A Wisp of Smoke

When I attended one of my first model meetup groups, I had no idea of what I was doing.

Luckily, the meetup organizer was well-experienced in studio lighting and direction, and I learned a lot from him. (I still learn something new every time we meet.)

In that meetup, we worked with both high-key and low lighting with the model, and it was there that I learned that I like low-lighting environments the most. Every little ounce of light must be taken into account before you press the shutter release.

In one of the setups for that shoot, I envisioned a trace of light just along one side of the model, such that only part of her figure could be discerned. The photo turned out well and I thought that her body looked like a wisp of smoke. Smoke with a nipple, that is.

I shared that image years ago (note: NSFW).

Fast-forward to last Sunday, when I joined a workshop on projection photography. We were in a studio that was made dark and the only light source was a digital slide projector that shone on a white backdrop. We had a model, Kim, who would pose within the path of the projection.

We could photograph her three ways: we could stand either behind or right beside the projector and capture Kim with the projection illuminated against the white backdrop. Depending on the image that was being projected, it could be a bright photo where Kim blended into the overall image.

I liked this angle the least, as it was hard to determine what the subject was. I only took a few photos from this position and there are very few that I bothered to process.

Another way to capture Kim would be to stand away from the projector but still facing the backdrop. If our model moved closer to the projector, we could shoot past her and get her silhouette against the backdrop. Depending on the projected image, we got some great captures.

My favourite angle was to be perpendicular to the projector, where the studio had a black curtain along the wall. The light from the projector would fall on Kim but the backdrop was not in the frame. Any light that touched our model could be captured: where she was in shadow or not illuminated, Kim would disappear.

Most of my shots from that workshop were taken from this position.

The trickiest shot was when we used an image that was an actual wisp of smoke that was illuminated against a black backdrop. When Kim stepped into the path of the light, only the smoke that touched her skin could be captured. But because the smoke was so thin, it was hard to see a person in the projection.

Kim is not a tall person. She's perfectly petite. So I had to get her to stand on her tiptoes and move until her face—mainly, her eyes—could reach a point where the smoke seemed to bunch on itself. The result is that you can only tell that there's a person in that wisp of smoke from the few parts of her face that captured the light. One hand also was illuminated as she brought it to her head.

Here's the result:

What do you think?

If you saw this week's Wordless Wednesday, you saw some other effects that I captured at the workshop. Even today, I'm still going through the hundreds of frames that I shot.

I love this format and hope to try it again in the future.

Happy Friday!