Simple photograph. Simple technique?

[eric-holmes]

A photographer I follow recently posted this image. I love it. It is so simple, but I absolutely love this style. So I got to thinking, is it that simple to recreate? I see one single catchlight in the eye. Appears to be just above the camera. So is that it? I just thought more would go into it. Thoughts?

http://www.kristenweaverblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/KW1_7210_i.jpg

 

[tirediron]

If I had to guess, I'd say single large soft-box high and centered above the camera with a large reflector image left. I think it really is that simple, 'though most of the effect of the image comes from post.

 

[Garbz]

No shadow on the background.

I'm going on a limb and saying this isn't a simple shot but rather a single front light shot through some kind of umbrella/softbox mounted above the camera, and one or two lights aimed at the background to eliminate any model shadows.

Could just be some dude bouncing a flash off a card though

 

[Derrel]

Very simple shot. Too bad it was shot as a horizontal....she's head-less and bust-less...would have looked like a pro shot it if the camera had been oriented correctly.

One large light source, probably a big reflector camera left, backdrop is gray seamless it looks like. Lastolite's Umbrella Box will produce that type of light quality.

 

[GeneralBenson]

Very simple shot. Too bad it was shot as a horizontal....she's head-less and bust-less...would have looked like a pro shot it if the camera had been oriented correctly.

I gotta say Derrel. I almost always really respect your opinions, but you've been like a broken record lately with the whole portraits should never ever ever be horizontal thing, and I have to say that I absolutely disagree. I'm fully aware of the rules of portraiture, and with the fact that the vertical orientation is called Portrait for this very reason.

But the days of the tyrannical reign of portraiture rules are coming to a close. Granted that are a lot of people out there who just don't know anything about the rules, and make all sorts of mistakes in their portraits; and these images almost exclusively look bad. Because they don't know even know the rules that they are breaking.

But there is a whole host of modern portrait photographers who are breaking the rules of portraiture intentionally and with great success. Portraiture is taken a massive swing towards artistic expression, naturalism and away from the formula that has been it's master for the last few generations.

I think this shot works very well as a horizontal, and it has a completely different feeling than if it were vertical. This image has room to breathe, and is a little bit more than just a portrait. If it were presented vertically, it would be nothing but a head and shoulders, with no room, and certainly no room to imagine the image as anything but just a picture of a face.

The idea that the image would only look pro if it had been oriented properly is sad to me and reduces portrait professionals to nothing more than human tripods that hold a camera and repeat a process governed by rules (which is what they have been for the last few decades) rather than artists, who understand guidelines, but ultimately make their own creative decisions according to each situation.

 

[Derrel]

First off you've got it ENTIRELY WRONG,and I truly do not like your uniformed allegation about what I say or write. I actually take great umbrage at your pomposity in your allegation. I do not ever say that portraits should never ever be horizontal; that's a load of crap that's coming from YOUR mouth, and not mine. Portraits can be horizontal when the subject matter lends itself to a horizontal composition. However, the vast majority of untrained shooters these days have zero idea of how to use compositional space, because they are self-taught, and they have no idea that there is a better way, and an inferior way, to compose a photo, or a painting, or a drawing. I rail against people who do not understand the FIRST rule of composing, and that is to make the correct decision on orientation!

This is not about "rules"; it is about the proper UNDERSTANDING of how composition works. This is something even more fundamental than a rule; it is a "concept"; it is a base-level decision. You're making a very simple mistake of my views on this entire situation, by attributing something I have NEVER said or written to me. Almost invariably, I bring up the idea of a completed pose or an incompleted pose; posing is an entire sub-area of drawing, painting, and photography. Again, I have NEVER, ever said a portrait must be vertical; there is a correct or best orientation, and that is dependent upon the pose and the composition. Which is better is situationally dependent, but the majority of self-taught camera-handlers these days have never even been exposed to the concept of DECIDING which is better--tall, or wide. It's not about rules, but about results. Aesthetics.

For a person who wants to publish photos like those in magazines, one needs to understand why one does not cut off the top of the HEAD AND the CHIN, in one frame. It looks like an amateur strobist took the shot. There's zero justification for the horizontal on this shot. Room to "breathe?" Sorry. No sale. She has no top on her head. This is NOT the cinema!

Look through a few hundred shots done by a leading photographer in this genre. You will see many examples of when and WHY a shot might be framed as a horizontal, and when and why it would be framed as a vertical. Your argument about human tripods is a facile argumentative tactic.

