The Art of Boudoir Photography with Speedlights

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Featuring Emily Wei

The Art of Boudoir Photography with Speedlights From the author of SmokingStrobes • use reliable lighting setups • enjoy shooting stunning photos • make your models proud

The Art of Boudoir Photography with Speedlights

Copyright 2011 by Michael Zelbel. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author.

Contents Introduction

My Painful First Bedroom Shoot The Perfect Studio The Concept of “Going NUTS”

Step 1: Know Your Bedroom Basics Hot Shoes – For Hot Lighting

Prime Time – For Your Lens Great Little Gear Playing Light Jockey Besides the Bed Go Nuts: Furniture Resembling Body Lines

Step 2: Choose The Right Lingerie A White Shirt

Lingerie with Lace Bridal Fashion High Heels Simple Underwear Go Nuts: Striptease Hot Pants A Blanket Clothes That Won’t Work

Step 3: Setup Your Light One Light Setup

Bodyscapes One Light + Accent Light One Light + Kicker Light The Lighting Sandwich Beauty Light Natural Light Go NUTS: Back Lighting Setups: Those We Don’t Speak Of

5 5 7 9 10 11 11 12 14 16 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 31 34 35 37 39 44 46 50 52

Step 4: Posing Your Model

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S-Curve 45 Degree Facial Expressions Tell A Story Lazy Posing: Body Parts Go Nuts: Stretchy Poses

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Step 5: Choose Interesting Angles Find the Chocolate Side Tilt Your Camera Lines Boring Dead Center Rule of Thirds Go NUTS: Shoot from Her Feet “Climb Into Bed” Height Go NUTS: Eagle’s Perspective Focal Point

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Step 6: The Don’ts: Avoid the Most Common Mistakes No Bad Hands

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Go to the next level Creating a Pool of Shooting Ideas

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Acknowledgements

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Too Much Distrac… Oh, Shiny! Too Many Colors Too Tight Lingerie… Ouch! Fat Wide-Angle Photos Dirty Heels Uncared Nails

Your Regular Portfolio Shoot A Helping Hand Author Bio

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Introduction I am probably not the fanciest artist you have ever seen. In fact, I still like to think of myself as an amateur photographer – although when your hobby starts bringing in some good money, you get kicked out of the “non-professional zone” by public opinion. I’m starting to feel it as of late, but I still enjoy being an amateur. For me, this means freedom of experimentation and also being able to get away with occasional mistakes or artistic decisions that a hardcore pro would be crucified for! Sharing has always been a big part of my activities in the photography community. The way I get other people acquainted with my techniques and methods varies from real-world workshops and blog posts on SmokingStrobes.com to personal coaching sessions in my little ProPortfolioClub.com. If by chance you have tried to become a member, but found us unable to accept new people at the moment, please keep reading – at the end of the guide you will find a handy loophole that makes the process a lot easier! Now that we are through talking about how awesome I am, we should get to the meat and potatoes of this e-book – making high-quality boudoir photography. We will go through the very basic aspects of preparing your bedroom studio for a shoot, adorning your model with all sorts of neat apparel (or stripping her naked, o la la!); then we will move on to something more advanced – various lighting setups, poses and shooting angles. Lastly, we are going to top everything off with a list of things you should NOT do if you want your pictures to be any good. Before we go any further and delve deep into the bottomless pit of photographic knowledge (although I’m probably just flattering myself ), may I interest you in a bit of storytelling? Don’t fret – it won’t take long. But by the end of it, you will have come to appreciate the conveniences of small lighting gear and eager models. Because, you see, when I was starting out in beauty photography, things were a lot more complicated.

My Painful First Bedroom Shoot I can still recall the first time that I was confronted with a real boudoir photography challenge. A few days after I had purchased my first DSLR camera and a set of monoblocks on lightstands, I could not resist bragging with this great stuff to anyone within earshot when a friend of mine visited me. She is a very beautiful lady – and, to my genuine surprise, she wanted me to take some good bedroom pictures of her. I thought I had died and went to Heaven. Back then I hadn’t the faintest clue about lighting, composition and posing. As you can probably guess, I was pretty terrible – a lot worse than Nonja, the famous orangutan photographer from Vienna. 5

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Predictably, this led to a hilarious photo shoot and some lame pictures that did my stunningly beautiful model no justice at all. I wasn’t experienced enough to know what exactly was wrong with those images – or just how horrible they were – but I felt quite embarrassed all the same. I thought I had just my one-in-amillion chance to shoot boudoir pictures of a hot girl. Stupid man... Now, after several years and countless photo shoots, I have come to realize two very important things: a) Learning means gradually going from bad to good. It depends not so much on your inborn genius, but on practice and skill. Vision, as well as technique, can be developed through trial and error. The vast majority of people start out shooting crappy pictures – it is a necessary milestone. b) There is no shortage of attractive women – some of them soul6

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crushingly gorgeous – ready to be your models. Bond with your potential subjects online on Facebook and other communities, or meet them in real world situations like gatherings of civic groups, foreign country associations and the like.

to deal with a mind-boggling quantity of clunky gear. If your goal was to shoot magazine quality pictures, there was no way around it – you just had to have all that stuff! Intense lighting was needed due to little sensitivity that film used to possess back then. But those days are over (fortunately). Nowadays any DSLR you can buy, be it a high-end camera or an entry level device, delivers much better image quality than any medium format camera did 10 years ago. It also doesn’t require anywhere near as much light. Speedlights are nowadays so powerful that the issue of insufficient lighting is practically nonexistent.

When I started to learn more and more about photography, the first thing I practiced was setting up light with the help of really big photography gear. You know, like gigantic softboxes, and octaboxes, and powerful monoblocks. Later on, inspired by the strobist movement I moved my primary focus on attaining the same excellent lighting by means of very small gear. I moved on to using only speedlights, umbrellas and very lightweight lightstands.

In fact, you are more likely to experience problems with light that is too bright and too intense – but those are easily remedied. I’ll show you how to deal with all sorts of hiccups related to lighting set-ups in this very guide. For now, don’t concern yourself with this and let’s carry on.

This was the point of no return for me – taking pictures became much easier. Portable and powerful equipment made boudoir photography less difficult to pull off in such locations as bedrooms that possess a lot of artistic potential but prove unsuitable for studio gear. With speedlights, however, you could shoot inside a dollhouse! Well, not really – but they are still a lot more versatile than your everyday studio equipment.

The Perfect Studio As unlikely as it sounds, a bedroom is an ideal location for taking beauty and nude photos. It gives you substantial opportunities for manipulating the light and positioning your model, which makes it, in essence, a studio. That’s right – a bedroom is just another photo studio for you. The one you need to know inside and out, the one you need to master.

As a result, now I can parade into a bedroom and set up some compelling and dramatic lighting in a matter of minutes. Then I pose my model in the most flattering way possible and start taking pictures. Easy as pie – no missed opportunities, no pressing deadlines, no complex lighting contraptions that nobody has any idea how to use.

Any beauty photographer who is striving to bring in good money with his skill should be flexible and able to shoot with limited time and resources. Your clients and your friends who want you to take boudoir pictures can’t relate to all the difficulties of organizing a shoot. That’s why it would be expedient for you to make it as time-saving and minimalistic as possible.

I work much smarter now. The best part is, my clients don’t care how big and complex my gear is, as long as the results are stunning. They are paying me serious money for doing what is essentially my biggest passion. How cool is that? Back in the golden days a photographer’s lot was 7

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If you can walk into a bedroom, set everything up, pull out your camera and shoot away, producing images of wonderful quality, asking why you won’t do it in an actual studio would be the last thing on people’s minds!

least become less dependent on expensive equipment and professional venues. The photos in this e-book were taken during a super long session with my wife Emily in our bedroom at home. Emily is very beautiful, but she is not a photo model; nor is every pose shown here ideal for her. But I wanted to keep it real and take the pictures for this guide “in the field” as opposed to just choosing some perfect examples from my portfolio. In this darn age photography is clearly a team sports. Makeup artists, stylists and assistants are REQUIRED on set. But in order keep this example shoot reproducibly on a shoestring budget I

A full-fledged studio encounter with your model is costly, laborious and time-consuming. The results are sometimes unpredictable, because not many non-professional models can relax in a studio. Relaxing in a bedroom is much easier – that’s what bedrooms are for! With this guide showing you how to take care of the gear and the pose, you will be able if not to ditch studio photography, but at

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opted for doing it without any third party help - just Emily and myself. I think it got paid off in terms of learning value. Had I just selected a couple of dozens of pictures from my portfolio and declared them as the standard, I would probably end up with something irreproducible. I wanted to encourage experimentation and freedom of expression. So whenever you see the examples in the book, please keep in mind that the same poses might look different with your model, and a different type of lighting can change the mood and the overall impression dramatically. I urge you to try everything and knock yourself out in every way imaginable!

