Help with lighting/settings for achieving a specific spooky look for nighttime pet photography?
Hello folks!
I'm a hobby pet photographer that primarily works with a Canon EOS 70D with my fav prime lenses, Canon EF 35MM f/1.4 & Canon EF 85MM f/1.8. I dapple in film as well but will be doing this shoot digitally. I do 100% of my photography with natural light currently, doing outdoor and indoor lifestyle-type shots. I'm a total novice when it comes to flash/lighting setups and was hoping to get some advice on how to achieve a specific look.
I live near a historic "haunted" compound that is used for filming a lot of horror movies & tv shows. You're allowed on campus during visiting hours (not allowed inside unfortunately). With spooky season approaching, I'm feeling inspired to do a shoot on the grounds to try and replicate one of my favourite (oddly-specific?) looks: "dark encounter with something-not-quite-right animal with eyes glowing back at you", often backlit by dusk, silhouetting the animal, but also front lit/headlights kind of look. Think the leopard with the zebra from 2001: A Space Odyssey and Dappermouth's art (will attach examples of both). I have two unconventional looking pets and would like to take advantage of their charming weirdness (sphynx cat and sighthound).
Here are the two looks I'd like to achieve:
- When the sun is almost done setting and we have some good dusk dark-blue lighting in the sky, I'd like to get some backlit shots nearly silhouetting my pets & BG structures while having light reflect back out of their eyes.
- After the sun sets, would like to shift the lighting around so it's in front of the subjects, deer in the headlights-type lighting, with the spooky structures/trees etc in the BG. (Could I literally achieve this by lighting them with my car's headlights?)
Apologies for being so specific, but hopefully that helps! I can get access to equipment via a local awesome rental place I love, so if it requires some lighting tools that I clearly do not have, I can rent them for this shoot and it'll be a good learning experience for me too.
Any advice would be appreciated, and thanks in advance for your patience/kindness!