There are a million different ways you can define portrait photography. So let’s turn to one of the genre’s greats, Richard Avedon, for some guidance and clarity. According to Avedon, “A photographic portrait is a picture of someone who knows he is being photographed, and what he does with this knowledge is as much a part of the photograph as what he’s wearing or how he looks.”
Consent then, if Avedon is to be believed, is a prevailing element that separates a portrait against every other genre of photography that happens to involve people in the frame — it’s about capturing the consenting subject’s emotion, personality and character in photos.
And if you’re thinking about starting a photography business as a professional portrait photographer, you probably already know that it’s such a profitable field to be in considering the wide scope of this genre. I’ve been a professional portrait photographer for nearly a decade, but I’m always learning. Photography is art that takes a day to learn and a lifetime to master. With that being said, to help you with your journey, here are 10 portrait photography tips that I wish I knew when I was just starting.
#1 Choose the Right Focal Length
Lens choice is a deeply personal thing and will vary a lot among photographers who come from different disciplines.
However, there are some extremes that you should stay away from. Generally speaking, you don’t want to go wider than 35mm (or the equivalent focal length) as stepping into this range would start to distort your subjects’ features more aggressively if you come in closer than you need to; you don’t want paying clients to look all wonky and stretchy in the final images.
Tighter focal lengths will do the inverse and will help make the subject’s features (eyes, nose, and chin) look a little tighter and more flattering. Somewhere around 50mm, 85mm and 135mm are what many call the “classic” focal lengths for portrait photography. Famed portrait photographer Annie Leibovitz reportedly favors the 35mm and 55mm focal lengths, and has said that her medium format, Sekor 140mm F4.5 L/A Macro (70mm full frame equivalent) to be a particular favorite. On the wider end of the spectrum, you’d shoot more environmental portraits, or perhaps half to full length portraits. For headshots, you’ll want something between 85-105mm to avoid distortion.
24-70mm f2.8’s are popular among all formats, but personally I started with primes and encourage others to do the same. Your kit lens (usually a 28-70mm) will help you find what focal length you like the most, so play with that and find out what primes you would like.
If you’re on a budget, try adapting old school legacy lenses, not only are they cheaper (and many are built better!), but many actually desire the film look you’ll often get with theses lenses. So much so that they’re often in high demand by filmmakers, and one of the top videography tips we’ve shared.
Note: Bear in mind the crop factors on APS-C and Micro Four Thirds cameras. For example, on Micro Four Thirds Lenses, a 12-35mm f2.8 has a 2x crop factor, thus it’s an 24-70mm f2.8 equivalent, and a DoF equivalent of f5.6. If that’s a little confusing, checkout our complete guide on Micro Four Thirds vs Full Frame Sensors.
To see different focal lengths in action, check out Jessica Whitaker’s super helpful comparison of the three most common focal lengths for portrait photography.
#2 Practice with Close Friends
A lot of what goes into a great portrait, aside from your technical skills, is communication and experimentation especially when you’re just starting out. One piece of advice Annie Leibovitz imparts to younger artists is to practice their craft with close friends and family.
You’re going to be trying out different lighting schemes, different lenses, and getting to know the exposure triangle like the back of your hand. It’s best to “stick close to home and photograph people that will put up with you, so you can see what’s possible,” as Annie had said. Working with friends and family members will let you direct them to your heart’s content without any filters and awkwardness. Fumbling about with your new camera while on location wouldn’t be too much of an issue as it would when you’re working with models that are paid by the hour.
So get out there and start planning fun shoots with your best buddies and just have fun with it. Annie thinks you’ll get better results faster that way, instead of trying to take good portraits of strangers right away.
#3 Build Rapport with Your Subjects
Portrait photography demands more people skills than any other genre of the craft. A lot of the people you’re going to be photographing won’t be natural-born models, and they’re going to be camera shy. If they’re stiff and awkward off-camera, then you best believe they’re going to look stiff and awkward on the images.
Break the ice and chat with your client. Discuss the shoot, set expectations, sure. But don’t forget to dig a little deeper and get to know your subjects on a more personal level. Be genuinely interested and start asking questions. You can even use humor to help loosen your subjects; I’ve even read about a wedding photographer who used to play the couple’s favorite comedian’s comedy album during the shoot.
Try working on becoming a people person — even when you’re just on the job — early on in your career and you’ll thank yourself in the long run. Having the ability to establish a comfortable level of connection helps disarm your subject and have them forget the camera for a minute, with you coming out of the session with better photos.
Here are 10 more tips from SLR Lounge’s Pye Jirsa that can help you build better relationships with clients and make them feel more at ease on set.
#4 Be Careful with Focusing and Recomposing
The eyes are the most expressive features in the human anatomy, and it’s your job to get your clients’ eyes in critical focus. Now, to get the eyes in focus and get the composition you want, photographers often use the focus-and-recompose technique.
Focusing and recomposing is when you lock on a focus point (like the eyes), re-frame your shot and then depress on the shutter button all the way through. It’s a classic method for getting things in focus, but it has its limitations. It doesn’t work as foolproof as it sounds when you work with such a razor-thin depth of field where you: 1) shoot at fast apertures 2) get too close to the subject, or 3) when the subject moves out of the focus plane.