The Concept of “Going NUTS” One particular thing I’m using throughout this guide is the concept of “going nuts”. N.U.T.S. stands for “not the usual tame stuff”. As I stated a couple of lines above, I want to encourage your creative expression and make all the process as interactive as it can get with reading a boudoir photography guide. Let me explain the idea to you. Despite being all about inspiration and originality, art is built on rules. It is important to learn them and know how to apply them. However, it is even more important to bend these rules occasionally – or downright break them. When you have tried the lighting setups and the poses that I provide in this guide, it means the time has come to put a twist on this material and see what happens. Just go with your gut feeling and see if you produce something fresh and good. You might succeed – or maybe not. Whatever result you end up with, don’t let it discourage you. Don’t be afraid to do something wrong. When you are scared of being wrong, you deny your own right to be original. Fresh perspective is the single most important thing that no education must take away from you! Now do me a favor and go nuts!

Go NUTS! You will find fun and practical advice (with many more saucy pictures) on how to go nuts and deliver crazy creative twists in colored captions like these, scattered throughout the guide. They are all over the place, so keep your eyes open!

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Step 1: Know Your Bedroom Basics Once you master photography in the bedroom then there’s one thing which makes it all worthwhile, and that’s flexibility. Wherever you go, there is always a bedroom of some sort. This basically means that you will have “a studio” regardless of where you end up. Whether you are visiting friends in order to take their pictures, or you are on holiday, or for any other reason, there is always a bedroom. It can be a simple one (in a house or an apartment) or a fancy one (you often get those in hotels, though kitsch costs extra!). You can produce awesome pictures in any bedroom, humble or posh. One significant drawback of bedrooms as compared to studios is their pretty confined space – I’m talking both width and height. A full body image would often require a wide angle lens, and those can introduce a lot of distortion to the photos, specifically – to your model’s body. Needless to say, you should use such gear with caution; not everyone has keen artistic taste, but everybody can spot weird details in other people’s anatomy! Limited size of most bedrooms also makes it more difficult to set up the light; it tends to bounce off every surface and illuminate the places you’d rather keep in shade. However, doing this correctly is quite easy to learn. We will talk about the matter in the next chapter – as well as many other aspects of creating beautiful bedroom lighting.

In order to create visual depth and add appropriate mood with lighting, you don’t need a lot of equipment.

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Hot Shoes – For Hot Lighting

on rare occasions I add pop-up reflectors to my boudoir photography kit. I don’t normally use the latter to reflect light, as much as direct it away from places I want to leave in shade. Beyond that, this is all the gear I need for 99% of my bedroom shoots.

When shooting in confined spaces like bedrooms or standard-sized hotel rooms, I am usually using very small and handy gear. I want something that is easy to carry inside and easy operate in a small environment. Oftentimes there is no free spot in a hotel room for big lightstands with large soft boxes. In fact, even a big camera bag can be an obstacle while working in a tiny room.

Prime Time – For Your Lens

Imagine you have got a couple of massive bags with cameras, lighting gear and whatnot and you put them next to the bed. When you are taking pictures over there – and you know you will – it becomes very easy to stumble over this pile of equipment. Your precious bags of high-end gear will most likely prevent you from moving around freely and positioning yourself for a perfect shot. Another thing I had to learn the hard way: sometimes the hotel management doesn’t really want you to carry a lot of equipment into your room. It happened twice to me: we arrived at the hotel and we got the reception’s permission to shoot inside – but when we had a bunch of gear with us nobody would want to let us check in. All sorts of concerns were expressed, from somewhat legit to absolutely ridiculous: like “the furniture might get broken” or that we’d use too much electricity. Such confrontations are unnerving and unproductive; so if you don’t want to relocate your shoot in haste you need to think small.

Since a bedroom is usually pretty small, it makes sense to take pictures with a very shallow depth of field. You want your subject to be sharp and crisp, and all the disturbing features (furniture, lamps and suchlike) – blurry, barely discernable. You might want them to be recognizable in your photos, but not so much as to draw the attention away from the pièce de résistance – the model. So shooting with a wide open aperture is a good idea – at least when it comes to boudoir photography. In a bedroom studio I usually aim for an aperture of f/2.8. At this setting the sharpness is falling off very rapidly around my subject. The face might remain crystal-clear and crisp while the rest of her body appears smooth and blurry; this style is both beginner-friendly and visually appealing, which is why I like it so much. The images in this guide – at least the vast majority of them – were shot with a 50 mm lens at f/2.8. I really enjoy shooting with a 50 mm prime lens; it provides me with me a very bright image in my viewfinder and enables me to check whether or not the focus is where I want it. All in all, it gives me a much better idea of the sharpness level in my would-be pictures than a zoom lens would.

Nowadays, when we have speedlights which give enough light for virtually any situation, I can walk into a room with two small bags and have enough equipment to carry out any shooting idea that appears in my head. My list of equipment consists of two light stands with a pair of shoot-through umbrellas and speedlights. An additional speedlight or two are sometimes used for accent light, and

However, for some photographs a prime lens is not going to do the trick. When dealing with, say, small details and extreme close-ups, a tele-zoom lens is better suited for the task. It serves two purposes:

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1. a tele-zoom lens minimizes optical distortion that might kick in if I used a prime 50 mm lens; 2. it lets me keep a polite distance from the model, whereas a prime lens would require me to come extremely close – and that would come across as creepy and inappropriate.

time-consuming. If I just hold the camera in my hand, I can quickly focus on the model’s eyes, move the camera back to frame the desired composition and press the shutter. It took me a lengthy sentence to describe it, but in reality these actions take up no more than a split-second. A tripod would actually interfere with my bedroom shoots rather than make them easier.

As to tripods, I never use them in bedroom shoots. Not only do they take up space and prevent me from moving around and changing angles quickly, but also make it hard to change focus fast. With low aperture numbers like f/2.8, I usually need to refocus every time the model makes the slightest movement. When my camera is mounted on a tripod and I need to focus exactly on my model’s eyes, the tripod head needs to be moved. Sometimes it even takes moving the entire tripod just to get the focus point right. This is tiresome and

Great Little Gear The pictures you can see in this guide were made using the following equipment: • • • • • • •

3 speedlights for lighting (I used Canon, but any brand will do); 1 trigger speedlight on camera (never used for exposure); 2 light stands; 2 umbrella holders; 2 shoot–through umbrellas; a 50 mm prime lens; 28 to 300 mm zoom (for detailed and sometimes for wide angle photos).

I did not even use reflectors to shield away unnecessary light. Speedlights are so small that I can position them very freely, and umbrellas can be turned in all sorts of directions. So it is usually not too hard to manipulate the light – exactly the way I want to. I am using very small and lightweight light stands. In a bedroom studio there is no wind or anything that makes it necessary to use very heavy and very sturdy stands. This is not a crash-testing site – in a bedroom people tend to walk around a bit more carefully (at least where I’m from!). I am not concerned about anybody running into a light stand and make it fall down.

See what I was talking about when I said that a tele-zoom lens made for great close-ups?

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Michael Zelbel Even though I am a big fan of TTL, the photos for this guide were all exposed in manual mode. This is because I want you, the reader, to be able to read exactly what power setting each flash was fired with to produce the images you see in here. Exact settings can be found in the lighting diagrams, along with explanations on how to make the most of them. I’m fortunate to have a couple of first class speedlights from Canon. They are really awesome. But if you are just starting out with this kind of photography and you still need to buy a couple of speedlights on a budget, then you can absolutely go for cheap, manual 3rd party speedlights. Choose some with guide number 58 and with a zoomable reflector head. Your photos won’t look any bit different, no matter if you use speedlights for $50 or for $500.

Lighting gear from left to right: lightstands, umbrealla swivels and speedlight foot, speedlights and shoot-through umbrellas

Small light stands not only fit better into a bedroom but also have another key advantage. With them I can usually set up the light at very small heights and from all sorts of angles. Smalll light stands can usually be positioned much lower than their bigger analogs. Oftentimes light coming from a low vantage point is exactly what I want when shooting in a bedroom. During a bedroom shoot I can trigger all speedlights via optical slaves (that’s what we call the flashes that are adjusted to go off once the master flash does). I am using the built-in triggering system in order to make all of them go off at once. In a bedroom there is no need for radio triggers. Here’s how the speedlight and the umbrella fit into the swivel, which is mounted on a lightstand

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If you got lamps, incorporate them as accent lights

Playing Light Jockey In a dance club there is usually a light jockey who is happily flooding the room with light in all kinds of colors. If you do something similar in your bedroom studio, your pictures would look like a mess. They might look somewhat artsy, but for the most part such photographs would come across as horrible. On the other hand, there are a number of situations that can result in exactly this type of mixed lighting colors. In a bedroom you might have daylight coming through a window, as well as a lamp next to the bed, on the wall or ceiling with tungsten light bulbs or incandescent lights. Then there are your flashes that will account for most of the lighting and convey the mood. Each of the above mentioned light sources has its own color temperature – that means they will show up as different colors in your pictures. Because you need to create particular atmosphere, convey the photo’s mood and direct the viewer’s attention, what you need is a photo which concentrates on one single color. That’s why it is a good idea to use only one sort of light sources and to ruthlessly eliminate any light that might have another color.

