Quick Tip: Simple Portrait Photography Tricks

Quick Tip: Simple Portrait Photography Tricks

on Jan 12th 2013 with 18 comments
This entry is part 9 of 14 in the Portraits Session
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Portrait photography is one of the most interesting types of photography. What makes it even more rewarding is the fact that you are making someone else beautiful through your camera. Interestingly, there are several things that one should keep in mind in order to get that “Wow” effect in the final portraits. Let’s take a look at a few Quick Tips!

Republished Tutorial

Every few weeks, we revisit some of our reader's favorite posts from throughout the history of the site. This tutorial was first published in July of 2010.

Choose the Right Subject

Simple Portrait Photography Tips and Tricks

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Your subject is the heart and soul of a portrait composition – the right face will determine the success of your shoot. That’s why you should spend much of your time and effort finding the most suitable subject for your assignment.

Define a Character

Simple Portrait Photography Tips and Tricks

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Choosing a subject alone is not enough. In portrait photography, every subject has their own individual character. A female portrait with gentle and soft skin defines a character which is very different from a wrinkled, older gentleman. Both are great subjects for portrait photography, but you have to select the best according to the composition you are have in mind.

Try Different Angles and Poses

Simple Portrait Photography Tips and Tricks

Photo credits

To add flavour, spice and freshness to your portrait photography, never fear to experiment with position. After you have finalized the model, experiment with different poses, angles and postures of the face and body. This will ensure that you not only end up with great portrait shots, but also very interesting ones. A natural pose is great, but you can also have fun directing unusual an unusual pose or stance.

Lights are Everything

The fate of your final photograph is largely determined by the lighting conditions. For example, if you have a very bright background, it may overpower your subject and result in a completely washed out photograph.

When you set up your portrait shoot, remember the following key points:

  • Don’t use direct flash as it may ruin the photograph and leave you with an overexposed subject
  • Use your photographic sense to make the best use of shadows

Having an Appropriate Background

Background can be sometimes as important as the subject itself. You could go for a beautiful bokeh blur effect, or a very high/low key approach with a black or white background. Either way, be sure to consider background in your mental checklist before pressing the shutter.

A great tip is to open your Aperture as wide as possible, to create a shallow depth of field and make your subject “pop” out of the background.

Looking for more information? Check out our article on 9 Tips for a Perfect Portrait Background.

Natural vs. Artificial Expression

Simple Portrait Photography Tips and Tricks

Photo credits

There has always been a debate about natural and artificial expressions of the subject. The most difficult task for a photographer is to make a portrait shot as natural as possible.

To attain this, make sure your subject is comfortable and ready for the shoot. Don’t jump into shooting right away. Spend some time chatting and getting to know one another!

Share Your Tips

Do you have any more suggestions and tips for portrait photography? We’d love to hear them – feel free to share in the comments!

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Rishabh Agarwal is an Engineering student from India. In addition to that, he’s also a passionate Photographer and a Web Designer. He writes about technology on his blog, TechyLabs, and Photography on ShutterSkills. Follow him on Twitter: @rish404.  

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  • Sam

    Nice little tips article, thanks!

  • http://www.henryhingst.com Henry Hingst

    I think it’s all about natural expressions.

    Honestly i don’t like artifical expressions, specially looking at the camera.
    For the background issue, I use a 35m. lens at f/1.4 to get it blurry.

    Best regards.

    • http://shutterskills.com Rish
      Author

      Henry,
      35mm f/1.4 a great lens to experiment with. Do share some of the pic you shot :)

      • Gurth

        I would think that using a 35mm wide would have a bloating effect on the subjects face. I was taught to start at 50mm.

        • http://www.flickr.com/photos/48014002@N03/ Abe

          Telephoto lenses are also great for portraits. I typically use a 70-200mm f/2.8. Not THE fastest, but with a tri-pod it works great.

  • http://nikonCoolpixDigitalCameraSite.com Tibor Szabadi

    Nice tips..Thanks for sharing it..

