Model Shoot in Old Town Edinburgh

I was contacted by Gift Panisara, a Strathclyde University Master student from Thailand to do a test shoot. She loves Old Town Edinburgh, so we met somewhere on the Royal Mile. It was early afternoon, something I usually try to avoid, for a number of reasons. First, the light comes from the top, giving people “racoon eyes”, and second, the city centre is quite busy with people at this time of day.

I looked for some side street (or close) giving us a bit more privacy, and tried some natural light pics with very shallow depth of field.

Thai model Gift Panisara in Old Town Edinburgh — I asked the model to look up a bit to get light in her eyes and avoid the “racoon” look.

I didn’t really like the colours, a bit on the bland side for my taste, so we moved on to another location off the Royal Mile.

I was first attracted by the red wall, giving great colour contrast with Gift’s blue dress. I lit her with a single speedlight placed high camera right.

Thai model Gift Panisara against a red wall — I let the natural fall off of the light from the flash draw attention to the model’s face.

For the last set up, I used some stairs nearby to get plenty of lines in my composition. One speedlight on top of the stairs and another camera left and we were done.