This is one of my favorite photos that I have taken.  It was taken as an entry in my local photo club’s salon (photo contest) with the topic of “portraits”.  A couple of weeks before the salon, there was a lighting and portrait workshop put on by a prominent local photographer with MANY years of experience.  I was really started to get interested in studio light and I asked him during the workshop how much I can expect to spend on some basic studio strobes and light modifiers.  His reply was, “All of it!”.  I thought this was a bit of an elitist answer.  So I went home, grabbed a black sheet, a 100 watt light bulb, my son and made him sit for about 30 minutes while I adjusted and readjusted my light bulb and camera settings.  For a 6 year old, he did great and I was able to capture this shot.

I brought the print to the salon and low and behold, this same guy was the judge for the salon.  I figured he would see right through my cheap setup and I wouldn’t even place.  I am glad to say, that this portrait got 2nd place out of a couple of dozen entries.  I credit that mostly to the modeling from my son, but it just proves that you don’t need thousands of dollars of equipment to make a great photo.