Cameras these days have widely spread focus points across the viewfinder and even have dedicated Eye AF modes that missing while focusing and recomposing should theoretically be less of an issue than it was 10 years ago. However, keep in mind that there’s nothing you can do to fix a missed shot after the fact, so it’s all the more important that you check your shots every once in a while.
Check out Manny Ortiz’ 3 tips at nailing perfect focus during a portrait shoot for more guidance:
#5 Mind Where You Crop!
There are thousands of ways you can mess up a perfectly good portrait. One of them is chopping off your subjects’ limbs with a bad crop. Now, the following advice is not set in stone by any means, but rather should serve as a general guideline for beginners: avoid cropping at the joints!
This might sound silly, but imagine cropping a bride’s portrait exactly at the waist or the knees. That picture would look odd, or more accurately, they’ll look “stumpy” like you just straight up maimed your subject with your camera.
Here’s a simple diagram that you should consider printing out to help remind you where it’s okay and not okay to crop your portraits.
#6 Direct the Hands
Speaking of limbs, did you know that your subject’s arms and legs can create dynamic lines in your images? Arm positioning can help draw your viewer’s attention and highlight a certain feature — having your subject “nest” their chin on their hands is an awesome way to direct the attention to your subject’s facial features.
Hand placement can also be used to flatter specific body parts. Telling your male subject to cross their arms will make their upper body look bigger and their shoulders broader. Before going into a shoot, try to study up on posing, especially the hands, and you’ll be more intentional with your directing and ultimately add to your confidence. Not to mention, you can now have an answer to “what do I do with my hands?!” which by the way is a real concern for non-modelling subjects.
Here’s professional fashion photographer Lindsay Adler walking you through how you can direct your subject and pose their hands if you need more help:
#7 Fill the Frame – Come in Closer!
One of the most common compositional pitfalls among beginners is that they tend to leave A LOT of headroom, consequently creating a lot of negative space in the images. Now that’s not to say you should get rid of all negative space in your composition repertoire. But I’m just saying that beginners are often timid and a little squeamish about coming in a little closer than they need to make a stronger photo.
Robert Capa once said, “If your pictures aren’t good enough, you aren’t close enough.” Capa was a war photographer, so tighter images in that context may automatically make for stronger images, but the same idea applies to portraits. Filling the frame, or shooting a little tighter, is a proven way to make your portrait all the more impactful. By shooting a little tighter and establishing a sense of intimacy, you grab hold of the viewer’s attention quicker and draw them into your subject more effectively.
Here’s Miguel Quiles demonstrating exactly just how much difference you can make by simply filling more of the frame.
#8 Look for Better Angles
When shooting in a studio or on location, it’s all too easy to gravitate towards easier, safer compositions. Now there’s really nothing wrong with shooting head-on and sticking to traditional angles, definitely do that and secure safe shots first whatever you’re shooting. But beyond that point, you should really look for shots that are a little more exciting.
Exploring different camera angles is a great way to add that extra bit of creativity and inject an entirely different feel to your images. Let’s say you’re shooting the catalogue for a clothing brand, and you want to convey a youthful, hip vibe to your set. Well, one thing you can do is work on a bird’s eye view shot and get that playful, funky feel to your images. Bring a stepladder into the shoot if you must, and keep on experimenting with the Z-axis more.
Here’s Jessica Whitaker with some helpful advice on framing and coming up with new angles:
#9 Learn How to Light Your Portraits
Photography literally means “drawing with light.” So to get better at your craft, you better learn how to find and create good lighting for your subjects as soon as you can. Knowing exactly what look you’re going to get from different qualities of light, creating harsh or soft shadows, and manipulating your light source’s directionality should be one of the priorities you’ll want to study.
One of the most popular and very accessible sources of good lighting for photographers is during the “golden hour.” It’s right around an hour before the sun sets, and an hour after sunrise (there are apps out there that’ll tell you exactly when the golden hour comes at a specific location). The golden hour produces a soft, warm light that wraps on your subjects, as opposed to midday’s harsh overhead lighting.
Once you get the hang of working with natural light, you should consider getting into flash photography. David Hobby’s Strobist series has become one of the best free resources on external lighting which should take you from absolute beginner to working with multiple strobes without any issue.
Jeff Rojas has an excellent crash course on how light works in portrait photography:
#10 Pick the Right Background
“Head in a clean spot!” is something you’ll often hear in Zack Arias’ many photography workshops, and this is sage advice. The background is one of the most crucial pieces to a great portrait, and it’s also most often overlooked by newcomers. It is, after all, too easy to just crank the aperture as wide as the lens goes and reduce everything in the background to a blurry mess.
If you’re serious about being a professional portrait photographer, you’re going to want to invest in some proper equipment, like photography backdrops. Clean, professional backdrops will help you avoid settling for backgrounds that’ll have distracting elements, such as railings, lamps, and millions of other everyday objects sticking out of your subject’s head.
Starting out, I would recommend the basics – a white, gray and black background… and perhaps a few colors of your choice. Nowadays I mostly shoot on hand painted canvas backdrops. Fortunately for you, we’ve recently covered the best photography backdrops for any budget and situation, so I highly recommend giving it a read if you’re thinking of picking up your first serious backdrop.