Comprehensive explanation of composition techniques for human body photography

Complete explanation of composition techniques in human photography

To learn portrait photography well, beginners can quickly get started with composition. Compared with other photography techniques, composition is easier to master. . Portrait composition mainly depends on two aspects: first, the expressiveness of the subject itself; second, the photographer needs to have certain creativity and ideas, and be able to perfectly express the subject through the camera in his hand. The following is a graphic analysis of portrait photography composition techniques for everyone, let’s take a look!

Scene 1: Common techniques for portrait photography to make the background beautifully blurred

1. Select the bright part as the background and perform a large blur

Choose the light Use the brighter part that can be illuminated as the background to prevent the picture from giving a heavy impression. It should be noted that the color of evergreen trees is relatively strong, and even if it is blurred, the color will not look too beautiful. The background of the subject does not have to be plants, you can also choose a brightly colored wall.

2. Use backlighting to create a highlight effect on the hair

When positioning the person being photographed, you must carefully consider the position and choose the appropriate position to make the hair appear highlighted and look very beautiful. Shiny. Once the hair appears shiny, the expression of the person being photographed will also give a special impression to the viewer. If the hair looks dark, the overall picture will appear darker, so the photographer needs to consciously add highlights.

3. Use reflectors to brighten a darker face.

Effective use of reflectors can brighten a dark face caused by backlighting and make the skin textured. When shooting portraits, in principle, you should use backlight or side light, and it is not suitable to use forward light that will cause obvious shadows on the face. Therefore, a reflector is a must-have shooting tool when shooting portraits outdoors.

4. You can crop the arms when composing the picture

Sometimes the subject’s posture will put his shoulders or wrists outside the scope of the composition. This is not a problem at all. . On the contrary, it can change the image and give it a bold feeling, so don’t hesitate to keep shooting. If you try to fit all of the subject into the frame, the photo will look mediocre. Try to be bold with your composition.

Scene 2: A wide-angle portrait that skillfully blends the background and the subject

1. Shows the spaciousness of the space

The angle of view of the photo is very wide, stretching into the sky The top is also included in the screen. When shooting with a wide-angle lens, unexpected parts will be included in the frame, so the composition must be carefully organized. Photographers should be aware of the camera's viewfinder field of view when composing their shots and consider how to use space flexibly.

2. Make flexible use of deformation around the picture

The picture taken with a wide-angle lens is particularly transparent. It will be very interesting to consciously use this feature to shoot. In the picture above, the deformation of the subject's feet is exaggerated, creating a unique visual effect.

3. Boldly enjoy the sense of transparency

If you shoot from bottom to top, then like this photo, the walls and iron doors in the background will have a strong sense of transparency. Flexible use of this sense of transparency in the picture can make the entire composition look very novel. When using a wide-angle lens, boldly changing the shooting angle can bring unique visual effects.

4. Do not use the focus lock function to achieve focus.

When using a wide-angle lens to shoot from bottom to top, you should avoid using the central focus point + focus lock method to focus. Because the subject is too close to the subject in focus, it is easy to produce an out-of-focus phenomenon called cosine error. The focus point should be selected in advance to avoid camera movement caused by using focus lock, so that the focus can be accurately achieved.

Scenario 3: Use a super telephoto lens to shoot full-body street portraits

1. Try to blur the background as much as possible

The super telephoto lens can take pictures of the subject The background is greatly blurred for full-body portraits. If you are only shooting close-ups of faces and portraits from the chest up, you can use a short focal length lens to get photos with a blurred background when the aperture is wide open. But when shooting full-body portraits, blurring the background requires a focal length of more than 300mm.

2. Consider the balance with the background color

Try to keep the subject’s head in the bright part of the background, so that the subject’s hair will not blend in with the background. Mix it up. It should be noted that if the background has eye-catching patterns or repetitive patterns, the subject will lose attention and the background will take over the focus. The photographer also needs to confirm whether there are dark parts or offensive-looking billboards around the subject's face, and then determine the location of the subject.

3. There should be eye light in the eyes of the person being photographed.

Even if the person being photographed looks small in the entire composition, the face should be illuminated by light. In particular, make sure that the eyes have obvious reflections (eye light). If there is no reflection on the eyes, the eyes will appear dull and lifeless, making it difficult to understand the facial expressions of the person being photographed. When taking full-body portraits, eye lighting is as important as when taking close-ups.

4. Without blurring the entire background, a certain sense of transparency can be achieved.

It is difficult to achieve a sense of transparency after blurring the entire background. In the picture above, the flowers on the sidewalk and the trees above the subject are in the same plane of focus as the subject, thus emphasizing the contrast between the subject and the background. One of the key points of full-body portrait photography is to skillfully show the transparency between the subject and the background by controlling the blurred and unblurred parts.

Scene 4: A dark-toned female portrait that reflects the inner world of the subject

1. The eyes and lips must be highlighted

As the entire photo When a portrait photo is dark, it’s best to add light to the part that attracts visual attention. By adding highlights, the exposure can be darker, giving the photo more impact. The key to shooting dark portraits is not simply to reduce exposure.

2. Consider the balance with the background light

If there is strong light coming from the background (behind) of the subject, then the overall picture will appear sharper and become a Sharp photos. If there is a normal background, the photo will only look darker, but if there is strong light in the background, the darkness of the subject's face will appear natural, and the dark tones of the photo will be emphasized.

3. The expression of the person being photographed should preferably be cold and wild.

The overall feeling of dark-toned portrait photos should be cooler. So the person being photographed should not have a smile on their face. It's best to give the photo character with a cold expression that's a bit surprising. The subject's posture must match the expression and not be too energetic. In short, you should grasp the overall feeling when taking photos.

4. Accurate focus on the eyes

One of the basic principles of portrait photography is to focus on the eyes. Especially when taking dark-tone photos, the eyes determine the impression of the entire photo, so the focus must be precise. Always pay attention to the focus position, do not relax after shooting, and carefully confirm the photo effect.

Scene 5: Female beauty in a black and white world

1. Blur the background to make the graininess more obvious

Using the noise generated under high ISO sensitivity, Makes photos grainy. In order to make this grainy feeling more obvious, you can blur the background by choosing the appropriate aperture and lens. If the noise in the mid-tone part of the picture can be used, the grainy effect will be more obvious, so the background should not be too dark.

2. It’s okay to have highlight overflow when necessary.

Highlight overflow is generally a phenomenon that needs to be avoided when shooting. But when taking monochrome photos, the appearance of highlight bloom can actually make the photo more impressive. It's certainly not good if the highlights appear on the entire main subject, but it doesn't matter if it occurs on a small part of the subject. In the picture above, the photographer intentionally made the subject's face appear highlighted, which became the highlight of the photo.

3. Choose a shooting location that matches the atmosphere of monochrome photos

Not taking monochrome photos anywhere will produce good results. Photographers should choose places that can render monochrome. Photo style atmosphere of the place. Compared with shooting outdoors during the day, the graininess will be more obvious when shooting indoors in a slightly dark environment, which can better reflect the unique atmosphere of monochrome photos.

4. Consider the color matching of the subject’s clothing.

Shooting in a monochrome style will greatly change the atmosphere and impression of the photo. Monochrome photos are much more than just shooting everything in black and white. When taking monochrome photos, some colors stand out more. You should conduct a test shoot before the official shoot. If necessary, you can change clothes of different colors. If photographers could realize the different effects of different colors when turned into monochrome, the technology of taking monochrome photos would significantly improve.

;