I'm Michael Zelbel

Today I've got a simple lighting setup for you

which enables you to turn any bedroom into

your own photo studio for boudoir photography.

Why that?

Well, because currently it's winter holliday season.

Outside it's blistering cold and

I'm really glad that our location for today

is a warm and cozy bedroom.

Ain't that good?

My initial idea for todays video was quite different.

I actually wanted to make a "making of" video of a photo shoot.

A "making of" of the shoot that

you see right now on your screen.

That is a photo shoot that I made for an ebook.

I published that eBook a couple of days ago.

But, you know, having such a "making of" video is nice,

I can put it onto my blog or

upload it to my social networks, but then again,

what is the use for you?

You know, what is the use for the viewer

if you see a "making of" video?

No benefit!

That is, why I now completely changed my mind

and I thought: "No, let's take one lighting setup

out of this ebook and explain that lighting setup".

Because then you have got something

which you can use in your photography,

which you can replicate and which you can try out

right today in your own bedroom or tomorrow,

in a hotel bedroom. It's quite easy.

So let's jump into that lighting setup

and I am going to explain it.

So, the fundamental thing is a bed.

Over here we have got a king-sized bed, 2x2meters.

And shooting such a bed is nice,

but can be quite boring at times,

that's why we should add a model.

We can pose the model in any way, shape or form on the bed,

but the main point is, we need some light

in order to see the model on the photograph.

That's why we add a speedlight over here at the side.

I used a strong speedlight, guide number 58,

but I dialed the power way down to 1/32nd of it's power

because the bedroom was quite small

and got white walls so I don't need so much light actually

I did let it go through a big shoot-through umbrella

so that the light is nice and smooth and soft

and I positioned the umbrella just above the bed,

so that the light is coming from a quite low angle

making all the folds in the bedsheet quite 3-dimensional.

The camera is positioned exactly oposite

at the other corner of the bed.

The settings are, well, most of them quite standard

1/200s, f2.8 for shallow depth of field, ISO100

but I dialed up the white balance to 10000 Kelvin

Why? Because the speedlight is delivering

very blue-ish, daylight-quality light of roughly 5800 Kelvin,

but I wanted to turn the thing

into a very warm and cozy scene, quite yellow-ish scene,

that is why I dialed up the white balance in camera,

so that the stuff comes out of camera quite yellow-ish

just like it would be Tungsten light, or even warmer.

This is one little trick, but wait there's more...

We have got another trick and that's a good one:

we add a second speedlight for much more punch.

A second speedlight is over there.

It's not quite as strong: guide number 43.

It's also dialed down to 1/32nd of it's power.

It's going through a lamp shade, a lamp shade of a bedside lamp.

Actually, the speedlight is inside the lamp,

so when you see the lamp in the photograph,

(the camera is shooting right towards the lamp)

when you see it, it looks like the lamp is glowing

but what you actually see is the speedlight

going off inside the lamp.

That gives the photos quite a bit of punch

and it's very easy to do. Just take a lamp shade,

put a speedlight inside and there you go,

there you got your punch. That's all it takes.

So, it's not so much gear, two speedlights,

a lightstand, one umbrella. I think that is somthing

that you can easily take with you, for instance

into a hotel room when you travel.

But you can also try it out at home.

Because it's working in very small bedrooms

you can have the tiniest and an ugly bed

but with that sort of lighting, you know, it will pop.

You can iluminate just a piece of the room

and it will be just fine. So go try it out!

Tell me how it worked for you.

Drop a comment under the video

and come back next Thursday.

Until then I wish you good light!