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Studies have shown that photographs of people, and faces in general, are among some of the most interesting and memorable photos to look at. Portraits help us to record a moment in someone’s life, and great portraits are often cherished and passed down from generation to generation. If you find your portraits are falling a bit flat or are just missing that ever-important-oomph, don’t despair. There are a multitude of ways to improve your portrait photography ranging from the technical aspects to simply amping up the creativity. Let’s take a moment to explore a few of those options, below.
1. Choosing The Right Lens
Lens choice makes a big different, especially in portrait photography where you want to accurately portray your subjects. You don’t necessarily need a fast, expensive lens to take great portraits, but you should be paying close attention to the focal length. As you know, different focal lengths will distort an image in different ways. Wide lenses, a 35mm for example, will stretch out your subject’s face, making it appear unnaturally long and narrow, while making the nose look larger and more prominent–not a very flattering look.
A 50mm lens, a commonly recommend minimum focal length, will slim the face, without causing too much distortion. (Red Rock Flowers by Ian Norman)
On the other end of the spectrum, however, using a long focal length, such as 300mm, will make a face appear more broad and thicker than it actually is. Most professionally-shot portraits are shot with a focal length ranging from 50mm to 200mm, and most consider an 85mm to 105mm to give the most accurate representations of a person’s face. There is no hard and fast rule on focal length, rather, choose a lens that will help achieve the look you are trying to achieve. If your subject wants their face to appear a little more slim, select a focal length that is a little wide, such as the 50mm. This will slim down the face slightly without causing too much obvious distortion. If you want to give your subject a wider, more masculine look, shoot a longer focal length, but typically not longer than 200mm.
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2. Ensure The Subject Is The Main Focus
When taking a portrait, the subject should be the center of attention. We often see portraits where the subject is the only thing in focus, while the rest of the background is blurry. This is commonly referred to as bokeh, and is a very effective way to ensure the viewer’s eye is immediately drawn to the subject. Beautiful portraits can be made using this technique, but it is not the only way to draw a persons eye to what you want it to see. You can also consider “filling the frame” with the subject utilizing the close-up, such as in the photo below.
Take the clutter out of your portraits by getting in close. (Photo by Anniina Mäkelä)
Another way to accomplish this is by framing your subject using elements found in the surrounding area. It can be done quite literally, like this…
(Photo by Won Jin Vark)
Or, done more figuratively…
(Photo by Mike Rolls)
3. Creative Lighting
There is a lot to be said for a well executed studio portrait. It can take years of practice to perfect all the different styles such as Rembrandt, butterfly, loop, etc…That being said, you can really take a portrait to the next level by doing the unexpected. Think of all the creative ways that you can light your subject using a tool such as the Lightblaster, or a GOBO, that will create an interesting pattern of light. This can be the broken light coming through partially opened window or shining light through a piece of cardboard with shapes cut out of it.
(Photo by Ian Carroll)
Taking creativity one step further, you can create scenes in which you strategically place a light source as a means to help illustrate a story. The photo (above) by Ian Carroll, does a great job of this.
