Portraits

When it comes to portraits there are a lot of things you can make use of and you need to pay attention to.
This blog covers the main aspects of taking portraits. You will be surprised what effort it sometimes takes for a simple picture of a person.

General

First of all, we need to separate taking simple street photography portraits from taking actual portraits. Why? Because in street photography you can only wait for the composition to work when someone walks in your frame, or you just got lucky with a quick snap.
We want to focus on taking pictures of someone you have to yourself and can direct the person to wherever you want them to be.

Location

Before you think about anything of taking a picture of someone you should ask yourself where you should go with them. This is crucial to the outcome of your photo. This is not as important as other factors, but it does matter and can make a huge difference in your photos. You can ask your model where they like to hang out or feel comfortable and what their outfit would look like for the shooting.
You can use this information to decide where it will take place. Let’s have a look at an example: Your model wears a summer dress and likes to hang out at the sea. An easy possible location could be somewhere on the beach. You can also use this for making up contrast in your image by taking the summer dress to somewhere it really does not fit in. An extremum for this would be a snowy landscape.

Composition

Speaking of creating contrast with locations, we can dive into the next very important step, composition. You should be familiar with the rule of thirds if you want to take great portraits. In general, having a little bit of knowledge in composition is a great way to improve the portrait game. Simply search it up on the internet, gain some information and you are done. What works out really well in portrait photography are things like leading lines, or frames.

Light

Light in your photo is crucial for setting the mood. Let's say you want some dark, creepy vibes for instance, then you should go and take pictures in low light. Taking pictures in daylight often results in harsh, overexposed photos. 
But you can use this harsh light to your advantage by simply playing around the shadows in a creative way to make frames or something else. You would be surprised what images could create out of this technique.

Props

Last but not least, we got props. Sometimes a person by itself is a little bit boring. By adding some sort of prop you give the whole photo a little bit of a story. For example, you are photographing a person who really likes to skate, but you just take pictures of themselves.
Why not bring the skating part into the photo shooting? You could also use any texture to bring your photo to a next level. Maybe adding some snow particles to your next winter portrait photography session would be a good idea.

Conclusion

All in all, there are no limits on creativity when it comes to portraits. It may be hard sometimes to think outside the box, so maybe try to recreate what other photographers have done first and make your own version out of it. It really is a learning by doing job.
Don’t forget to share your best photos to others. If you tag us on your next portrait photo on Instagram we will check it out and give you feedback as soon as we can.