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If you absolutely need to incorporate tungsten light sources into your photograph, you can change the light of your flashes to a warmer tone – to match the lamps. You can do so by attaching a Color Temperature Orange (CTO) filter to your speedlights. I’m personally using Lee 204 filters for this purpose. But keep in mind that this tactic shouldn’t be your first option – first you need to try and remove all the unnecessary light. Whether or not light from the outside coming through the window is matching your flashes depends on the time of day and the weather. Light on a partly cloudy day has pretty much the same color temperature as your primary flashes. It’s all around 5800 Kelvin. So you can match those two types of light with little to no trouble. Sometimes it pays off to position the speedlight outside the bedroom, so that the light would be coming through the window. This is great for simulating a bright sunny day outside when reality doesn’t live up to your demands. So for this strategy you would complement the real light outside with your flash. On pretty much all of the images in this guide I refrained from using any light sources other than speedlights. With the exception of very few “available light photos”, all of the pictures here were shot with speedlights only. I closed the curtains so that the outside light wouldn’t enter the bedroom – at least not visibly. Dealing with the lamp next to the bed, I simply removed everything but the lamp shade. Then I put the lamp shade right on top of my speedlight. This way I generated a naturally looking accent light.

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We don’t want to have a rainbow of colors all over the place. Keep it simple with one or two light sources and a single main color.

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Most photos in a bedroom happens on a bed

Besides the Bed Most boudoir photos have the model posing on top of the bed. That’s naturally the case, and it allows for considerable freedom of choice as to poses and lighting set ups. In addition, if you’ve got a lamp or a special piece of furniture next to the bed, you might be able to incorporate that nicely into your pictures. It gives the photos the much-desired context and mood. On the other hand, it makes sense to brainstorm all of the different ideas for a photo shoot, even if they don’t have much to do with the good old “sexy girl on a bed” cliché. You can have your model posing right next to the bed leaning on its side. There are usually all sorts of furniture as well, that would contribute nicely to other scenes. For example, an arm chair is a wonderful piece of furniture that is often overlooked. Not only does it perfectly fit into a bedroom, but it also can accommodate a wide array of poses. Another promising bedroom prop is a mirror – whether it’s a full-length body mirror or a smaller one for makeup. All of those 16

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usually provide interesting opportunities for photos. Moreover, oftentimes windows and curtains can be used to frame your model beautifully.

sheet of paper over a power socket is so easy to do that I don’t ever hesitate!

When you prepare your bedroom studio you need to consider moving away all the unnecessary things that don’t contribute to the picture. Do not clutter your photos with non-essentials. Put away magazines from the bedside table. Remove the alarm clock that does not play a role in your photo. Consider removing paintings and photographs from the walls; you may or may not want them to be part of your images. For the photos in this guide I also covered the power socket in the wall with some white paper. The paper doesn’t make it disappear, but photoshopping its edges away is so much easier than removing the power socket itself during postproduction. You might think that in both cases not much editing would be required, and you are right. However, I try to avoid excessive Photoshop work wherever possible – nothing beats the image captured as perfect as possible on location. Sticking a 17

Save your retoucher some time and effort by covering up the power sockets with paper. It’s easy, fast and very effective.

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Go NUTS! Furniture Resembling Body Lines Why not use a wardrobe as the background for posing the model? In this example I used the post-modern shape of Emily’s shoe cabinet and a white towel to frame Emily’s body in the photo. The 70’s style rounded shape and the color of the drawers resemble the camel toe in Emily’s panty, as do the folds of the towel. it may seem barely recognizable at first, but this sort of visual consistency adds up to the particular feeling that the picture exudes.

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Step 2: Choose the Right Lingerie I’m sure you know it already, but I’m still going to say this: some clothes are suitable for a bedroom setting, others… not so much. Whatever the model wears needs to match the mood of your pictures; if clothing serves no purpose, it sticks out and doesn’t contribute anything to the image, making it unwholesome and flat. Posh bras, sexy panties, hotpants, bathrobes and other bedroom apparel are an obvious choice when doing boudoir photography. There are less conventional options too, and we will talk about those as well. Along with appropriate clothing items, there are inappropriate ones. I mean, really, really inappropriate. In real life they will pass, but they have no place in our beautiful make-believe world of bedroom photos. Socks, baggy jumpers or dirty heels don’t exactly spell “sexy” or “charming” and will most certainly ruin the mood. Besides, we want to reveal and emphasize certain body shapes, which can be achieved through a combination of seductive poses and sexy clothes – or no clothes at all! You can be a virtuoso of light and composition – it will not matter if you can’t choose the right apparel for your bedroom pictures. This is one of the very rare occasions when a masterful setup and brilliant execution can’t compensate for a poor choice of props. Choice of clothing always happens beforehand. You don’t want to waste any time on this matter during the actual photo shoot – you will have enough things to worry about. That’s why you either decide – by yourself and well in advance – what the model will wear or you consult her and request that she bring particular items to the photo session. Sometimes my model would show up with literally a suitcase full of clothes, but none of them would be suitable for a photo shoot. I learned from that and nowadays there is always a bunch of clothes and lingerie at my studio that we can use as a fallback. Among other things this includes white shirts, bathrobes, underwear, and high heels. In any case, clarify the type, quantity and quality of clothing that your model is supposed to bring with her to the shooting location. Underwear that has gone through a couple of washings is still usable in life, but usually not in a studio. It often ends up looking worn-out in the pictures. Never, ever simply tell your model to bring whatever she likes! Later on, when she shows up hauling a tremendous bag, and then you will say how none of this is suitable for the shoot (too colorful, too tight, too used up etc.), she will be very upset. Also, she will have a hard time resisting the urge to hit you in the face with said enormous bag! In order to avoid such conflicts, you need to communicate with the model and be clear about what you need of her.

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A White Shirt

Michael Zelbel the woman woke up in her new lover’s house after a naughty night and, having come unprepared, has no clothes of her own to wear. Or she might simply enjoy walking around in her boyfriend’s clothing, who knows? There are a million different things you can do with a white shirt when taking bedroom pictures. You can roll up the sleeves, knot the edges of the shirt, straighten up the collar, make the fabric wet and much more. As you can see, there are many subtle details and twists you can play with to create a compelling shot. So don’t pass up such an opportunity!

Some photography techniques never get old!

A white shirt is a time-honored theme in photography, and a failproof way to construct an atmosphere of intimacy and gentleness. It is a somewhat clichéd trick, but its popularity stems from how awesome it looks and how suitable it is for experimentation and putting unexpected twists on this deceptively simple technique. It is also beginnerfriendly and doesn’t take a lot of preparation to pull off.

A white bathrobe can be used as a variation of the white shirt theme. It exhibits a warmer and cozier feeling compared to a man’s shirt. On the other hand, your viewers will probably miss out on the romantic subtext, since a bathrobe is neutral when it comes to sexual connotations. See which alternative is going to work best for the specific purpose you hope to achieve.

Just have your model wear an oversized men’s shirt – preferably white, but feel free to play with the colors. The premise behind such a photograph is obvious:

Experimenting is one sure-fire way to get amazing results. And there’s a lot of room for experimentation with the “men’s shirts” theme!

Bathrobes can be both cozy AND sexy!

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Black lace lingerie, though seductive, is quite unforgiving to poorly adjusted lighting.

Lingerie with Lace This is a tricky one, as lace lingerie might not look half as exciting in pictures as it does in real life. It is made specifically to look sexy and seductive, but oftentimes lace lingerie comes across as boring when captured on camera. For instance, if it’s black, you sometimes need a ton of light in order to bring out enough details – otherwise even the sexiest piece of lingerie might look like a black hole and nothing more. When there is enough light to pull such a shot off, you often end up with an image that look like something out of a lingerie catalog rather than a photo shoot meant to glorify female beauty. I’m going to make a wild guess that this is not what you really want to create, so be mindful about the possible drawbacks of such clothes. Quite a lot of models would opt for pictures in lace lingerie, and you shouldn’t be freaked out about it. However, don’t rely on it completely and have some other options ready when the time comes to whip out your camera and start rocking!

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Bridal Fashion I do a lot of wedding-themed shoots both in my studio and in bedrooms. The fact is, a lot of bridesto-be would like nothing better than to make a photo album for their future husband. Preparing such a sexy gift takes serious guts, especially for shy women – getting married is a major turning point in their lives, even more so when coupled with doing nude photos for the first time. In my opinion, items of bridal fashion are great for boudoir photography. However, I like to reduce the wedding clothes in the photograph to one or two items or garments. Since the primary focus is the bride and not her outfit, it makes a lot of sense. For instance, I would normally feature just the veil and the white high heels. This way the photo comes across in a very sexy way, at the same time keeping in with the bridal theme.

Bridal fashion is great for boudoir photography

Bathrobes can be both cozy AND sexy!

