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How to shoot lifestyle portraits
Techniques
24 October 2007 12:39
Great portraits often reveal something about the person in the picture and give an insight into their personality, lifestyle, pastimes or occupation. There really is no better way to portray who your sitter is than to photograph them in their usual environment.
This style of location portrait takes more preparation and thought than usual.
First, have a good look around the location and observe your model going about their usual tasks. Talk to them about how they spend their time to get a feel for the props you could use and work out potential images you could take. You’ll then be able to communicate this to your model so they can help you capture the ideas with your camera – it really is a team effort.
An environmental portrait is not generally a candid snap: the subject is posing for the camera, but in a more natural-looking context than a formal studio portrait. At the same time, it’s more than a nice snap of a friend enjoying one of their favourite hobbies – you should also be looking to capture a dramatic, artistic composition.
Don’t be afraid to exaggerate the setting or pose to hammer home the mood you want to portray. This may mean you’ll need to select the best props and best-looking locations, even if that’s not really what your portrait subect would normally do. Talk to your subject if you’re worried your ideas might not be accurate enough to be realistic. After all, they’ll probably know more about their hobbies and interests than you do.
Here we decided to photograph horse enthusiast, Hannah. After looking around the well-weathered and rustic-looking stables, we decided to make the most of the olde worlde setting.
On our shoot, it soon became apparent that a normal day at the stables wasn’t anything to get very excited about. There was lots of great potential for candid shots, but nothing obviously worthy of taking one step further. The thought of modern clothes and equipment wasn’t gelling with the antique surroundings and the look we were aiming for. Instead, Hannah agreed that the contrasting tones of her formal dressage outfit would be much more dramatic. You’d never see anyone wearing these clothes around the stables normally, unless they were competing, but in a single staged image, who’s to know any different? Hannah helpfully offered to wear a formal hairnet to make it all the more theatrical.
Following the olde worlde theme, we wanted to play on the old stereotype of equestrian folk and exaggerate their perceived personality traits through the pose and facial expressions of the model. Taking inspiration from portraits taken by Frank Sutcliffe in the late 1800s, we felt a stern, stately and no-nonsense expression and pose would bring the shot together nicely. We relayed this idea to Hannah so she’d know what was required. She soon got into character and blended in perfectly with the rural surroundings. Here you can see how a typical big toothy smile crushes the solemn mood. It’s a nice snap to put on the mantelpiece, but nothing we prefer the other version.