Photography Portrait Tips
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While photography portrait tips address photography poses, there are other very important factors to keep in mind.The most important factor: Confidence!
If a friend or family member mentions that they need a portrait photograph taken, which of the following two thoughts first pops into your head...
- Do I know any professional photographers I could recommend?
- I could do that!
To move from #1 to #2 requires confidence, practice, and some guidance. We'll provide the guidance. Use it to take lots of practice shots. At some magical point in time, you will feel confident about doing it.
So, let's not wait... Here are some professional photography portrait tips to guide you on your way.
Why Didn't My Pictures Come Out
Like They Should Have?
We've all been there... Frustration! You take your digital camera to an important event, notice a terrific photo opportunity, and then:
- Focus the camera
- Have the subject(s) get into a "cute" pose
- Click the shutter, knowing you've just captured a great photograph
Then you get home, download your masterpieces, and disappointment sets in.
What happened!? This doesn't look like the scene that I photographed! Well, that is about to stop.
We've created 2 QuickTips® eBooks that provide step-by-step guidance for capturing the best pictures possible:
- A one-page "What to Do" Summary Sheet (to take with)
- A 22 page Reference Guide that provides details and sample pictures
Wouldn't it be nice to look forward to downloading your pictures, rather than holding your breath as you hope they come out like you want?
Photography Portrait Tips Y-O-U can Use
Frozen Portraits
Many people have the mistaken impression that "good" portraits should have a somewhat "frozen" look to them.Maybe those are appropriate for business annual reports and graduation pictures, but definitely do not apply to ALL portraits!
Some photography portrait tips go beyond photography. This is one that encourages you to play director as well as photographer when you're photographing people.
The best portraits are ones that capture the essence of the person. Sometimes as the photographer, you'll need to interact with the person and help them feel comfortable or invisible or maybe even feeling silly.
Then, coach the subject into various poses that reflect their essence. Believe it or not, you will be able to tell when this happens much more easily than most subjects will.
Oh, and did I mention that #34 in the Photography Portrait Tips Handbook, there is no rule that portraits have to be of one person only?! Stretch the creative envelop.
Props
Photography portrait tips sometimes involve adding items to the picture. You will rarely have your subject and a neutral background, as the only things in the portrait.Since most portrait shots are done in natural environments, it's important to learn how to co-exist with yours. Realize that some people are just "camera-shy."
So, unless you believe your subject is in the witness protection program, work with them by having them relax before the shot. You can sometimes accomplish this by adding other elements to the image, therefore taking their mind off being photographed.
As far as photography portrait tips in this department, the perfect prop is one which says something about the subject as well as puts them at ease about the entire photographic experience.
The Portrait's Background
When does a portrait capture more than your subject? Answer: most of the time!
As mentioned earlier, photography portrait tips deal with much more than the subject of your portraits.
Unless you intend to do an ultra close-up picture, where the subject's face fills the entire frame, part of the background will be in the frame.
Backgrounds will either add to or detract from your portrait. But don't worry, there are ways to handle both situations.
Your goal is to have the background as complimentary to your subject as possible (or, at least not take the focus away from them).
Position the subjects in such a way that the overall composition of subject(s) and background fills the frame in the most pleasing manner.
On the other hand, if the background detracts from your subject, you want to minimize it as much as possible.
This image is a great example of several points:
- The original photograph did not cut the top of the man's head off. This image demonstrates some creative liberties that cropping provides.
The overall composition of father and daughter is good, although an additional picture of one of both people looking at the other would produce a totally different emotional feeling. - Although the background is fairly bland, and not distracting, it would have been better if the molding for the side of the stairs was not visible.
- Here is a photography portrait tip that is valuable, but may not be able to be applied. In this photo, the background could have been thrown very out of focus by using a very large aperture, such as F/1.2 or F/2.
However, this picture was taken with a point and shoot, which does not use a wide aperture. Therefore, when using this type of camera, based on how large your aperture goes, you need to be more careful about how you deal with the background.
In summary, to throw the background out of focus, use as large an aperture (smallest possible F-stop) that you can. Switch to "aperture priority mode" (or whatever your camera calls it) and set the aperture to the smallest F-stop number possible.
As a bonus, this is one of those photography portrait tips that is a "universal" tip for any type of photography you do. The more in-focus you want your background, the larger the F-stop number you should use. The more out-of-focus, the smaller the F-stop number.
When Your Subject IS NOT a Hollywood Super-Star
There are so many categories of "photographic light, or lighting" that if I explained all of them, you would walk away shaking your head.
So, since my goal is to provide photography portrait tips without confusing you, I will keep it simple.
Models and superstars can get away with portraits made in very strong or direct light. However, the rest of us mere mortals can benefit from softer light.
What is soft light, you ask? If you take a portrait outside during the day, do it in the shade or when the clouds block out the sun. This will produce a nice soft look which will not draw attention to any "imperfections."
Visit us often, because we are continually adding photography portrait tips!
