Adding Drama to your Photographs

Want an easy way to add a little drama to your photographs? I shot this image of Kelly and besides the teen drama she really pops on this image against the blue background.

The only thing besides a flash unit for your camera are some CTO (Color Temp Orange) gels. For this shot I used Rosco Cinegel Roscosun CTO Full and Rosco Cinegel Roscosun CTO 1/2 combined together. The shot was done outside on a cloudy day for the background texture with a wide angle lens.

First start by setting your White Balance in your camera to Custom and set the color temperature to Tungsten or 3,200 K. Then shooting in Aperture priority mode adjust the EV +/- value to under expose by 1 and 1/3 of a stop or – 1.3. Add the filters to your flash. I just added them one on top of each other and taped them over the flash head or use a holder if you happen to have one and shoot away! The flash itself was in manual mode set to full power.

Don’t forget to set your White Balance back to Auto or normal when done.