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Limit yourself to one or two items of bridal clothing. Choose quality over quantity.

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High Heels Of course, it is not exactly habitual for any woman to wear high heels in bed. However, this sexy article of clothing keeps coming up in boudoir photography more and more often – probably due to strong sexual associations. Whatever the reason, high heels are considered to be a classical element in bedroom photographs and you might want to practice featuring them in your work. There are countless examples of how to successfully incorporate heels into your bedroom photo shoots. However, I suggest that you really need to take care of two things:

Nobody likes dirty heels in bed. Well, I sure don’t!

It looks weird if the heels are two sizes too big and it simply unpleasant if the soles of the shoes are dirty. This is not what people want to see in a bed – so spare them the experience.

a) high heels need to fit perfectly; b) they must also be clean.

Oversized shoes are not sexy – just awkward. Make sure they fit perfectly.

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Simple Underwear In boudoir photography, “fancy” doesn’t always equal “good” – unexpected, isn’t it? In fact, using simple underwear for bedroom shoots is one of my favorite things to do, because it makes you count more on your creativity than the wow-factor of the model’s bra and panties. Plain underwear doesn’t have to look cheap though; it just doesn’t draw too much attention to itself, that’s all. It is always a plus when the viewers can concentrate fully on the model’s beauty rather than her fancy lingerie. There’s one more thing that I like about that sort of underwear. It looks pretty enough to make for a good photo, at the same being believable – which means that in my bedroom pictures I’m featuring the type of underwear that a woman would actually wear in everyday life. This introduces a whole new level of believability and aesthetic appeal to my work.

Fancy isn’t always better. And “simple” doesn’t mean “cheap”...

... it’s something she would actually WEAR in real life.

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Bedroom Photo Setups

Michael Zelbel

Go NUTS! Striptease If you would like to crank up the levels of sexual tension in your pictures, and all you have is very simple and lackluster underwear, making a striptease photo shoot is a great way to deal with the problem. This tells a story which can come across as very intense, even if the choice of clothing doesn’t express the level of sexiness you were hoping for.

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Bedroom Photo Setups

Michael Zelbel

Hot Pants If your model has a good body shape, then hot pants are easily one of your best choices of clothing for a bedroom shoot. The most popular way of depicting those is when they are unbuttoned. You are in no way obliged to do it exactly like that, but over the years this tactic has proven consistently successful. If you were blessed with a shy model, reluctant to pose in underwear, let alone without it, this would be a perfect way to take some great pictures and not to harm anyone’s sensibilities. A photo shoot in hot pants might also help you to ease the model to try out something more risqué.

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Bedroom Photo Setups

Michael Zelbel

A Blanket When you’re taking pictures of your model in bed, consider the blanket to be just another article of clothing that can be made use of or discarded. The model might wrap it around her body, or cover some parts in particular. She might also conceal her legs and buttocks underneath like most people naturally do when in bed. Oftentimes your models would want nude shots that don’t actually reveal anything to the viewers – and that often takes a blanket to accomplish. All in all, this is an excellent prop for creating decent bedroom photos – especially for the shy models.

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Bedroom Photo Setups

Michael Zelbel

Clothes That Won’t Work Now that we have roughly defined the selection of suitable bedroom clothes for your model, let us talk about items that don’t work in boudoir photography. Here is my list: x x x x x

Socks Sporty underwear Evening dresses Casual wear Jumpers

You might find yourself in a situation when the above-mentioned articles of clothing would fit in a scene nicely or emphasize certain attributes of your model – her innocence, for example. After all, there are exceptions to every rule. Besides, I’d be the first one to tell you to try and break the conventional canons at least once in a while! In general, however, it pays off to abide by the rules of thumb laid out in this chapter. Boudoir photography is a peculiar style that conveys a certain mood and creates a certain atmosphere - naturally, it makes use of particular types of clothing. If you experiment and find that something doesn’t work, let it go and proceed with something else. Sometimes an idea just doesn’t look all that brilliant once carried out. It’s alright – as long as you have something else up your sleeve!

Cute socks in funny colors will usually not work well in boudoir scenes.

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Bedroom Photo Setups

Michael Zelbel

Umbrella close in, soft light, even for whole body photos

Step 3: Setup Your Light As I have annoyingly elaborated before, there are a number of reasons why you don’t want any heavy equipment in a bedroom, so it makes sense for a boudoir photographer to become a Zen-like minimalist and make the most use possible out of the least means available. If this has in any way discouraged you, don’t worry – if this kind of approach worked for me, it will certainly do you a lot of good as well. In pretty much all of the lighting setups described in this chapter I rely on two key items: speedlights as my powerful and portable sources and shoot-through umbrellas as the diffusers that soften and uniformly distribute the light from the flashes all over the scene (more or less). I always – well, almost – bring the umbrella as close to the model as possible. When you see a photograph of mine and you imagine that its frame would expand some centimeters to the sides, these wonderful contraptions would come into view. I kid you not – they are usually just a couple of centimeters outside the frame. 29

Bedroom Photo Setups

Michael Zelbel

It’s a bit like in Hollywood where the boom microphones are always as close to the actors as the frame allows. Sometimes, if someone makes a mistake, you can see the boom microphone hanging down into the shot. The same thing happens to me time and again – but not too often! One technique that I am always using in my bedroom sessions is placing my shoot–through umbrellas at a very low height – just above the bed level, in fact. By doing so, I make the folds of the blanket throw nice shadows across the bed. It brings out the depth and the details in the pictures, makes the fabric (and the model, naturally) stand out as three-dimensional. Below you will find some basic but quite versatile lighting setups; these will serve as a frame of reference for you to experiment and play around with various settings, quantity and position of light sources etc. This will help you to hone your skills and eventually come up with exactly the light you love. If you can make your model happy by shaving off a bit of weight, then focus more on the setups lighting the model from the side rather than from the front. This also gives you more options to cover flaws like cellulite in shadows, than you would have with frontal lighting.

Charming light often comes from the sides, seldomly from front.

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Bedroom Photo Setups

Michael Zelbel

One Light Setup A single shoot-through umbrella with a speedlight can provide enough soft and charming lighting to gently enwrap a full body shot of a model. If all you have is speedlight and an umbrella, consider yourself well-equipped for taking a lot of great photos! A word of advice on posing: what works well in its usual position may look no less beautiful turned around by 180 degrees. Try it out! Have I mentioned that I prefer to position my primary light source as close to the model as possible? Well, there are some exceptions. For instance, if you aim at shooting a bodyscape or two, it makes sense to move the light several feet away from the model; as a result, there will be noticeably more punchy delineation of the model’s curves. Firmer and more defined light will bring out more details and depth in your bodyscapes than soft light would.

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Michael Zelbel

One Light, Umbrella Close White umbrella shoot through 40” / 100 cm

King Sized Bed, 2x2m

Height: just above the bed

Speedlight Guide Number 58 1/32, 28mm

DSLR, 50mm 1/200s, f/2.8, ISO100, 10000k Height: 60cm / 2 feet above bed

Tip: If you want to warm up the colors of your photo, especially the skin tones, then dial up your white balance. Sure, alternatively you can gel your speedlights or adjust tones in postproduction, but shooting at - for instance - 10000k white balance gives you a warm image right out of the camera.

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One Light, Umbrella Further Away

King Sized Bed, 2x2m White umbrella shoot through 40” / 100 cm Height: just above the bed

DSLR, 50mm 1/200s, f/2.8, ISO100, 10000k

Speedlight Guide Number 58 1/8, 28mm

Height: 60cm / 2 feet above bed

Tip: In the lighting setups of this book, the umbrellas are usually positioned directly next to the king sized bed. This means, they are never further than 3 feet away from the model. The only exception: Bodyscape type of photos. Here I had them 5 feet away to have a bit more punch thanks to a little but harder light.

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Michael Zelbel

Umbrella far away, for bodyscapes

Bodyscapes I know, I know – bodyscapes are done in a studio. Just don’t tell anyone, OK? If you approach the task properly, nobody is going to notice the difference! Bedroom bodyscapes are an awesome add-on to all other boudoir photography stuff that you see. Exercise common sense along with your artistic taste, and everything is going to be just peachy.

