Lighting Basics: How to Light Portraits with a Beauty Dish

So far, we've covered how to light portraits with an umbrella, an octabank and a softbox--today we're focusing on the beauty dish. Beauty dishes were used mostly by fashion and portrait photographers for a while and for the most part they still are. They're designed to give a very specific soft look that is directional and uses light in an inefficient way. The look has been characterized as being like a softbox and an umbrella at the same time. That's part of the beauty of a beauty dish--pun tot...