Again, your idea that "the days of tyrannical reign of portraiture rules" is what this is about is a hugely, fundamentally flawed argumentative assertion. This is not about "rules", but rather about a FUNDAMENTAL DESIGN PRINCIPLE. One does not match stripes with plaids...no matter how trendy it might be. One does not pair gasoline with flame. Of course, as more and more unstudied and uneducated people pick up cameras, we're seeing more and more fundamental compositional and posing errors being rationalized by people who have no training or education in design, or composition, but are pretty good at getting exposures correct and running "files" through Photoshop. People today, many, are not even studying composition, but they break their backs studying "Lightroom".

Take a look at how a true master of people photography approaches photos very much like the one brought up for discussion:

http://www.herbritts.com/images/

By the by, it's not just "my opinion" I am advancing--it's a fundamental principle of art, and of composition, and of design...it'd be nice if you wouldn't target me unfairly by attributing something I have never said to me. Seriously. Vertical compositions are not a requisite. But what *is* required is understanding when horizontal framing and "amputations" are inappropriate, or amateurish, or noobish, or flat-out idiotic.

 

[Derrel]

Here are a few articles dealing with the basic, fundamental decision that must be made on each photograph taken or made with a non-square format camera.

composition-vertical or horizontal

Picture Composition - Vertical And Horizontal Balance (published in 1903)

Exercise 13: Vertical and horizontal frames | Dominic Allkins photography blog

Composition: Part II - Horizontal or Vertical (published in 2001)

Composition & Design: Understanding it - Using it

Composition in Photography - Horizontal vs. Vertical Photo Compositions

The Elements of Art (Education at the Getty)

Photography Tips - Composition Refresher - Vertical or horizontal - from Wild Things Photography

Horizontal or Vertical Format?

Composition: From Snapshots to Great Shots > Lines, Shapes, and Patterns > Vertical or Horizontal Shots? - Pg. 97: Safari Books Online

 

[table1349]

Very simple shot. Too bad it was shot as a horizontal....she's head-less and bust-less...would have looked like a pro shot it if the camera had been oriented correctly.

I gotta say Derrel. I almost always really respect your opinions, but you've been like a broken record lately with the whole portraits should never ever ever be horizontal thing, and I have to say that I absolutely disagree. I'm fully aware of the rules of portraiture, and with the fact that the vertical orientation is called Portrait for this very reason.

But the days of the tyrannical reign of portraiture rules are coming to a close. Granted that are a lot of people out there who just don't know anything about the rules, and make all sorts of mistakes in their portraits; and these images almost exclusively look bad. Because they don't know even know the rules that they are breaking.

But there is a whole host of modern portrait photographers who are breaking the rules of portraiture intentionally and with great success. Portraiture is taken a massive swing towards artistic expression, naturalism and away from the formula that has been it's master for the last few generations.

I think this shot works very well as a horizontal, and it has a completely different feeling than if it were vertical. This image has room to breathe, and is a little bit more than just a portrait. If it were presented vertically, it would be nothing but a head and shoulders, with no room, and certainly no room to imagine the image as anything but just a picture of a face.

The idea that the image would only look pro if it had been oriented properly is sad to me and reduces portrait professionals to nothing more than human tripods that hold a camera and repeat a process governed by rules (which is what they have been for the last few decades) rather than artists, who understand guidelines, but ultimately make their own creative decisions according to each situation.

But the days of the tyrannical reign of portraiture rules are coming to a close.

Wrong. You can put a dress on a pig, but it is still a pig. Portraiture is just that portraiture, with standards by which it is defined. Otherwise every photo that has a human being in it be it great or trash is a portrait.

The excuse that the rules of portraiture are coming to a close is just that, and excuse for what ever reason someone has to make it. Frankly I don't care if it is because they just can't take a decent portrait, don't have the gear they feel they need to take good portraits or whether they are of the "new generation with a new vision" it is just an excuse. It's like trying to state that Picasso's Guernica was his vision of a Neo-classical painting.

That's not to say that they aren't photographs or they can't be pleasing, they just are not portraits. Just as Picasso's paintings are art, they just aren't Neo-classical.

 

[GeneralBenson]

Ok, so apparently I've punched a beehive here. Sorry bout that.

Derrell - I didn't mean that to come across as a personal attack or be inflammatory. I always seem to write my most potentially provocative posts right before bed, in the shortest amount of time, with the least tact. So, sorry that you took offense. And sorry if I put words in your mouth. But I was going off the fact that in the past few months, I seem to remember you dismissing quite a few 'portraits' right away for not being vertical.

I completely agree that it is all about understanding, not rules. But rules, when left to themselves, don't teach understanding. I do agree the in most cases there is a better presentation and a worse one. But I'm completely against rules as absolutes, and the idea that one thing is universally right and something else is universally wrong.

