Throughout artistic history the presence of portraits is always strong. Ancient sculptures, painting from the renaissance, the first photographs and still in present day the subject of people has always been relevant. They are a reflection of humanity, a powerful connection between the photography and the viewer. As I took my portraits for this project it started me on a concept that I was just becoming familiar with. Although my experience with portraits is little, I began formulating many ideas from the inspiration I found. I became aware of the many portraits that have impact on my life, without me noticing it. One photographer in particular that I was influenced by was Steve McCurry. His most famous piece “Afghan Girl” is one of my favourite portrait works, because of the emotion and how it has become such a widely recognized photo. I gained inspiration from many aspects of his work, the attention to detail, the focus and the authenticity of the subjects. I took what I learned from my research of portraits and applied it to my studio and environmental portrait photography. When I took the portraits I tried to make them stunning and interesting. I experimented with lighting and focus to find combinations that would give me beautiful results, I tried many angles and distances and I attempted to highlight the simplicity and uniqueness of the human face. In my opinion my most successful way of making the portraits amazing was to capture the true story and personality beyond the model's appearance.
As I took the studio portraits of Jamie I was amazed by the array of emotions that were portrayed within seconds. When I took shots I kept the environment natural and comforting. The most successful shots were the ones that captured a genuine motion, each one with a distinct story hidden behind the mystery of the camera. I realized as I looked at someone I knew through the lens of a camera I was discovering a personality that I never realized was there. I felt that through all the pictures a consistent underlying theme of wonder was present, wonderment from Jamie, from a viewer that sees the photo and even from me. I captured a personality that was complex and emotions that was shown through the eyes. Finding authentic moments became easier with the environmental portraits, as the subject was in a familiar environment. In this case it was my brother in the backyard. When doing the environmental portraits I took them over a series of days. Each day the camera slowly merged in with the environments and closer to the end I was able to get photographs that were taken in a moment, portraying true emotions. My brothers personality is curious, and playful and yet he always seems wise beyond his years.By allowing the subject to be free I was able to photograph a real personality in the portraits.
Through the process of completing this project I ran into problems when using studio lights and trying to achieve natural poses and expressions. However by experimenting, not rushing and using inspiration from strong portraits I was able to resolve different issues. If I was to give advice to others doing this project I would advise them to take their time, insure the subject is comfortable with being expressive and capturing the best moments that occur naturally.
As I took the studio portraits of Jamie I was amazed by the array of emotions that were portrayed within seconds. When I took shots I kept the environment natural and comforting. The most successful shots were the ones that captured a genuine motion, each one with a distinct story hidden behind the mystery of the camera. I realized as I looked at someone I knew through the lens of a camera I was discovering a personality that I never realized was there. I felt that through all the pictures a consistent underlying theme of wonder was present, wonderment from Jamie, from a viewer that sees the photo and even from me. I captured a personality that was complex and emotions that was shown through the eyes. Finding authentic moments became easier with the environmental portraits, as the subject was in a familiar environment. In this case it was my brother in the backyard. When doing the environmental portraits I took them over a series of days. Each day the camera slowly merged in with the environments and closer to the end I was able to get photographs that were taken in a moment, portraying true emotions. My brothers personality is curious, and playful and yet he always seems wise beyond his years.By allowing the subject to be free I was able to photograph a real personality in the portraits.
Through the process of completing this project I ran into problems when using studio lights and trying to achieve natural poses and expressions. However by experimenting, not rushing and using inspiration from strong portraits I was able to resolve different issues. If I was to give advice to others doing this project I would advise them to take their time, insure the subject is comfortable with being expressive and capturing the best moments that occur naturally.