Headshot photography seems a simple enough genre to quickly master at first glance, but there’s more to it than meets the untrained eye. Despite only having to photograph the subject’s head, at least for the most part, there are still plenty of factors to consider when capturing headshots, including lighting, posing, and more. Fortunately, with a bit of guidance, mastering the perfect headshot setup can be as easy as 1-2-3, which also happens to be how we’re going to break it down.
Let’s dive in.
Video: Master the Perfect Headshot Setup
Gear Checklist
Here’s a quick overview of the gear used in this video/article:
Like always, use whatever gear you have available to you.
Setup #1: Paramount or Butterfly Lighting
Let’s start with the basics, namely the Paramount or Butterfly setup. This setup is great in its own right, which you’ll see below, but it’s also the first step towards building our favorite lighting setup for headshot photography, which is known as clamshell lighting.
For those who’ve never heard of Paramount or Butterfly Lighting, it is one of five key lighting patterns that you should know as a portrait photographer. This top-down portrait lighting pattern places the key light above and directly centered with and angled down towards the subject’s face.
Positioning
In addition to the angle, the distance between your subject and the light source can make a noticeable difference in the way that that light falls onto the face. In the three side-by-side shots above, the subject moved 6 inches closer to the light source with each shot. The first position does an okay job filling in lines and creating catchlights, but it’s still a little too far from the light source and we’re losing some of the softness of the light. The second position gives us beautiful catchlights in the eyes and fills the shadows in nicely. Finally, the last position is a bit too close, and we get harsher shadows and lose our catchlights. It’s worth taking your time and positioning your subject to stand at the right distance to get the best results.
Light Modifier Considerations: Softbox
We’re using the MagBox Pro 24 Octa to capture these headshots. MagMod also makes a larger size softbox, which provides a softer quality of light, but we opted for the 24” softbox for this round to show the impact of moving your subject closer to and farther away from the light source.
Focal Length Considerations
Generally, when photographing headshots, it’s recommended to shoot at a focal length of 70mm and up. 85mm is ideal for capturing flattering headshots. Wider focal lengths tend to distort the subject’s facial features more.
Light Modifier Considerations: Reflector
Next, with our subject in the sweet spot, we can finish out our clamshell and add another modification. We could add another light for more control, but it’s efficient and effective to add a reflector.
You can use whatever you have handy, including a v-flat or the white side of a basic 5-in-1 reflector. Position the reflector under the subject (see above) with the white side up to reflect light back onto the subject.
Here’s a look at the difference between using the reflector for fill light versus not using it. You can see how the reflector works to fill in more of the shadows and add a bit of light to the eyes. Adjust the reflector to be higher or lower (brighter or dimmer, respectively) as needed.
Setup #2: Positive and Negative Fill Light
Now, let’s move to level two. We’re going to stick with the clamshell setup, but this time we’re going to introduce positive and negative light fill using V-flats.
Positive Fill Light
We’ll start with the white side to add positive fill light. More specifically, we’ll use the white sides of the V-flats on each side to push light from all sides, which creates almost the same effect as if you were using multiple lights, simpler to a square lighting setup.
What you see is beautiful, soft fill from all sides, with very minimal shadows.
Negative Fill Light
Now, let’s do the opposite with negative fill. Reverse the sides of the V-flats and use the black sides facing the subject to prevent light from reflecting and bouncing around, essentially creating a more chiseled look on the subject’s face.
When we compare the shots, from the image without V-flats and without the clamshell, you’ll notice that we have a little bit more light pulled out of the face and darker shadows along the cheekbones. You can use this technique to create a slimming effect, or a more dramatic look to the image.
If we add the clamshell back into the setup (using the white side of the reflector like before), you get the results above. Add this to your list of go-to setups.
Setup #3: Multi-Light Setup
For the third round, we’re going to add a couple more lights. Any small flash will work because we’re just going to use them to add a splash of light. In this instance, we’re using a couple Profoto A1 flashes with MagMod MagGrips added for extra control and to minimize light spill. Using the MagMod system also makes it easy to add color gels and introduce colors in the rim light, which we’ll get to shortly.
We’ve placed one light on each side of the frame, behind our subject, raised up and angled slightly down, directly towards our subject (see the image above). As we mentioned previously, we don’t need a lot of power from these lights, but we do need to position them correctly to give us the edge or rim light we’re after.
So, combining the black v-flats, the clamshell setup with the main light and reflector, as well as the kicker lights in the background, this is what we get.
Keep in mind, you can adjust the flash power to make the look more or less subtle with the backlights. Be careful not to come in too hot, or else it can look like your subject’s hair is almost catching on fire. Adjust the flash power as needed.
With Color Gels
Finally, with everything else set up, we can add color gels to the kicker lights. In this example, we’ve added two CTO gels to create a little more warmth in the hair light.
What a difference it makes just adding a little bit of color with the gel versus capturing the shot with standard light.
Final Images
Here’s a look at our final images.
Conclusion for Mastering the Perfect Headshot Setup
We hope you found these tips for mastering the perfect headshot setup helpful. From the basic paramount or butterfly light setup on through to the clamshell, including versions with positive or negative fill, it doesn’t require too much gear to get great results. Paying attention to positioning and posing, as well as using the right modifiers for the job can get the job done every time. Of course, if you have the resources, adding a couple of lights to serve as kickers in the background for hair and shoulder edge lights can take your headshot game to the next level.