  • http://www.ezcreate.com.au stephen

    I also find that having the right glass/lens is important. A dedicated portrait lens (in my case: Canon EF 85mm 1:1.8) helps most of the issues. If not available, a 60mm macro or 50mm fixed lens can produce great results. I agree, lighting is everything. With natural lighting, almost any outdoor setting is easily perfected with either direct or reflected light. Great article, succinct to the point.

    • http://shutterskills.com Rish
      Author

      I’m glad you liked it :)

  • 7

    “Don’t use direct flash as it may ruin the photograph and leave you with an overexposed subject”

    Probably best not to generalize……

    http://neilvn.com/tangents/2010/02/23/simple-on-location-lighting/

    • Renan Le Caro

      Well, with 2kg of makeup of a heavy surface blur on your model’s face, it’s true that soft light concerns don’t apply. Your sense of composition is really impressive and your photos work very well, but the model’s skin just feels like plastic. And many there aren’t familiar with retouching so i don’t think this “exception” is really applying here.

  • http://vrillusions.com Todd Eddy

    Couple tips I have: get closer. Usually starting photographers will get uncomfortable when zoomed in at some point. Keep in mind that while the subjects face may fill your entire viewfinder and it looks like your only inches from them in reality (depending on the lens) you’re several feet away. Still throws me off. Probably once you get zoomed in close enough that you feel uncomfortable, that will probably make a good portrait. Some photographers don’t experience this and are perfectly fine at getting up close.

    As for “getting your subject ready to shoot” a simple way to do this is to take a LOT of pictures, not even necessarily of the person. Like if you are walking to a certain location just take pictures of the scenery. What that does is get the subject used to the clicking noises of dSLR’s. If they’re only familiar with near-silent point and shoots (aside from a “click” sound coming from a speaker) it may throw them off to suddenly keep hearing it. Obviously if your subject is a model that does this a lot then they will be used to it.

    One last tip, take a lot of pictures. Put your shutter drive to continuous shooting so when you hold down the shutter release it keeps taking pictures. Take at least 3 at a time. So many times I’ve forgotten to do this and have to toss out a good composition because I caught the subject in mid-blink so they look half asleep.

    A quick example: http://photos.vrillusions.com/events/anime-punch-2010/photo-shoot-2-sakura/IMG_4195.JPG.php When framing it I noticed the car parked in the street so I made sure I had the aperture wide open so it would throw it into the blue and white blob you see. Also I didn’t follow my own rule of getting close where it may look better (of course I can just do a tighter crop if I wanted). Another thing not mentioned here is the subject looks towards the center of the frame. If the subject is facing the edges then it creates a more “hostile” mood. (forget the term that’s usually used) And not looking directly at the lens but off camera adds a sense of intrigue “What is she looking at?” where if she was looking at the camera it would have a more direct connection with the viewer.

  • otomo

    This tips are sooooo common sense.

    Short Summary:

    Get a nice head. Position it in some interesting way. Dont flash the head frontal. Use a small aperture (what every portrait mode does). Make your head look natural.

    I was hoping to find something more useful here. I.e. what about elaborating on the right choice of lenses for portrait photography?

  • http://NikonCoolpixL22.com Patrik

    Great photography tips.Thanks for posting it.

  • http://sonyCybershotDSCw290.com Tibor Szabadi

    Photography is part of my lifestyle.I love your tips and through this I may improve my skills.Thanks for sharing!

  • beck

    no flash? be specific. no on camera stock flash. off camera flashes are an amazing tool for portrait potography

  • Franck

    A flash light can make eyes bright ! The result is great when you get a clear light circle in the eyes of the subject. Just set the intensity of your flash to its minimum.
    That is a tip.

  • DeviantBeliviant

    Todd Eddy below just wrote what this article should have been. I’m really disappointed with these quick tip sessions from PhotoTuts or TUTs in general. It’s a lot of straight forward common sense advice that really only applies to someone who is clueless to photography in general.

    When I see an article about simple portrait photography tricks that’s what I expect, not common sense bogus material like “try new angles and poses”, like “oh, wow, different angles? I never thought of that!”.

    Come on guys, I feel like some of these articles are just posted for the sake of getting posts out daily.

  • DestinS

    When you’re photographing groups of people, if it’s an option, photograph odd numbers. Groups of 3′s and 5′s photograph better than groups of 4′s and 6.