Humans 1: Portrait of an Artist
I'd like to start off my portrait and event series with a visual artist who is particular, in the best way, about the images that appear online about her.
Let's talk about the photography first, and then we will introduce today's model.
Photographing people poses at least four challenges: you need to get the composition and the posture right; you need to catch the right facial expression; and the lighting also matters a lot. Finally, if the photoshoot is about one model (and not an event), your model must accept the photos, too.
Peter Lindbergh had a famous photoshoot in New York City more than forty years ago; he said he used up 6 rolls of 36 in 45 minutes, if memory serves. Not that I compare myself to Peter Lindbergh, but this sums up the challenge well enough.
A human body is always in motion. In just a few seconds, it might go through very different postures and facial expressions: the muscle tone changes all the time. Most of these postures and expressions will be unappealing... for the model themselves.
So, you found the right frame (positioning, background and all), made sure that the face is not in the shade and remains in focus... and then the photo is anything but nice. What more do you need to do? Well, it's all about timing. If you just take one shot, there is very little chance your models' muscle tone will co-operate. So you need to shoot a sequence, and choose the one or two good photos, if they exist.
Luckily, most cameras have a "continuous shooting" feature, where you take 8-10 photos in one go. This boosts your chance of finding one good shot. But even then, you need to get the timing right. Don't photograph people while they eat, for example, unless eating is your theme.
These are all obvious things, but not for someone who discovered them the hard way (me).
The model in this post is a visual artist (and a fashion design student) relatively close to me (you get it, she is a relative). The artistic concept, if there is any, belongs to her just as much as it does to me: I might have taken the photos, but she was the one who guided me when I wanted to select eight photos out of 28.
I hope you will be able to learn more about her when she goes online with her own portfolio: until then, it's not my business to reveal her details. Suffice it to say that I have her consent to post the photos here.
I did not include separate descriptions of the photos: these are all of the same person in various (mostly family) settings.
