PORTRAITS

9 WAYS TO TAKE BETTER PORTRAITS

"Humanity must always be the principle subject of art." Robert Stone

1. Alter Your Perspective: Most portraits are taken with the camera at (or around) the eye level of the subject. While this is good common sense – completely changing the angle that you shoot from can give your portrait a real WOW factor.

D. Jackson
  • Get up high and shoot down on your subject
  • Get as close to the ground as you can and shoot up or
  • Angle the shoulders. Either way you’ll be seeing your subject from an angle that is bound to create interest.

2. Play with Eye Contact: Most portraits have the subject looking down the lens – something that can create a real sense of connection between a subject and those viewing the image. But there are a couple of other things to try:

A. Looking off camera – have your subject focus their attention on something outside the field of view of your camera. This can create a feeling of candidness and also create a little intrigue and interest as the viewer of the shot wonders what they are looking at.

B. Look within the frame – alternatively you could have your subject looking at something (or someone) within the frame. A child looking at a ball, a woman looking at her new baby, a man looking hungrily at a big plate of pasta…. When you give your subject something to look at that is inside the frame you create a second point of interest and a relationship between it and your primary subject. It also helps create ‘story’ within the image.

3. Break the Rules of Composition: There are a lot of ‘rules’ out there that are useful to know so you can purposely break them – as this can lead to eye catching results.

  • The Rule of Thirds is one that can be effective to break – placing your subject either dead center can sometimes create a powerful image – or even creative placement with your subject right on the edge of a shot can sometimes create interesting images.
  • Another ‘rule’ that we often talk about in portrait photography is to give your subject room to look into. This can work really well – but again, sometimes rules are made to be broken.

4. Experiment with Lighting: Another element of randomness that you can introduce to your portraits is the way that you light them. There are almost unlimited possibilities when it comes to using light in portraits. Side-lighting can create mood, backlighting creates a silhouette. It allows your subject to hide their features which can be powerful.

A. SPLIT LIGHTING: It splits the face exactly into equal halves with one side being light and the other in shadow. Often used to create dramatic images for musicians or artists and tends to be more masculine.

B. BUTTERFLY LIGHTING: Named for the butterfly shaped shadow created under the nose by placing the main light source above and behind the camera. The photographer is shooting underneath the light source in order to create this pattern. It is used for glamour style shots to create shadows under the cheeks and chin. Flattering for older subject as it places less emphasis on wrinkles than the side lighting would.

C. LOOP LIGHTING: This type of lighting is is the most common and can be made by creating a small shadow of the subject noses on the cheek. To create lool lighting, the light source must be slightly higher than eye level and about 30 - 45 degrees from the camera. Remember, the shadow of the nose and that of the cheek do not touch. Keep the shadow small and pointing downward. D. REMBRANDT LIGHTING: Rembrandt the painting often used this pattern of light identified by the triangle of light on the cheek. The shadows meet and creates a trapped triangle of light in the middle. To create this, make sure the eye on the shadow side of the face has light in it and has a nice sparkle. It's dramatic, and creates a dramatic mood. 5. Shoot Candidly: Some people don’t look good in a posed environment and so switching to a candid type approach can work.Photograph your subject at work, with family or doing something that they love. This will put them more at ease and you can end up getting some special shots with them reacting naturally to the situation that they are in.

6. Introduce a Prop: Add a prop of some kind into your shots and you create another point of interest that can enhance your shot.

7. Get Close Up and take part of the face: (manipulate the Aperture) Get right in close so that you can just photograph a part of your subject. Sometimes it’s what is left out of an image that says more than what is included.

8. Take a Series of Shots: Switch your camera into ‘burst’ or ‘continuous shooting’ mode and fire off more than one shot at a time, doing this you create a series of images that could be presented together instead of just one static image.

9. Consider Silhouettes: It’s a wonderful way to convey drama, mystery, emotion and mood to the viewers of your photos. The basic way in taking silhouette shots is to place your subject in front of some source of light and to force your camera to set its exposure based upon the brightest part of your picture (the background) and not the subject of your image

By D. Nyie

References: http://digital-photography-school.com/6-portrait-lighting-patterns-every-photographer-should-know/