There's zero justification for the horizontal on this shot. Room to "breathe?" Sorry. No sale.

It's statements like the above that I have a hard time sitting easy with. And it's statements like this that make me thing of nothing but the rules calling the shots. It's a pretty bold statement to say that there is "zero Justification" for anything in art. At best, you are qualified to say that you see no justification, but no one is qualified to speak sucha justification out of existence. But you've gone one step further by invalidating my opinion because it doesn't line up with what you've come to understand as being 'correct'. I'm sorry, but you don't have the authority to overrule my opinion. The very foundation of art is that it's about appealing to people. Different things appeal to different people, and when the rules try to subjugate art by declaring what someone is or isn't allowed to like the look of, then the chain of command is out of whack.

The rules exist because there are things that generally look better than other things. I'm not against the rules. I think everyone should study them extensively. But ultimately, the rules are not in charge of what people think looks good. The rules were meant to be guidelines to help people recreate what people have already decided they think looks good. Certain things just are more pleasing looking than other things. The rules were meant to serve the tastes of the viewers, not decree what the viewers are allowed to enjoy. Rules have their place in learning, but after they are known and understood, it all comes down to what looks good, which is a personal decision by the artist, and may not be agreed upon by all.

I read all of the links you posted, and none of them went any deeper than a rudimentary and shallow explanation of composition. Most of them just feature people explaining things in extreme brevity, then using bad photos to prove their points. Quite a few of them just used obvious examples of compoistions that don't work in a given format to try and prove the rule. But a few of them were more along the lines of orientation being an important choice, and sometimes one or the other is more appropriate than the other, but it all ultimately comes down to photographer's choice, and that nothing is flat out wrong.

I find the image in question enjoyable. I could maybe do with the top of her head, but it honestly, it doesn't bother me that much. If I were to change it in any way, it would only be to slightly open up the crop. I would leave the orientation the same. I prefer it in horizontal over vertical. The photographer and the OP apparently also like it that way. I visited the photographer's site, and found many more examples of horizontal oriented 'portraits' with the top of heads cut off, and honestly, I don't think many of them looked good at all. That's why the rule exists. Most of the time it doesn't look good. But there are exceptions to every rule. A picture's ultimate job is to connect to the viewer, and if people are connecting to this image, than no rules have the authority to say it's bad photo. You can say you don't like it. You can say it's not a good example of what generally looks good. But you can't say that it is therefore disqualified from being enjoyed by anyone else or that it is wrong.

The rules are a reflection of what looks good. What looks good isn't a reflection of what the rules declare.

Final Disclaimer - I'm still not trying to be inflammatory, nor am I attacking you, nor am I all heated up over here. I"m calm and just debating, so lets keep this cool.

*flame suit on*

 

[GeneralBenson]

But the days of the tyrannical reign of portraiture rules are coming to a close.

Wrong. You can put a dress on a pig, but it is still a pig. Portraiture is just that portraiture, with standards by which it is defined. Otherwise every photo that has a human being in it be it great or trash is a portrait.

The excuse that the rules of portraiture are coming to a close is just that, and excuse for what ever reason someone has to make it. Frankly I don't care if it is because they just can't take a decent portrait, don't have the gear they feel they need to take good portraits or whether they are of the "new generation with a new vision" it is just an excuse. It's like trying to state that Picasso's Guernica was his vision of a Neo-classical painting.

That's not to say that they aren't photographs or they can't be pleasing, they just are not portraits. Just as Picasso's paintings are art, they just aren't Neo-classical.

I didn't say that the rules are coming to a close. I said the their rules as ultimate authority on what is allowed to be considered good is. The rules have been in charge for a long time, and rightly so. I think the mostly express what looks best. But between people being sick of the static look obtained when the rules are the only thing paid attention to, and the sheer number of people who don't know them at all, I they are under immense scrutiny right now. We are experiencing a giant backlash against what has been deemed correct, both by those who are intentionally challenging it, and by those who don't even know they do it. They rules themselves will no longer just be taken as how things must go, but will be re-examined and weighed. People will re-decide what they think looks good, and rules will be changed, modified or forgotten. Thus is art. The evolution and advancement of art almost always comes at the expense of the rules and pre-conceived notions of yesterday.

 

[table1349]

But the days of the tyrannical reign of portraiture rules are coming to a close.

Wrong. You can put a dress on a pig, but it is still a pig. Portraiture is just that portraiture, with standards by which it is defined. Otherwise every photo that has a human being in it be it great or trash is a portrait.