Lighting Setup

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Bedroom Photo Setups

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One Light + Accent Light Placing another light source to accentuate the scene will most certainly make it look more powerful and dramatic. In many images in this guide you can see a lamp next to the bed – as you have undoubtedly figured out by now, it’s actually just a lamp shade, and inside it there’s another flash supplying the much-desired accent light. As seen through the camera

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Bedroom Photo Setups

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One Light plus Accent Light Bedside Lamp with Speedlight inside Speedlight 430 EX II 1/32, 28mm

King Sized Bed, 2x2m

White umbrella shoot through 40” / 100 cm Height: just above the bed

Speedlight Guide Number 58 1/8, 28mm

DSLR, 50mm 1/200s, f/2.8, ISO100, 10000k Height: 60cm / 2 feet above bed

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Michael Zelbel

One Light plus Kicker Light

One Light + Kicker Light A kicker normally comes from outside the frame and throws some harsh light onto the model, invoking a more action-oriented, more dynamic feeling. To make a kicker light, I use a bare speedlight without any modifications or filters. It fires at roughly 2 f-stops stronger than the primary light source, hence the “action” effect. Lighting setup

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Bedroom Photo Setups

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One Light plus Accent Light King Sized Bed, 2x2m White umbrella shoot through 40” / 100 cm Height: 1.2m / 4 ft Speedlight Guide Number 58 1/128, 105mm

DSLR, 50mm 1/200s, f/2.8, ISO100, 10000k Height: 60cm / 2 feet above bed

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Speedlight Guide Number 58 1/64, 28mm

Michael Zelbel

The Lighting Sandwich I like myself a good sandwich! This is one of my favorite set ups. When you make a lighting sandwich, the model is illuminated from both the right and the left side. Such a pattern results in a well-lit contour and a somewhat darker center. Since the usual lighting scheme makes use of the opposite (illuminated front and center, darker outline), this particular setup shines a new light on familiar compositional solutions (no pun intended). Oftentimes I go one step further and shift the light sources to the back, so they give off more light to the background and less to the model. This is the simplest way to challenge the conventional approach to lighting that is used 99% of the time in boudoir photography – that’s why I recom-

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mend it to aspiring photographers and use it quite often myself. With a couple of minor manipulations, you can make your pictures stand out, drawing the attention of the viewers. For a more challenging variation, you can also add an accent light – it doesn’t stand out much (you have a plenty of light already), but it does contribute to the whole boudoir atmosphere. In the example photo I used the sandwich lighting which was a little more intense compared to the previous shot. This way the body and the buttocks of the model are better illuminated, acquiring more presence and balancing out the scene. The only elements left somewhat downplayed are the face and the arms. In this case, the lighting context is only partially reversed.

Bedroom Photo Setups

Michael Zelbel

Lighting Sandwich plus Accent Speedlight 430 EX II 1/32, 28mm

Bedside Lamp with Speedlight inside

King Sized Bed, 2x2m

White umbrella shoot through 40” / 100 cm Height: 1.2m / 4 ft

White umbrella shoot through 40” / 100 cm Height: 1.2m / 4 ft

Speedlight Guide Number 58 1/32, 28mm

Speedlight Guide Number 58 1/32, 28mm

DSLR, 50mm 1/200s, f/2.8, ISO100, 10000k Height: 60cm / 2 feet above bed

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Michael Zelbel

Lighting Sandwich Context Reversed White umbrella shoot through 40” / 100 cm

White umbrella shoot through 40” / 100 cm

Height: 1.2m / 4 ft

King Sized Bed, 2x2m

Height: 1.2m / 4 ft

Speedlight Guide Number 58 1/32, 28mm

Speedlight Guide Number 58 1/32, 28mm

DSLR, 50mm 1/200s, f/2.8, ISO100, 10000k Height: 60cm / 2 feet above bed

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Bedroom Photo Setups

Michael Zelbel

Lighting setup Here you see the reversed lighting context in action

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Michael Zelbel

Just sandwich, reversing the lighting context

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Bedroom Photo Setups

Michael Zelbel

Beauty Light This lighting setup is widely used for beauty portraits, as well as for images appearing on ads of skincare products. In order to duplicate it, you need to set up the light so close to the model’s face that they would engulf it entirely. It becomes uniformly highlighted and deprived of any shadows, reflecting some of the light. Such a setup flattens the facial features, virtually eliminating the majority of distinctive marks such as wrinkles, freckles etc. For most female faces, this kind of light is very flattering. You should definitely give it a try! Beauty Portrait Light (no shades, all highlights)

You can also add an accent to this lighting

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Michael Zelbel

Beauty Portrait Light

King Sized Bed, 2x2m

White umbrella shoot through 40” / 100 cm Height: just above the bed Speedlight Guide Number 58 1/32, 28mm

White umbrella shoot through 40” / 100 cm Height: just above the bed

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Speedlight Guide Number 58 1/32, 28mm

DSLR, 50mm 1/200s, f/5, ISO100, 10000k Height: same as bed

Michael Zelbel

Natural Light If you are shooting in daytime, consider working with the natural light coming through the window. Firstly, it is easy enough, and secondly, it is quite rewarding. You don’t really need any equipment except your camera: curtains often act as a simple diffuser, making it very soft and picture-friendly – basically, windows become soft boxes and light sources all-in-one. What could be more suitable for taking awesome and sexy pictures? In a slightly overcast weather, the daylight will have the color temperature of approximately 5800 Kelvin – roughly the same as your speedlights. That means you can place a speedlight outside the room to amplify the natural light, in case it’s not bright enough. On the other hand, most modern DSLR cameras handle insufficient lighting very well – so you might as well just dial up your ISO setting, until your camera is sensitive enough to work with the amount of daylight available.

Available Light Only 46

Michael Zelbel

Beauty Portrait Light Windows witth Curtain

DSLR, 50mm 1/200s, f/2, ISO100, 10000k

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Michael Zelbel Main light coming from an umbrella in her back

You can also mix the natural light with speedlights positioned inside the bedroom. Sandwiching your model between the window and a speedlight with shoot-through umbrella is also a good idea. According to your preference, you can adjust the intensity of the speedlight to either perform as a supporting fill light to the sun shining through the window, or vice versa. Either way it will make for some quite astonishing shots

Available Light as Fill Windows witth Curtain

White umbrella shoot through 40” / 100 cm

DSLR, 50mm 1/60s, f/2, ISO400, 10000k

Speedlight Guide Number 58 1/32, 28mm

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Michael Zelbel

With a speedlight as a fill

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Michael Zelbel

Go NUTS! Back Lighting Silhouette photography is not the first thing that comes to mind when someone is planning a bedroom shoot. However, it does provide a refreshing twist to the concept of boudoir photography and has very lenient requirements to an artist’s gear and skills. Back lighting is achieved by simply reversing the normal lighting context completely; just throw all those watts and Kelvin at your disposal into the background – and none onto the model. This is especially effective if you’ve got a bright backdrop or a simple white wall behind her. Depending on how far away your model is from said wall or backdrop, she might be illuminated by pleasant contour light reflected off the background… or stay completely in the shadows as a Beauty Portrait Light (no shades, all highlights) distinctly seductive yet very enigmatic female shape.

Go nuts: blinding Backlighting - reversed lighting context. Throw all the light you have against the wall

Umbrella pointing to the wall in the background

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Michael Zelbel

Beauty Portrait Light Bedside Lamp with Speedlight inside Speedlight 430 EX II 1/32, 28mm

King Sized Bed, 2x2m

White umbrella shoot through 40” / 100 cm

Beauty Portrait Light (no shades, all highlights)

Height: 120cm / 4 ft Speedlight 1/16, 28mm

Go nuts: blinding Backlighting - reversed lighting context. Throw all the light you have against the wall

Umbrella pointing to the wall in the background

DSLR, 50mm 1/200s, f/2.8, ISO100, 10000k Height: exactly on bed level

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Bedroom Photo Setups

Michael Zelbel

Setups: Those We Don’t Speak Of Using speedlights and shoot-through umbrellas opens up a world of possibilities beyond those I have described above. However, there are certain types of setups were left out intentionally – as I have been experimenting with different lighting schemes, I found that some of them are more than fitting for studio conditions, but – alas – fail to deliver in a bedroom. That’s why they were not featured. A typical studio setup with one main light coming from one side of the camera and a fill light coming from the other seems all too boring for me when applied to the bedroom setting. It “irons” out all the nice folds of the blanket and makes everything else look far too flat for my taste. I have also tried shining the light directly from above the model by attaching an umbrella to a boom that I placed over the bed. However, this ended up giving me a softened version of the regular interior lamp lighting – boring, boring, and did I mention it was boring? I am not saying that none of the alternatives are possible when making boudoir photography – they are, and there are more variations than most of us would care to remember. When I set out to write this book, I was downright determined to suit you up with the very best lighting solutions available – and that’s exactly what you’ve got in this chapter! No sense in wasting any more kilobytes of text, is there?

