Better Portraits

There’s more to portraiture than just pointing a camera at a person and saying smile.

When making a flattering portrait of a person, you looking to accentuate the positives and minimise the negatives.

Here are a few tips to help achieve this.

Make your subjects Slimmer

A very simple way to make someone look slimmer is with creative posing. Do not to have the person square-onto the camera because it emphasises their width. Also you do not want them side-on, which draws attention to any "protruding parts".

Instead place them at an angle to the camera and have them standing rather than sitting, which also prevents the body slumping down.

If they are sitting, have them sit at an angle to the camera and use the hands and arms to cover body parts like their stomach.

Reduce Ear Size

When photographing someone with ears that are too large or protrude, do not photograph them from straight on as this will make the ears very visible.

Pose them at an angle that is three-quarters to you, so that one ear is hidden. Then make sure the person is facing the light in such a way that the exposed ear is in shadow.

Give Stature

If someone is below average height and you want to make them look taller, shoot from a slightly lower angle.

Large Nose

To reduce the size of a large nose shoot them from a slightly higher angle to help reduce its size. Another method would be to take a lens with a long focal length (from around 100mm up), this will help flatten the nose if its long.

If you do photograph a person with a long nose from an angle do not let the nose line break the line on of the far cheek.

Lighting can also help reduce the apparent size of the nose. Use butterfly lighting (placing the main light straight in line with the direction the face is pointing and slightly higher than the face 25-75 degrees) or loop lighting (placing the main light above the face 25-60 degrees and somewhat to the right or left of the of the direction in which the face is pointing) and in both cases keep the light source soft to avoid harsh shadows and if your subject is a male with protruding ears and short hair Butterfly lighting is best avoided.

Reduce a Double Chin to a Single Chin

To help reduce a sagging chin use a camera angle that is slightly above the line of the cheek and ask the sitter to raise their neck and lean it forward slightly, this will help tighten the skin and pull the chin in.

Help reduce Thinning hair and Baldness

To help reduce thinness on top use a camera angle that is slightly below eye height and/or have the subject tip his head up slightly.

Try to keep the amount of light hitting the top of the head to a minimum and definitively avoid using light sources directly over head (so bouncing the flash off the ceiling is probably best avoided in this situation).

Photographing Subjects with Glasses

Have your subject tilt their head a little or to tilt their glasses forward to reduce reflections coming back into your camera lens. Get them to lean forward, with their arms resting on a table or the back of a chair.

chair.

So next time you are going to take a portrait of someone, just stop for a second and try to think how can I make a more flattering result for my subject.They will thank you for it later.