How to shoot a location portrait with 1 light

  Location portrait  with one lamp will require you to think of your image in ways of layers.  The same way you edit an image in Photoshop by adding layers you will have to light your subject as a separate layer than the background. You must understand that using 1 light will do all the lighting,  but in some exeptions. Using a tripod is a must in this kind of image.

In the example image #1 you see the regular result of a subject lit with an umbrella mounted on a Cameron battery operated 160w/s studio strobe, you can also appreciate the great advantage of studio strobe over camera mounted flash. To set the aperture using a studiostrobe you will have to set the aperture according to the power of the flash. But the background using the synchronising speed is to dark and un-informative. Now if you turn your layers eyes on you consider this image as 2 diferent subjects one being the subject and one being the background, then all possibilities open, like slowing the sync speed to ½ of a second to let light from the background time to register in the image as on image #2. You will be able to lower that speed as low as you want as long as the ambient light, especialy your modeling ligt doesn’t  start changing the color balance of your subject layer’s.

Used here is a Cameron AC/DC studio strobe , an unbrella and a Cameron tripod.