Inspired by fellow blogger but well out of my league, when it comes to taking pictures, photographer Nicolai Brix, I tried my hands at some ambient light portrait photography by the pool.

Coinciding with my maternity leave from work, I got the opportunity to join my parents at a luxury summer residence, with a fireplace, 5 bedrooms, courtyard, and of course, the “must have” pool.

After spending what seemed like an eternity in the before mentioned pool with my daughter and oldest son, he agreed to model for me after I promised to also shoot some shots of the pool itself for posterity.

The setup was as simple as it gets; light from a big ass window, shallow depth of field (to retain focus on the subject) courtesy of the 1.8 aperture from the Canon 50 mm f:1.8 lens, and Bobs your uncle (weirdest expression ever!)

Colour Alexander

EXIF: ISO 100 - f/1.8 - 1/125

After getting it into Lightroom, I fiddled around with the Black & White settings, cropping and finally some post crop vignetting, ending up with the photograph below.

BW Alexander

EXIF: ISO 100 - f/1.8 - 1/125 plus some Lightroom editing

I could have used my reflector for some fill light, camera left, but decided not to due to the fact that I would have to have had him sit and wait while I fetched it from the back of my car… and he’s not that patient a model yet ;-) .

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