Portrait shooting skills

Lead: It is not only good photographic equipment that can shoot emotional portraits. It needs a lot of preparation work. When everything is ready, it will be handy to shoot. Now everyone's photographic equipment is not bad, so I won't say much about the equipment here, just take my own actual shooting.

1, the general style and direction of shooting

Before each shooting, you should know what style you want to shoot, so that you can easily carry the required equipment and lenses, and avoid carrying a lot of unused equipment because you don't know the style, which will bring you a lot of inconvenience in the shooting process.

2. Determination of shooting theme

First of all, we need to determine the shooting style, whether it is small, fresh, fashionable or dark. Many times we use the shooting time and model name to name the theme, which will inevitably appear single after a long time. If you decide the theme in advance, you will save a lot of energy, whether it is in the middle or late stage of shooting.

Step 3 invite the right model

Not every model is suitable for one style, but there must be a style suitable for models. Choosing a good model to express the style you want to shoot is probably the key to a good movie. In addition to familiar models, we may meet some models we have never met who are interested in the theme style. We can ask for the model's life photos in advance for reference. Of course, we can also ask the model to come out and shoot once to make sure whether the theme we want to shoot is suitable for the model.

4. Choose a suitable shooting site

After the theme and model are determined, we need to find the location suitable for the theme shooting. You can ask your friends who like photography or have seen suitable places by themselves. If it's a small shop or coffee shop, you can ask if you can take pictures first, so as not to cause unnecessary trouble. The safest way is to go on-the-spot investigation first, and observe the changes of light and people flow at different times in the environment, with a clear mind.

5. Costume collocation and props

Although many models have a lot of clothes, they may not be suitable for the theme style we want to shoot. You can know in advance what models there are, determine whether they are suitable, and how to match them is more in line with the shooting environment and theme. If necessary, you can purchase some clothes that meet the requirements in cost performance and style and props that can match the theme. You don't need to bring too many clothes, one set for each theme, no more than two sets at most, mainly because it is inconvenient to change clothes when shooting outdoors. Secondly, the model of a suit has just entered the state, and it takes time to adjust his mood and state when changing a new suit.

Step 6 communicate with models

We can find some samples with similar styles to those we want to shoot online and send them to the models for reference. After all, what we say is too abstract, and the model has no bottom. When shooting, we also need to properly call the model's emotions to make the shooting achieve the ideal effect. Halfway break can let the model watch the film made before, and let the model know whether his style and mood need to be adjusted.

General models are in the adaptation stage in the first 30 minutes of shooting, and it is difficult to perform well (except professional models), and 30 minutes before the end of shooting is often the best time. My biggest problem at present is communication, which may be related to my personal character and needs to be accumulated slowly.

Step 7 use equipment

Most of my own portraits use fixed focus. In the early days, because there was no automatic pan/tilt, manual pan/tilt was mainly used. With the increase of shooting volume, the manual pan/tilt can no longer meet the needs of snapshot, so I bought the only 35L, which is not a propaganda equipment. Fixed focus is better in workmanship and lens material, and the image quality can be guaranteed.

85mm and 135mm can compress the space at a long distance, blur the soft background, give the picture a sense of depth and space, and highlight the presence of characters. 35mm is the suspension lens of full-frame machine, because its viewing angle is relatively wider, and it can accommodate more environmental elements within the effective distance, giving people an immersive visual sense. 50mm is the standard focal length of the lens, which can achieve satisfactory results in background blur, sense of space, sense of atmosphere and image quality. It can be said that it is a combination of 85mm, 135mm and 35mm, so I suggest that photographers who have just taken portraits can start from 50.

A few focal segments feel that the portrait is basically 35mm within 6m, 50mm within 10m, 85mm within 15m and 135mm, which is the best performance distance of these shots.

8. About late color matching

In the digital age, there are not many post-films at all, but the purpose of photography is to record, and post-color mixing actually accounts for only a small part of the whole photographic work. Many colors can have a general direction in the early stage of shooting, at least the main color tone can be determined. For example, it is also a method to adjust the color by controlling the contrast of the picture with depth of field, aperture and shutter, or to determine the color tone by shooting time with blurred foreground. There is also the use of backlight, live lighting, and the main color in the environment, and even the hair color and clothes color of the model, which may be used as the main color in the later stage of the film. Finally, we will consider using software tools such as software plug-ins and filters to polish.

My own photo processing is also controlled at the beginning of my study. Most of them are processed by software, because I can't meet the theme color in the early stage. Basically, I use ps color balance and optional colors to adjust the basic colors, and finally use plug-ins to polish them. There are many Ps masters in this respect, and I believe that as long as you pay attention, you will gain something.

9. Lessons learned

Last year, a book had a great influence on me, that is, The Beauty of Portrait Photography by Sun Guozhi (Red Hedgehog). The first time I saw the work of Red Hedgehog was in a forum in Taiwan Province Province, which left a deep impression on me. Later, when I saw this book, I immediately bought an original copy. I have read some books on photography before, but most of them are about the evaluation and use of equipment and basic portrait shooting skills, and I often forget them after reading them for a while. However, this book has made me read it many times, and I have different feelings and experiences every time.

Portrait photography mostly records beauty. How to discover beauty is also the most important thing in photography. How to discover and record natural beauty is even more difficult. I like this sentence in the book. As long as you appreciate the picture with your eyes, you will never be separated from beauty. And beauty is not only a feeling, but also a sensitivity and an emotion. You must know how to appreciate beauty before you can create it. ?

We need to constantly improve our aesthetic ability, because the change of equipment is nothing more than the high resolution of the focal part and fuselage, so it is good to master and use it. First, it is not difficult to enhance the aesthetic feeling and discover the beautiful perspective. Other technical things are not difficult. The equipment really exists as a recording tool. I always believe that what photography always lacks is not equipment, but creativity and a pair of eyes to discover beauty.