended in the center of the reflector so that the bulb is unseen from the front view. The light from the bulb is reflected back to the main reflector and then to the subject. This type of light modifier is most effective when used close to the subject’s face, attached to a boom arm so the light can be lowered into place out of the camera’s view.

A beauty dish attaches to a strobe light with a collar and is available with either a white or silver reflective surface, in widths from 16 inches to 32 inches. The light can be further softened with an optional diffusion sock.

To create this image, the beauty dish was placed to the model’s right, with the front of the dish perpendicular to her face. The 16-inch-diameter beauty dish had a silver interior reflector with a diffusion sock. A parabolic reflector was used as a hair light directly over top of the model, and a strip box was placed to her left for additional highlights and to outline her form. A small 16-x-22-inch soft box was placed in front of her to fill in a bit of detail in the shadowed areas. —MR