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Michael Zelbel

Step 4: Posing Your Model The importance of good lighting is obvious; good posing, on the other hand, is a rare treat to come by. Many photographers are faulty of putting their models into unnatural, forced and very queer-looking positions. The majority of models, too, don’t seem to have any clue as to how a three-dimensional pose should work on a two-dimensional medium like photography. Luckily, I can help at least one of you make sense of all this and master the complicated art of posing. It’s never as simple as inviting your model to lie in bed or find a good spot in a bedroom and shooting away. True, such an approach can produce all sorts of pictures, from interesting to downright hilarious, but I strongly doubt that this is what you, your clients or your model are looking for. Posing requires the photographer and the model to work together; also, one or the other should know what he or she is doing. In order to succeed, you will need a set of guidelines and examples. Luckily, in this chapter you will find all of this and more. In addition, together with this boudoir photography guide I included a cheat sheet with sample poses you can choose from and modify however you see fit. You might want to print out the pages with those positions and look at them together with your client or your model in order to determine which ones will work best.

vertical s curve

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Horizontal S-curve

Bedroom Photo Setups

Michael Zelbel

S–Curve Unless you are shooting boudoir pictures for a crowd of angry orthopedic surgeons, you will discover that most people don’t find completely straight bodies very attractive. Curves not only seem more favored by boudoir photography fans, but also serve as optical guidelines that direct the viewer’s eyes within the frame. This is where the famous S-curve posing comes in. To achieve this effect, you pose your model so that her head and her hips seem to point in a different direction from her shoulders and knees. The resulting position is reminiscent of letter S, hence the name. Whether your model is standing or kneeling or lying somewhere, you can always try and give her body this curved look. The most obvious way to make use of this guideline is to apply it when you need a touch of slenderness to your current pose of choice. If the position you are working on at any given moment during your shoot doesn’t seem very appealing, adding a little curvature where it counts might prove a quick fix. However, you should remember that it is not a panacea!

Vertical S-curve

45 Degree Frontal perspective makes everything look wide and blocky. This is no good if you want to convey a feeling of femininity and tenderness. When shot bluntly from the front, both hips and shoulders might appear broader than they are. To avoid this, turn your model’s body towards the camera at a slight angle – about 45°. A simple solution that takes several seconds to implement – but it will make a world of difference in your pictures. The model will seem taller and slimmer, with none of that “basketball shoulders, hips like Elvis” business.

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Michael Zelbel

Facial Expressions Facial expression is a significant part of what brings your photographs to life; on par with atmospheric lighting and thoughtful poses, it is a mood-creating element no photographer should overlook. Your model’s face and eyes are what the viewers turn to in order to discover the story behind the picture. Sometimes a detail as the direction of the model’s glance can make all the difference. She may be looking straight into the camera, or sideways, or have her eyes shut – each of the three variations conveys a different mood. Although establishing direct eye contact with a viewer is widely considered bad taste, it Looking into the lens, viewer Closed, dreaming Looking away serves to establish a connection more personal connection. A sideway glance, on the other hand, implies that the viewer is an observer, contemplating the image and trying to figure it out. When the model closes her eyes, the “observer effect” becomes even more obvious, but the implication is that she is asleep or dreaming. The photograph acquires a new dimension: a dream within a dream, a fantasy inside a fiction. The viewer can be the addressee of your picture’s message, a casual observer or an involved voyeur – depends on how you wish to play it. Notice that we haven’t even touched the facial expressions themselves – we have only been talking about such a seemingly simple matter as the direction of the model’s gaze. Imagine the possibilities!

Chin down, softer, submissive

The way your model is holding her head defines how strong or dominant she seems to everyone else. Holding her head up high, especially with chin pointing upwards, indicates a very dominant personality. If the model keeps her chin low, she comes across as soft or even submissive. You can play with it to a reasonable extent – when the chin is brought too high or too low, any prideful or humble posture becomes merely weird and anatomically challenging.

Chin up, strong, dominant

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Bedroom Photo Setups

Michael Zelbel

Breath through your mouth: communication

Bodylanguage: have her acting out the feeling that you want to express

Voyeuristic story telling, the viewer is outside the story

Eye contact, the viewer is part of the story you tell

Your model’s lips, whether they are open or pressed together, will impact the mood of the image significantly. In order to make it look natural, do this: when you need the model to open up her lips slightly, ask her to breathe through the mouth; if you want closed lips, ask her to breathe through the nose. By doing so you will avoid making your model adopt a forced expression and tense her facial muscles more than necessary. This is a very common sight in boudoir photography, and it doesn’t look good – ever.

We get a lot of information about the world and people around us through reading body language; you can use it to add depth and context to your bedroom pictures too. However, people perceive non-verbal expressions in motion; when depicting them in a static photo, part of the info gets “lost in translation”, so to speak. To make the viewers “get” what the image is all about, it is often necessary to act out the situation you have in mind.

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Michael Zelbel

Tell a Story

a particular body part in the most interesting and flattering way.

Telling a great story can be quite challenging; creating a picture that is worth a thousand words is doubly so. If your photos don’t tell a story, they are not particularly interesting – even if they are beautifully executed from a technical point of view. Substance without style is still intriguing; style without substance goes nowhere. If a picture challenges your viewers to think and use their imagination, it means it’s memorable. They might not think of the same things you were when shooting that photo, but it doesn’t matter. The fact their imagination takes flight because of what you show them is a hundred times more important than where it ends up.

A well formed chest

We have already discussed how the model’s eye contact with the viewer can define the mood and the story. Use it to either make them participants or observers, involved parties or voyeurs. Although being a beholder is psychologically safer than being a part of the story, I would like to encourage you to take a risqué path from time to time and have the model reach out to the audience. Some people won’t appreciate it, but others will. You can’t play safe all the time – it’s predictable and it’s boring. Take chances!

Lazy Posing: Body Parts If you are tired of spending countless hours tirelessly devising new poses for your models, here’s some good news for you: sometimes you don’t have to. Human anatomy can be admired, let’s say, in parts. Some details of the human body speak for themselves – all you need to do is point your lens and listen. For starters, find the right point of view with your camera; choose an angle that displays Well rounded buttocks - surround them with soft fabric

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Bedroom Photo Setups

Michael Zelbel

For example, if your model boasts wellrounded buttocks, they would definitely make for a good photograph. You can surround her buttocks with soft fabric in order to frame them nicely. Beautiful breasts are also very photogenic (yeah, like I have to explain you that one!). Depending on your model’s anatomy, they might look different when she is lying, standing or seated. Experiment with postures and choose the one that gives her breasts the most visual appeal. For depicting delicate private parts like her vagina, make sure that you use light and shadows discreetly, lest she feel too ashamed. Be mindful of the angle – a pubic region can make for the cutest curve imaginable, whereas an all-pink shot looks neither interesting, nor very flattering. delicate private parts - cover them in enough shade so that the model don’t get ashamed about the result

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Go NUTS! Stretchy Poses A word of advice: when it comes to posing, it is most advisable to master the basics first, and only then go nuts. You should follow this rule of thumb for every step in the guide, but especially so for poses. If there is some time left during a photo shoot for fooling around, and the model is flexible enough, you could try putting her through some challenging poses. For instance, she could lie on her back and lift her chest as high as possible. Pushing her breasts up will make it seem even higher. Thrusting her hips upwards is also a possibility. This is going to look particularly saucy if she lies on her stomach and sticks her butt up in the air. A really brave and flexible model could perform a horizontal or vertical split while in bed. You might want to cover her vagina for that one – hide it in the shadows or pull a bit of blanket over it.

Stretching up her chest

Stretching up her hips

Stretching up her buttocks

For extra bonus points the really brave model can make a stretchy “giant leap” pose on the bed

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Step 5: Choose Interesting Angles A good pose makes the model look good. But a good pose combined with a smartly chosen shooting angle makes the model look irresistible!

Find the Chocolate Side Our bodies are built with slight asymmetry, we don’t get light and shadow evenly on each side of our body and we don’t choose symmetrical poses either. That’s why one side of your model is bound to look better than the other, even if the difference is marginal. Your task is to find that “chocolate side” and capture it on camera. When a new pose is assumed by your model or a new lighting setup is used, take your time to choose the best side and work with it. Don’t just jump into the scene – take it in, evaluate it from several angles and go with the sweetest one.

Tilt Your Camera

Vertical straightened line

There is a trick in movie photography that is called a “Dutch tilt”. It is performed by turning the camera at an angle, so that the scene’s composition becomes not vertical or horizontal, but rather diagonal. I’m not suggesting you take this technique and run with it (you certainly could!); however, you should try and experiment with this stuff. Here are some obvious suggestions: • • •

horizontal shots; vertical shots; the aforementioned “Dutch tilt”.

Horizontal straightened line

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Michael Zelbel The general rule of thumb for camera tilts is that at least your model should maintain some alignment, horizontal or vertical. The rest of the scene can go topsy-turvy for all I care. Tilting your camera creates an impression of dynamics, of life going about its way. Although 99% of photography mentors will probably go all preachy about how you shouldn’t make a falling horizon, don’t bother. When it’s your photography instructor lying in that bed and being shot on camera, you can be a darling and play by the rules. Otherwise – be ready to break them from time to time.

Boring Dead Center I don’t mind rules very much, but some of them are worth following 9 times out of 10. For instance, one of the more or less foolproof rules dictates to avoid placing your main subject in the center. It doesn’t mean that your model should be dumped right at the edge of a picture, however. As long as it’s not in the very center, it’s fine. To know where exactly all the key elements should be placed, we need to turn to the rule of thirds.

Lines Lines – straight or curvy – are excellent for creating patterns and leading the viewer’s gaze towards the key elements of your pictures. Boudoir photography and strict geometry of space are not mutually exclusive, but you will want to avoid sharp angles or boxed patterns. Make it curvy and seductive!

