Here is a basic setup to achieve a commercial studio headshot. If you’ve never played with lights, it can be intimidating but once you just do it, you will find you have much more control and it’s not as scary as you imagine. This is a very basic setup with two lights. 1 Key light, 1 hair light and a white board for reflection.

The Gear

  • 1 Photogenic Powerlight 1250 w/beauty dish
  • 1 Elinchrom D-lite 4 with a grid
  • 1 old piece of a broken whiteboard

The Setup

As you can see we have the beauty dish right in front on one side. Underneath her face, we have the white cardboard. In the back, notice we have a small hair light with a grid. This adds a nice touch to separate her from the background and I love how it adds a slight touch to her hair.

Here’s a picture of the setup.

headshot setup

Here’s me standing in for the model as we get the settings tweaked.

headshot setup

Camera settings used for this setup

Here are the settings I used and keep in mind these settings can be easily tweaked to match your camera body and needs.

NIKON D800
ISO 100
Focal Length 85mm (85mm in 35mm)
Aperture f/4
Exposure Time 0.005s (1/200)

Here’s the final image

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