Portraiture

The second task for portraiture was to take picture of complete strangers. Since the Christmas market was in Lincoln I decided to see if I can find some more uniquely dressed people to photograph. In the end I decided to take photograph of the people running an Ale stall. I chose these people because their clothing was vintage and not something you would see everyday. I decided to use the environment of their stall as a background. I found it easy to ask them once i spoke with them a bit and they was very happy to help even saying to wait a minute so he could go get his scarf and hat.

With this image I got the subject to stand slightly in front of the tap and kept the tap in focus, this was to show more of the environment and what the persons job is. The boxes and other things also made a mice background and the went around the area gives it a Christmas feel. I’ve also fiddled with the temperature and other parts of the image to create a warm glow effect.

With this image I managed to get the barrels in the background. Like with the first image i managed to give this a nice glow and use that along with the white in the image to create a Christmas like atmosphere. I feel the clothes such as the hat and his suit give the look of an older time, creating a much more unique image, making it look almost period (besides from the more modern environment). I also managed to interact with the subject for them to feel comfortable and for them to give a natural smile. Again this joy and cheer really gives across the message of Christmas cheer which is what I really wanted to show with these two images.

We was given the of creating 4 portrait images of subjects of our choosing. We should be concentrating on what makes the image, this means factors such as the lighting and compositions of the image and where the subject (and any props) are placed within the frame of the image. Personally i decided to shoot later in the day to get a darker lighting, using a high light shooting light directly down to give a noire like effect. I also took inspiration with this idea from the poster for the original Exorcist movie. I played around with casting shadows and making the image seem moody yet clear.

For the first Image I went for a more wide image approach, this allowed me to show the shadows created on the body and emphasize it. In light room I’ve brought up the highlights and shadows while also tweaking the black and white balances.

The second image I wanted to obscure the models face, I did this by getting them to look straight ahead getting the light to not hit their face as much. Then in light room I brought the shadows up slightly. The source of light can not be seen in the image but you can see the beam it’s producing against the wall, I feel this gives a spotlight like effect and creates a dark and mysterious atmosphere.

Portraits 3 and 4 are both very similar in terms of the models pose but between them i changed the distance from the model leaving more of the area around the model. I turned up the clarity of the images to bring out the textures of the wall behind which gives it a nice rough look which matches that of the leather jacket. I made the background lighter to help show the texture of the wall. I managed to keep some shadows on the model while keeping the detail in the image.

Category: Portraiture

Stranger Portraiture