Avoid the boring, dead, center

Rule of Thirds The Rule of Thirds helps photographers with arranging the key compositional elements within the frame. Basically, you dissect the frame into 9 equal blocks by tracing two vertical and two horizontal lines across the scene. The most important elements are to be placed on the intersections of those lines. The bigger objects are placed alongside the lines.

Geometrical lines anyway

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When in doubt: rule of thirds

Here’s a little tip: when your model sinks too deep into the soft bed sheets, you can always put something underneath them to prevent such a thing from happening. A couple of folded towels would do nicely – they are almost invisible and will not show as a budge under the blanket.

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Go NUTS! Shoot from Her Feet Why not shoot the model from her feet up? This looks especially interesting with high heels on. If you use a very wide angle lens and place the camera close to her feet, you can get a very special effect. It might not be the cutest picture in the world, but it will certainly stand out and attract attention.

“Climb Into Bed” Height The height of your point of view (POV) is a very important variable. In boudoir photography there is something we call “climb into bed” height. This is pretty much the height you would have when kneeling on the bed. If you are of less than average height, you can simply stand in front of the bed – the height of your POV will be exactly like the “climb into bed” height. However, if you’re a tall person, you will have to bend down a bit.

Shooting from low angle, the viewer is “on the bed”, inside the scene

Otherwise the picture might look boring because the POV would be too high. Oftentimes it proves useful to bring your camera down all the way to the bed level. This way you “take the viewer to bed”. If you do a good job, he will experience the scene as if lying in bed himself – such an uncommon angle helps to build up a certain level of intimacy.

The “Climb into bed height”

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Go NUTS! Eagle’s Perspective Eagles are amazing creatures: they can spot their prey from as far as three kilometers. Now, before you leave your model in the street, get the biggest lens you’ve got and drive to the other side of the town, let me explain what “eagle’s perspective” means photography-wise. You shoot from a point of view that is directly above the bed, plain and simple. Find a wide angle lens, get yourself or your camera directly below the ceiling and shoot away! You will need at least 24 mm for this type of angle. If your feet get in the way – it happens sometimes – you can crop the photo later, during post-production. Hold the camera under the ceiling: Shooting from very high position, voyeuristic

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Focal Point “Focal point” is the concept very similar to the “point of view”. This is the point you focus on, the point of sharpness. It indicates an important element within the frame, revealing part of the story and directing the viewer’s eyes to it. Usually it’s your model’s face, more specifically – her eyes. Sometimes you might want to focus on a different body part: her hands, for instance. If everything else is blurred, you make it clear to the viewer that in this particular image you want to draw attention to something other than the model herself. In the example photo, the model is pretty sharp, while the hand with the phone is blurred. What a viewer sees is a woman holding a mobile phone. If we shift the focal point to the phone itself, the viewer is going to see a mobile phone in the hand of a woman. The difference is subtle, but we have changed the main subject of the picture without actually rearranging anything. Anything but our focal point, that is.

Woman, with a mobile phone

A mobile phone, in the hand of a woman

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Step 6: The Don’ts: Avoid the Most Common Mistakes Oftentimes your artistic taste and your sense of right and wrong will be your only helpers during difficult shoots. Use them and the guidelines laid out in this chapter to determine what doesn’t work. It could be unnecessary objects, compositional errors, unflattering angles, poor match of colors or anything else you might have missed. Various mistakes and inadequacies might seem very minor and hardly noticeable when you take a shot, but they will stand out in your bedroom pictures. It doesn’t take much to ruin an otherwise great photo, so be on your toes for mess-ups.

No Bad Hands Hands are an important element of any pose; they are also long and awkward, and nobody ever knows what to do with them. A common mistake is to depict a hand with some fingers visible and others out of sight. It looks weird, to say the least. “Amputated” fingers attract the wrong kind of attention. When the fingers are all folded away or bent to one side, the hand might appear deformed. Although it is a minor inconvenience, you should avoid it as much as possible. Yeah, I know – those viewers are a sensitive crowd! Even partially hiding fingers beneath a piece of clothing or another body part might look strange. Make sure that the model keeps her hands open and relaxed, so the poor viewers rest easy and enjoy the photographs instead of thinking about all the missing fingers. The same applies to your model’s feet. Adjust the pose so they look naturally and all the toes are visible and the shape of the feet is not distorted.

No “amptuated” fingers

No deformed hands

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Too Much Distrac… Oh, Shiny!

If you were not explicitly requested to make your model look less skinny, use underwear that fits comfortably – or maybe even a bit loosely. If you plan to conduct a nude session after a photo shoot with lingerie, have her take it off well in advance. That way any imprints from the underwear will have time to fade, so the model’s skin will be intact.

Keep your photos clean and simple. Focus on what mood and message you want to get across, not on how much stuff you can show off. All too often bedroom pictures contain a lot of non-essentials that take up space but don’t contribute anything, drawing the viewers’ attention away from things that really matter.

Fat Wide-Angle Photos

Make sure that your background is clean and that nothing will distract people from your model. Think about removing paintings, pictures, calendars and posters from the walls before shooting. Put away magazines, books, alarm clocks, extra clothes, extra linens and pillows, bags, purses and other stuff that doesn’t belong in boudoir pictures. Blur your background, make its presence weaker. Stick to simple one color bed sheets with no distracting patterns.

Too Many Colors

Dirty Heels

Just like “too much distraction”, this mistake comes from our desire to show off more, to do more, to use more… don’t let yourself go wild, keep everything simple. Nice red lingerie combined with yellowish walls and blue bed sheets, next to white lilies? No way. Emphasize one color or tone if possible – leave those crazy combinations to avantgarde designers, rainbows and LSD.

As obvious as it is, this mistake is extremely common. Maybe it doesn’t occur to male photographers that you can get something as slim and pointy as high heels dirty, or maybe it’s the whole “women are cleaner” stereotype that kicks in – I don’t know and I don’t care. However, what I – and the viewers – do care about is a clean bed, and clean footwear. Either use new shoes or thoroughly clean the ones you’ve got. Ideally, people who look at the pictures featuring high heels should have no clue they have been used before. Unless you want to build the concept of your photo shoot around old and dirty things, everything should be crispy clean.

Too Tight Lingerie… Ouch! There are two solid reasons why you should not let your model wear too tight lingerie: x x

As you already know, a wide angle lens introduces distortions to bedroom photos. Objects closest to the lens are magnified, and those further away from it shrink. The effect is bad in and of itself, but it becomes even worse when depicting facial features or limbs. Spaghetti arms, big nose, short (or overly long) legs are only welcome in caricature shots, not in boudoir photography. If you don’t invoke this effect deliberately, stay away from it and keep your eyes open for optical distortions.

skin rolls that look like extra weight (love handles, anyone?); lasting marks on the model’s skin.

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As much as clothes need to be clean - the model needs to be as well. super cared nails are essetial in boudoir photography

Uncared Nails Just as clothes and footwear need to be clean, so does the model. I know – it’s a painfully obvious no-brainer. However, if I received a dollar for every time I see a picture of a model with uncared fingernails or toenails, I’d be conducting photo shoots on my private jet or my own island right now. So please make sure that your model’s nails are as clean as they get – not only from a purely hygienic point of view, but also in terms of fresh nail polish. Renew it shortly before the shoot. This is essential; no exceptions, no excuses.

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Go to the next level Creating a Pool of Shooting Ideas If you want to make it as a photographer nowadays, what you need is a truly outstanding portfolio. People are flooded with gazillions of photos online and off-line every day – thank the Internet and the inexpensive DSLR cameras for that! On the Web, literally thousands of photographers are competing for the attention of a vast online audience. The way to stand out from the crowd has always been – and remains – to feature excellent photos in your portfolio, which are unique and creative; pictures that don’t get mixed up in the mainstream, but shine brightly against the background of millions upon millions of mediocre images. “It’s all well and good”, you might say, “but how exactly am I supposed to get the ideas for all those unique photos? Pretty much everything has already been photographed!” For shooting ideas that will take your breath away, I have a solid technique that I would like to share with you. Said technique is deceptively simple – maybe that’s why most photographers feel they are all too high and mighty to use it. But you’re smarter than that, aren’t you? What I would like you to do is take 10 minutes to brainstorm ideas. I know, it’s a very “meh” sort of advice. But it will transform your creative process, I can vouch for that! I want you to think about the subgenres of photography that you like most and on which you want to make an impact. Then simply let your mind go absolutely, uncompromisingly wild for 10 minutes. Write down every single idea that pops into your head. I would like you to collect at least 100 different ideas for photos. If you can’t do it in a single sitting – which is no big deal – do several brainstorming sessions throughout the day, or space them out evenly during a week. I don’t care how you do it, just get it done. As it is your goal to collect a HUNDRED shooting ideas, you can’t afford to be picky. Don’t try to think only about the “good” ones – you won’t be able to. Don’t try to be super creative – there’s nobody around to impress. The trick is to let things flow freely and avoid self-censorship or editing out any outrageous thoughts that happen to come by and say hello. Just write down every single idea that comes to mind, no matter how stupid or insultingly simple it might seem at the moment. Once you have collected a hundred of those, you are allowed to select a few “prize pigs” out of this pool of thoughts. Find at least 10 solid suggestions that in any way stand out from all the rest. These are what you will work with. 69

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The time has come to take these ideas and make them bigger. Your mini-goals will be:

poison that slowly kills your creativity AND your productivity.