The excuse that the rules of portraiture are coming to a close is just that, and excuse for what ever reason someone has to make it. Frankly I don't care if it is because they just can't take a decent portrait, don't have the gear they feel they need to take good portraits or whether they are of the "new generation with a new vision" it is just an excuse. It's like trying to state that Picasso's Guernica was his vision of a Neo-classical painting.

That's not to say that they aren't photographs or they can't be pleasing, they just are not portraits. Just as Picasso's paintings are art, they just aren't Neo-classical.

I didn't say that the rules are coming to a close. I said the their rules as ultimate authority on what is allowed to be considered good is. The rules have been in charge for a long time, and rightly so. I think the mostly express what looks best. But between people being sick of the static look obtained when the rules are the only thing paid attention to, and the sheer number of people who don't know them at all, I they are under immense scrutiny right now. We are experiencing a giant backlash against what has been deemed correct, both by those who are intentionally challenging it, and by those who don't even know they do it. They rules themselves will no longer just be taken as how things must go, but will be re-examined and weighed. People will re-decide what they think looks good, and rules will be changed, modified or forgotten. Thus is art. The evolution and advancement of art almost always comes at the expense of the rules and pre-conceived notions of yesterday.

I gotta say Derrel. I almost always really respect your opinions, but you've been like a broken record lately with the whole portraits should never ever ever be horizontal thing, and I have to say that I absolutely disagree. I'm fully aware of the rules of portraiture, and with the fact that the vertical orientation is called Portrait for this very reason.

But the days of the tyrannical reign of portraiture rules are coming to a close. Granted that are a lot of people out there who just don't know anything about the rules, and make all sorts of mistakes in their portraits; and these images almost exclusively look bad. Because they don't know even know the rules that they are breaking.

But there is a whole host of modern portrait photographers who are breaking the rules of portraiture intentionally and with great success. Portraiture is taken a massive swing towards artistic expression, naturalism and away from the formula that has been it's master for the last few generations.

I think this shot works very well as a horizontal, and it has a completely different feeling than if it were vertical. This image has room to breathe, and is a little bit more than just a portrait. If it were presented vertically, it would be nothing but a head and shoulders, with no room, and certainly no room to imagine the image as anything but just a picture of a face.

The idea that the image would only look pro if it had been oriented properly is sad to me and reduces portrait professionals to nothing more than human tripods that hold a camera and repeat a process governed by rules (which is what they have been for the last few decades) rather than artists, who understand guidelines, but ultimately make their own creative decisions according to each situation. __________________

Apparently you did say that the rules of portraiture are coming to a close. Are you a politician running for office by chance?:lmao: :lmao: :lmao:

Again in terms of portraiture, which is what we are talking about, the rules are not in some great area of flux. Owning a Volkswagon doesn't make you a NASCAR Driver, just a driver. You want to race in NASCAR you have to conform to the rules. Nothing wrong with being a driver or driving a Volkswagon. But taking the family on a trip on the highway is not the same as driving in a NASCAR event.

A photograph of an individual can be outstanding, and very pleasing, but that does not make it a portrait just a great photograph. Nothing wrong with it being a very appealing photograph. You seem to be confusing professional, what ever that means to you, and portraiture.

 

[themedicine]

I'm going to disregard the middle of this thread as I have nothing important to offer, but I will say my deduction of this photograph is one light source and possibly a reflector, but I would actually lean away from that idea if I had to choose. I think she's very close to a wall and the DOF is shallow enough to get rid of any detail on said wall. just my .02 on the original image.

 

[GeneralBenson]

I gotta say Derrel. I almost always really respect your opinions, but you've been like a broken record lately with the whole portraits should never ever ever be horizontal thing, and I have to say that I absolutely disagree. I'm fully aware of the rules of portraiture, and with the fact that the vertical orientation is called Portrait for this very reason.

But the days of the tyrannical reign of portraiture rules are coming to a close. Granted that are a lot of people out there who just don't know anything about the rules, and make all sorts of mistakes in their portraits; and these images almost exclusively look bad. Because they don't know even know the rules that they are breaking.

But there is a whole host of modern portrait photographers who are breaking the rules of portraiture intentionally and with great success. Portraiture is taken a massive swing towards artistic expression, naturalism and away from the formula that has been it's master for the last few generations.

I think this shot works very well as a horizontal, and it has a completely different feeling than if it were vertical. This image has room to breathe, and is a little bit more than just a portrait. If it were presented vertically, it would be nothing but a head and shoulders, with no room, and certainly no room to imagine the image as anything but just a picture of a face.

