Basic Lighting Setups-Paramount(Butterfly)

There are some popular and basic setups used for portrait photography.

The paramount lighting is a very popular lighting setup for shooting female models, also called sometimes Butterfly Lighting as the shape of the shadow it creates under the nose.This lighting setup is common glamour lighting style. It works best suites models with strong cheek bones and good skin.You usually don’t useĀ  The paramount (Butterfly) lighting setup for shooting male subjects.

Main tips for this setup:

  1. Place the main light high (above the camera/lens axis) and the fill light directly under it (under the camera/lens axis).
  2. Keep the light close to the subject.
  3. This setup is called the butterfly because it shapes a butterfly shadow under the models nose.
  4. Be careful not to place their eyes in shadow.
  5. Fill light is placed roughly at head height.
  6. The fill light can be accompanied or even replaced by a reflector under the face of your model,to lighten the shadows under the chin and lower cheek.

Examples will be available soon.

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