1. to make them specific; 2. to make them special; 3. to make them personal.

There is a major downside to committing yourself entirely to photography – life tends to get in the way. There is one thing you could do to bring balance to your world, however, and that is to make the “habit” of doing portfolio photo shoots on a regular basis. Turn creative process into something you just have to do, otherwise you won’t feel good. Make it addictive, so you can’t even imagine your week without a photo session and new additions to your portfolio.

Be clear and honest with yourself as to what you hope to convey to the viewers, what mood you need to create, how these concepts can be made even more original and what part of your creative personality they will express. The objective is to take a “good” idea and turn it into something truly special – something that bears your personal touch. Congrats – you have just created the first 10 worthy ideas for your creative “pool”! Are you awesome or what? I hope this will motivate you even more to maintain and expand this collection of shooting ideas on a regular basis. This will be your photographer’s fountain of youth, so to speak: the magic spring that keeps your vision young and agile. Most people don’t realize it, but inspiration is hard to come by spontaneously. In fact, it takes hard work to become inspired! But now that you’ve got it, let us talk about how to implement our inspirational (read “laboriously brainstormed and then crafted to perfection”) shooting ideas in an actual photo session.

Here is how you can develop such a habit: firstly, think about the frequency of shoots that you can actually keep up with. Don’t cut yourself any slack (“once a year is fine, duh!”), but be realistic (“I could do it every day!”) – if you can handle one portfolio shoot per week, go for it. If you can only keep up with monthly sessions, it is still OK. Whatever your perfect rhythm turns out to be, decide on it and stick to it. Now, the “sticking to your commitment” part usually proves to be the most difficult for virtually everyone. But if you want to succeed, you have to do it. To form a habit, you need to repeat an action consistently, over and over again, until it’s so completely ingrained into your brain that you won’t be able to feel right if you skip even once. But once you’ve mastered it, once it is a full-blown habit, it becomes invaluable. Most photographers would sell their soul for a steady flow of quality images into their portfolio – and for you it will come as naturally as breathing!

Your Regular Portfolio Shoot Here’s a revolutionary idea: in order to get good at photography, you need to take a lot of photos. When I say a lot, I mean A LOT! Groundbreaking, I know. It is so obvious, yet so many talented boys and girls prefer to slack out and spend days, weeks, or even months without even laying hands on a camera. That’s just sad, and it’s one of the worst things to do to your photographic ability. It’s a

In order to stay on track with conducting regular portfolio shoots, you need to act now. First and foremost, schedule the next 10 photo sessions on your calendar, according to the frequency that you’ve chosen. If you have something planned already, either reschedule your prior commitments 70

Michael Zelbel or try to cram it into a single day. Don’t be tempted to postpone your shoot just because something else has been arranged on that particular date.

other people who will be involved in the creative process. Just contact everyone whose help you will need to make the future photo sessions happen – right now. Make appointments with the models and makeup artists, talk to studio or bedroom owners, get it all sorted out as soon as possible. Once everybody else expects you to stick to the plan, it will no longer be only about you; which makes it all the more likely for you to follow through and deliver.

Next, take your top 10 photo ideas that you have developed by applying the techniques from the previous chapter. If you haven’t done it yet, I forgive you – but this only means that you need to go through with it now! Once you picked and refined those 10 ideas, assign each one to a photo shoot that you’ve scheduled. The order doesn’t matter: just fill every timeslot with a specific topic for a photo shoot, and do it without any delays.

A Helping Hand

It has been pointed out many times that time is the scarcest resource at anyone’s disposal. While this is true to some extent, if you think about it, we’ve all got the same amount of time. I mean, nobody on planet Earth has 48 hours a day – we all need to get by on measly 24. Time is definitely not as scarce as people make it out to be. In fact, if you are anything like me, the hardest resource to find is not time, not money, but willpower. We all have just a little amount of willpower available, and how we spend it makes all the difference in terms of the results we get, the happiness we feel and the life we lead. For your own benefit I would ask you to commit all of your willpower over the following months to carrying out the portfolio shoots that you have scheduled with yourself. This will set you on a path towards continuously improving your results and productivity. It will contribute to your happiness and make you more successful. It has certainly done all of this for me, except improving my poor coffee-brewing skills – but one can’t have everything, can he? Finally, I want you to invite external accountability that will help you to stay on track with your portfolio shoots. You can easily do that by aligning with 71

Well, that about wraps it up for this guide. If you, dear reader, made it to the final pages, chances are good you are very serious about becoming a better photographer. If you are hungry for improvement and spectacular photos, you will achieve all of it and more. I would very much like you to. If you feel like you could use some solid help to overcome the challenges you face in photography, or a gentle kick in the right direction once a week, you should consider nurturing external support. The simplest way to do so is by actively participating in the life of the photographic community. Regular meetings with fellow photographers who have climbed a bit further up the ladder towards mastery than you are will do you a lot of good. However, it may prove difficult to find such people and get into their social circle. Another alternative you might be interested in is a private coaching club that I started for those photographers who want to improve their skills and keep learning something new. It is a great platform for you to work on your current “sticking points” in photography – under my guidance, together with other club members.

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Of course, there’s a catch. The monthly membership fee for this club is very low, so it is not a matter of price, but rather of access. Because it is so affordable, the club is currently filled up and new openings are quite rare. As you are reading this, the club is probably closed for new members. However, since you have made it as far as this chapter, it means that you are very committed to becoming a better photographer – and I enjoy working with people like you. That makes you a worthy candidate for membership, someone I’d be very happy to meet. If you are willing to get to the next level and give photography coaching a try, check out the “back door” to the club. I don’t promise that it will be open wide by the time you read this, but your chances are good! Go to: www.ProPortfolioClub.com/secretgarden If the club currently accepts readers of this guide, it will be stated bold and clear on that page, and you are free to give it a try and join us. We accept people with every level of ability; if you don’t have skill, we will help you acquire it. What we can’t provide you with is dedication and commitment. To learn and improve, you need to be willing. Beyond that, you could be a total newbie. That being said, I really hope that in this guide I was able to give you at least some advice for becoming a better photographer and shooting better, truly unique and inspiring pictures. I can only hope that now you are closer to your dream than you had been before this book came along. You are now closer to success, to the kind of life you want to live. I am proud to have done something to help your progress, and I would love to get your feedback. So don’t hesitate to drop me a line to [email protected] and let me know whether or not my boudoir photography guide helped you. Until then I wish you … good light! –– Michael

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Author’s Bio Michael Zelbel is an amateur photographer operating a studio in Duesseldorf, Germany. He accepts bookings for fashion, beauty and nude photography. For his colleagues of every level of ability he is constantly posting photography tricks and findings on his blog at: http://SmokingStrobes.com. Michael’s personal mission with photography is to bring together the cultures of East and West. Living up to this challenge, he frequently combines models, fashion, photographic styles and other elements from Asia and from the western world into a seamless (as he hopes) intercultural blend. This photography guide was created in conformity with his personal philosophy and features a carefully selected array of skills and techniques adopted from oriental and occidental practices.

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Acknowledgements There are a number of people who helped me to create this guide. I’d like to thank every one of them. It would have been impossible to put all of this together if they weren’t around. Well-deserved words of thanks go to: My wife Emily, who patiently modeled for me in what was one endless photo shoot. It took several hours until I had all the images for this guide ready for post-production. Trust me, it was no small feat on her part! My retouching specialist Gina Hernandez deserves much praise for taking care of nearly a hundred pictures in order to make them ready for publication. She did an excellent job walking the hair-thin line between getting the images through post-production and leaving every little nuance of lighting intact. Thanks to her terrific work you, the reader will be able to clearly see how each type of lighting setup impacts the photos. My graphic designer Renzy Memije, who constructed the awesome lighting setup diagrams which show you in the blink of an eye how exactly each one is put together. It was his masterful hand that worked on the layout, taking it all the way to perfection. Honestly, this guy could make a shuttle launch look like a no-sweat task! My writer Oleg deserves a big thank you for having the patience to make sense of the verbal mumbling that I can sometimes produce with my limited English. He put everything into crystal clear and wellchosen words, so you could benefit from this guide a lot more than if you were reading anything that I’d come up with. Finally, the real star of the production is my producer Julia Li. She was never tired to care about all the logistics enabling everybody on the project to work hand in hand like clockwork in order to finally produce the photography guide you have in front of you. Here’s my big “thank you”, folks. Without you, this ride would have been a lot bumpier.

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Copyright 2011 by Michael Zelbel. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author.