How to eliminate specular highlights in portraits

[sk66]

Would upgrading to a more powerful flash head help rather than two lights?

Not really. Because you need to get it closer in order to make the highlights translucent; and that requires less power. If the skin is particularly oily/reflective that could be as little as 1ft away. Part of your original issue is using a speedlight in a small softbox... that isn't going to be very effective at all. Going to a reflected bounce umbrella helped even the light out a lot and made it larger. If you got one of these things you would be pretty well set IMO; but they are a bit of a PITA to use w/o remote power control (first image I found of the type... not necessarily recommending the brand/model).

This is the difference between a 7" reflector and a 3ft softbox at 8ft distance... not a lot of difference; and some of the difference that there is is due to a lot more spill from the softbox in a smaller/white room.




This is the difference of a 3ft softbox at 4ft, 2ft, and 1ft.




Your other choice is to kill the lighting ratio... so your key light isn't really key at all and it isn't adding a highlight (i.e. flat lighting).

 

[RichardH]

The pros understand that make up artists do a better job of killing specular highlights than stupidly oversized light modifiers.

I hear you. On occasion when I do a portrait for a friend, we use make up. More often than not, it is a semi impromptu nice portrait of family, and there is no appetite for make up.

 

[RichardH]

Folks. Thanks for all your input. I know I have a lot to learn. I've taken some of your guidance and mixed it with my needs/wants/budget and come up with a solution I suspect some of you won't like! Still FWIW this is what I did...

• I bought a bigger softbox. A 16 sided Selens 105cm job with 2 diffusers. I took on board one comment that 120cm is probably too big for a home location. They were right. 105cm is plenty big enough. I decided I didn't particularly like an Octagon's catchlight, and went for a rounder umbrella.
• I bought a flash head from the much maligned Yongnuo ;-). A YN200, which is a rip off of the Godox AD200. Half the price. I also do some portrait stuff outside, so needed one with a battery. I have never had trouble with Yongnuos in the past, and most importantly, it works with my current Yongnuo transmitter, so I can use my current speedlights for secondary duties.

So I got the missus (no make up as usual) in roughly the same spot and took this shot. Some editing has been done (a bit of desaturation of the face but not her lovely hair), but no skin softening as before. To my eye, the specular highlights are gone, a marked improvement on the previous two efforts.

To my mind the questioned has been answered and I have learned a lot!

Thanks again - great community.

 

[Garry Edwards]

If you are comparing your portraits to that of the pro photographers don't, they have have a secret way of controlling specular highlight that does not involve big light modifiers.
That secret they use is called a make up artist. The most important part of the makeup artist job is to turn a shiny face into a non shiny face.

More power is not the answer, this is photography not Top Gear. Simply applying foundation to kill the shine will improve your pictures a lot more than wasting money on big softboxes. The pros understand that make up artists do a better job of killing specular highlights than stupidly oversized light modifiers.

This is very true, up to a point.
Many photographers even get the MUA to paint in the features (such as high cheekbones) and use totally flat lighting. And then there are the "photographers" who do ALL of the work in post-processing - this is, sadly, a favoured technique used in the deceptive videos designed to sell useless lighting equipment.

And these techniques are valid, but expensive.. My old-fashioned approach is to do as much as possible in lighting, and to use minimal make-up and PP.

Folks. Thanks for all your input. I know I have a lot to learn. I've taken some of your guidance and mixed it with my needs/wants/budget and come up with a solution I suspect some of you won't like! Still FWIW this is what I did...

• I bought a bigger softbox. A 16 sided Selens 105cm job with 2 diffusers. I took on board one comment that 120cm is probably too big for a home location. They were right. 105cm is plenty big enough. I decided I didn't particularly like an Octagon's catchlight, and went for a rounder umbrella.
• I bought a flash head from the much maligned Yongnuo ;-). A YN200, which is a rip off of the Godox AD200. Half the price. I also do some portrait stuff outside, so needed one with a battery. I have never had trouble with Yongnuos in the past, and most importantly, it works with my current Yongnuo transmitter, so I can use my current speedlights for secondary duties.

So I got the missus (no make up as usual) in roughly the same spot and took this shot. Some editing has been done (a bit of desaturation of the face but not her lovely hair), but no skin softening as before. To my eye, the specular highlights are gone, a marked improvement on the previous two efforts.

To my mind the questioned has been answered and I have learned a lot!

Thanks again - great community.

Well, you've found affordable solutions and it doesn't matter whether or not other people would have made the same choices, because you've achieved a massive improvement

 

[cargo]

Hi Richard.


Thanks for coming back and sharing your results. It's great when folk do that. Plus it's real good for the forum users whom provide us with there knoweldge.
As mentioned above you seemed to have achieved your desired outcome.
Well done the pair of you.

Gaz