Photographing people with dark skin

[Lacey Lewis]

I didn't see a thread on this already, so I thought I'd post. Later this week I am going to photograph a model who has very dark African-American skin. I've heard here and there that there are certain ways that are better to light and photograph people with dark skin, anyone care to share some knowledge?

I will be using simple clamp lights from the hardware store with white-light bulbs, and I have foamboard to fill the shadows, and I have been thinking of getting some of that semi-transparent plastic sign board to diffuse the light some. I may also get to photograph her outside at some point, so all advice will be useful to me.

Also, I have a digital camera, but not much to manually adjust. Just the auto, sport, landscape type settings.