You don’t have to be a professional photographer to take frame worthy portraits. However, you do need to practice, practice, practice… and exercise a certain degree of patience. After all, the most important part of a portrait is the subject’s face. In order to capture the true essence of a subject’s personality in a portrait, consider the following:
Background: The right background is crucial when shooting portraits. Stay away from busy backgrounds that draw attention away from your subject. A neutral background is much better for a portrait shot than a chaotic street filled with people and other moving objects.
Indoor Lighting: Photo portraits should contain excellent lighting that accentuates the subject. Aim to incorporate as much natural lighting as possible in your portrait shots. If you are shooting indoors, open as many windows as possible. However, be careful not to position your subject directly in the sunlight. Harsh lighting can create shadows and cause a subject to squint. If you don’t have a professional-grade reflector, then have your subject hold a piece of white paper beneath her chin. The paper will act as a reflector to bounce light and reduce shadows.
Outdoor Lighting: When taking portrait shots outdoors, make sure the sun is not positioned directly behind your subject. Doing so causes overexposure and distorts a person’s natural skin tones. Instead, position your subject, so that the sunlight hits her from the side. If some shadows appear on her face, use a soft fill-in flash to get rid of them.
Blurring: If you are an advanced shooter, then you can further enhance your photo portrait by blurring the background. When done properly blurring will emphasize your subject instead of his surroundings. The easiest way to blur a shot is to use a shallow depth of field. Simply use a zoom lens and shoot a short distance away from your subject. Another way to blur the background is to shoot with a wide aperture manual setting. If you are using a point-and-shoot camera with limited settings, you can always blur the background later using photo editing software on your computer.
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