BP4U Photo Tips Portrait Session Tips

What kind of lighting do I need for indoor sessions?

Note: QOTDs (Questions Of The Day) are from our Facebook page. If you would like to submit a question, please click here to submit your question. We will then post them on our Facebook page and let our fans respond to the question. We will then transfer the question over to our blog so we can keep them in an organized way for others to see.

QOTD from Kristin: " I have a question, I'm wanting to buy a large soft box that is square or rectangle shaped, I found one at a good price but I'm confused with what kind of light I need to buy. Is it a strobe, continuous light? Or flash? Sorry! I am wanting to use it just for newborns and babies indoors. Thanks so much!!"

Brian: You can use all of the above. It depends on what kind of lights you do have and what you will use to trigger it... (and also how you will mount the light to the softbox (via speed ring, cold shoe mount, etc)

For continuous light, key points: what you see is what you get (meaning you can use your camera to meter your exposure), it is less powerful than a strobing light, if you ever want to do video you must have continuous light, you will find it more difficult to do stop motion

For strobing light: you will need a light meter (unless you fancy trial and error, it's more powerful so you can do stop motion, can't do video, and you will need to figure out how to trigger that light.

Watch this episode from Marc Wallace of Adorama.. He covers all that I said in way more detail and probably better than me

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4QaCI_SUc5c

Carrie: for newborns and babies you want continuous light, it wont startle them, Im not very familiar with lighting but i have been looking at purchasing a spyderlite.

Melanie: I've only worked with continuos light once. It seemed to really help the baby also stay warm since the lights were closer. Also, I'm curious...are there different strength of bulbs for continuous lighting?

Kristin: Thanks for the info , this was my question. Do you guys have a specific continuous light brand you recommend?

Feel free to keep responding to this question using our comment section below.