Portrait

Portrait

 Here's a picture I found on Google which is of a 50's styled photoshoot which did catch my eye I don't know who the photographer was for this picture. It is a formal head shot which was created using a soft box. I like how half of the models face is fully lit and the other not so much. For my picture I do want to have one in black and white as I do like black and white pictures. I think with a black and white picture you can see so much more detail and I think it just overall looks nicer. I like how the model fills the frame and the background is black which makes her the clear focal point and stand out more.










Irving Penn

Irving Penn (June 16, 1917 – October 7, 2009) was an American photographer known for his fashion photography, portraits, and still life's. Penn's career included work at Vogue magazine, and independent advertising work for clients including Issey Miyake and Clinique. His work has been exhibited internationally and continues to inform the art of photography.

While perhaps best known for his fashion photography, Irving Penn’s repertoire also includes portraits of creative greats; ethnographic photographs from around the world; Modernist still life's of food, bones, bottles, metal, found objects, etc.; and stunning scenes from photographic travel essays. That said, his fashion photography is paramount to his career, and his creative eye helped to shape the post-World War II feminine chic and glamour photography of the mid-twentieth century.

Penn was among the first photographers to pose subjects against a simple grey or white backdrop and used this simplicity more effectively than other photographers. Expanding his austere studio surroundings, Penn constructed a set of upright angled backdrops, to form a stark, acute corner. Subjects photographed with this technique included Martha Graham, Marcel Duchamp, Pablo Picasso, Georgia O’Keeffe, W. H. Auden, Igor Stravinsky.

Here is a picture taken by Irving Penn which is taken of Miles Davis. This is an extremely close up of miles which is of his face. This picture is in black and white pretty much like all of Irving's work.

I like this picture as its pretty simple its just his face with no facial expression. The light hits his forehead and middle section of his face which is the most lit up in this picture and then gradually gets darker as around his face its complete darkness. The focal point of the picture would be his face as its the only thing in the picture.

Here is another picture which was taken by Irving Penn or a shoot inspired by his work but either way I liked this picture. This was a fashion shoot picture that he had done. I like how the eyes are really dark with the makeup used making the models eyes really stand out compared to the rest of her face which is quite bright.

From looking at Irving Penn's photos I want my model to keep a straight face show no facial expression. I want the photos to be kept simple so no props or anything to be used.

As I said in one of the other photos I do want to have one of my final portrait photos in black and white.

This is one of the portrait pictures that I have taken. For this picture I wanted my model to show no facial expression just to keep a really straight face which I think I achieved.  I took loads of pictures which show a variety of facial expressions just in case I wanted to use them but for the end product I wanted a straight face which I think I achieved and im happy with.

I had the model sat slightly turned facing the soft box that I was using as I wanted to create a shadow on her face like the picture I found in my research.

I got the model to wear a strapless top as I wanted all of her tattoos to be on show and her hair to be down straight as I wanted all the focus to be on her face.

The main focal point of this picture is the models face as that's really clear and in focus and then my eyes get drawn to the massive tattoos across her chest.

For this picture I had the soft box to the right of my model which is why her right side of her face is more lit up than the other side.

I have photoshopped this picture to start of I cropped the picture down because there was so much of the background on show so I cropped it down after that I got the spot healing tool and removed any blemishes she had and I decided to remove her facial piercings apart from her nose ones. After that I changed the saturation and made the picture black and white. Once I had done that I played around with the brightness and contrast until I was happy with thee picture.

 The camera used to take this picture was a canon EOS 650D, the F - stop was F/ 4, exposure 1/20, ISO - 800, Focal length 27mm and there was no flash used when taking this picture.

This is another one of my portrait pictures. For this picture I wanted the model facing me and her body facing me to compared to the other picture her body is slightly turned as is her head.

I had the model once again keep the strapless top on which is black as I didn't want there to be any bright or splashes of colour I just wanted to keep it basic and as she has black hair I wanted the focus on her face and tattoos not a bright coloured top. The focal point of this picture is her face and chest.

I asked the model to wear fake eye lashes and eye liner just to make her eyes more darker so they eyes stand out more and with the highlighter in the tear duct it really makes the eyes pop and stand out which I wanted.

In this picture I wanted her to keep a straight face once again but this time to have her mouth slightly open. When photoshopping this picture I kept the facial piercings in where as the other portrait picture I had taken them all out apart from her nose ones. I decided to keep these ones in as I liked the look of all of her tattoos on full show and then the piercing I think it gives the picture an edgy rocky look. I like how all of her tattoos are on show I didn't want them covered up as I think they are nice and her tattoos are part of her so I wanted them on show.

When photoshopping this picture I didn't crop the picture as I was using rule of thirds and she is directly in the middle which I liked. I changed the brightness, contrast and saturation and played around with them until I got this picture and I was happy with it.

For this picture I had a light set up to the left of my model which created a shadow the right of the model which I liked.

 The camera used to take this picture was a canon EOS 650D, the F - stop was F/ 3.5, exposure 1/20, ISO - 800, Focal length 18mm and there was no flash used when taking this picture.