Another self portrait

Last year about this time I posted a self portrait.  It has a much better story to go with it, so if you haven't seen it check it out.

It wasn't my intention to make another one.  However, I did.

A friend of mine wants me to make some passport style photos.  I've never done this, so I wandered off on the web to find the guidelines for making them.  That looks easy, I thought, just make flat boring light.  The problem is, I don't have a full size studio. Getting two umbrella'd lights setup in my house is a bit difficult.  No worries, I could just stick a big lightsource in front of the person.  But I needed to test it out.  Carly didn't want to, so I was stuck with me. 

After verifying that I could, indeed, make flat boring light, I decided to add two kickers to me large light source.  I figured a did all that setup work, I should try to make something real.  I dialed the big light down to use as fill, and used the kickers as my key.  I was still stuck with only me and since I really don't feel like looking at myself I covered up as much as possible and let the camera make the picture.

Again, framing was an adventure, but this seems almost like something I'd compose through the viewfinder, although my normal subjects are good looking.  Post work was a series of high pass filters, a de-saturation, and a curve to increase contrast.