Make Your Portraits Pop

When taking portraits of family or friends you can make them memorable with a couple of techniques I like to employ. Here's an example from my French Quarter Workshop for American Photo Safari yesterday morning.

This is Melissa Holman, daughter of Ron Holman. Both were with me for 4 hours of photo fun from 9am-1pm yesterday. I took this shot mainly to show how getting close to Melissa helped achieve a shallow DOF starting close to the camera so the background was out of focus. exposure data: 1/1000 @ f/9, -1/3 EC, ISO 200, Aperture Priority, spot metering and focusing. The Canon EOS 5D Mk2 had my favorite Canon 24-105mm f/4L IS USM lens at 45mm. I was 2 ft from Melissa's face. That may be a little close for the comfort of your subject in some cases.

The close up aspect is one of the techniques I recommend. Don't be worried about losing the top of that hair. It's the face that speaks to us. I also like to put my subject off center. I think that creates a suggestion of context or activity while still keeping the face the center of attention. The lighting is something you can achieve with positioning. In a studio you'd try to get a 1 to 2 or 1 to 3 ratio to create some defining shadows. In the open you can often just position your subject to achieve that look with the ambient light. On a sunny day like yesterday a shaded area would have provided more diffuse and potentially flattering light but for Melissa this spot worked.

Melissa is a pretty and cheerful young girl who isn't worried about being in a photograph. The photograph above gives you a feeling that she's enjoying herself and comfortable. You may find people over 40 less comfortable with close ups, especially women. Never the less you'll be happier with those portraits that give a closer look at the person even if your female subject tells you to get rid of that picture immediately. For that type of subject remember the soft light of shaded areas and a little refinement in the development stage.

I've written in other posts about the difficulty of photographing females who simply don't want their appearance recorded as if we don't already know what they look like. Those subjects often like the results of your handy work in helping recall a slightly younger look in the finished image. The best subjects for this kind of photograph are comfortable with or perhaps resigned to their appearance. To them it is what it is, baby.