The idea that the image would only look pro if it had been oriented properly is sad to me and reduces portrait professionals to nothing more than human tripods that hold a camera and repeat a process governed by rules (which is what they have been for the last few decades) rather than artists, who understand guidelines, but ultimately make their own creative decisions according to each situation. __________________

Apparently you did say that the rules of portraiture are coming to a close. Are you a politician running for office by chance?:lmao: :lmao: :lmao:

Again in terms of portraiture, which is what we are talking about, the rules are not in some great area of flux. Owning a Volkswagon doesn't make you a NASCAR Driver, just a driver. You want to race in NASCAR you have to conform to the rules. Nothing wrong with being a driver or driving a Volkswagon. But taking the family on a trip on the highway is not the same as driving in a NASCAR event.

A photograph of an individual can be outstanding, and very pleasing, but that does not make it a portrait just a great photograph. Nothing wrong with it being a very appealing photograph. You seem to be confusing professional, what ever that means to you, and portraiture.

You've emboldened what I said twice, and paraphrased it twice more, and yet you still apparently haven't read it. I did not say the days of the rules of portraiture were coming to a close. I said the the days of the tyrannical reign of them was coming to a close. If I say the rule of President Bush came to a close, the president himself did not cease being. He's just no longer the governing power.

I suppose the that argument that since this image falls outside of some technical definition, by the book, of a portraiture, then it is not a portrait. But I would argue that that is my whole point. What is considered a portrait is changing. What is considered pleasing in a portrait is changing. I think the definition of portraiture is a bit looser than you lead one to think. I did some searching around to see what definitions I could find fora portrait, and these are some of what I came up with:

-A portrait is a painting, photograph, sculpture or or other artistic representation of a person, in which the face and its expression is predominant.

-A pictorial representation of a person usually showing the face

-A representation of a person or group or animal on a two-dimensional medium that typically also shows some aspect symbolic of the subject.

I see nothing about aspect ratios, orientations, lighting schemes, poses or any other rules. As far as I'm concerned, if an image is primarily about the person that is in it, than it's a portrait. Now there are still sub-classifications within portraiture, like formal portraiture or traditional portraiture. But I think portrait photography, up until recently, has taken a big step away from the artistic definition of a portrait, and starting to box it up by saying it can only be these certain things. The movement I see going on all around in photography, is taking portraiture back out of the box and letting it again be any image that is about a person, and helps the viewer to connect to the person or know something more about them.

 

[table1349]

You've emboldened what I said twice, and paraphrased it twice more, and yet you still apparently haven't read it. I did not say the days of the rules of portraiture were coming to a close. I said the the days of the tyrannical reign of them was coming to a close. If I say the rule of President Bush came to a close, the president himself did not cease being. He's just no longer the governing power.

I suppose the that argument that since this image falls outside of some technical definition, by the book, of a portraiture, then it is not a portrait. But I would argue that that is my whole point. What is considered a portrait is changing. What is considered pleasing in a portrait is changing. I think the definition of portraiture is a bit looser than you lead one to think. I did some searching around to see what definitions I could find fora portrait, and these are some of what I came up with:

-A portrait is a painting, photograph, sculpture or or other artistic representation of a person, in which the face and its expression is predominant.

-A pictorial representation of a person usually showing the face

-A representation of a person or group or animal on a two-dimensional medium that typically also shows some aspect symbolic of the subject.

I see nothing about aspect ratios, orientations, lighting schemes, poses or any other rules. As far as I'm concerned, if an image is primarily about the person that is in it, than it's a portrait. Now there are still sub-classifications within portraiture, like formal portraiture or traditional portraiture. But I think portrait photography, up until recently, has taken a big step away from the artistic definition of a portrait, and starting to box it up by saying it can only be these certain things. The movement I see going on all around in photography, is taking portraiture back out of the box and letting it again be any image that is about a person, and helps the viewer to connect to the person or know something more about them.

So is this a portrait or a snapshot? Flickr: Please wait...

How about this? Flickr: Please wait...

Or this? All sizes | Tokyo snapshot 31 | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

This one? All sizes | Snapshot: "Timid" the hunter. "Timmy" for short. | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

Maybe this one? All sizes | Formal Portrait in Black | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

 

[cyngus]

this shot is way simpler than u think haha.. just get a strobe head and softbox or umbrella and a model and test it out for yourself =) 1 light can do everything you see in this shot

doubt the photog used a light on the background.. shadows if there were any are probably out of the frame.. subject was probably off the backdrop a bit.. and there is a lot of DOF .. probably using a tight lens at like.. 1.8 or something.. so all the background detail is washed away..

pretty girl =)