Environmental Portraiture

The essence of environmental portraiture is to capture the subject in the context of their surroundings. The best portraits are achieved when the photographer and subject exist within a common space, completely aware of each other’s existence. The photograph then becomes a reflection of this relationship. In this post, I will tell you about the process I used in a recent portrait shoot to capture some wonderful images.

Background to the shoot

The location of the shoot was in the town of Aalborg, Denmark, where I was photographing the new junior world record holder for the dead lift. The previous record for her category (under 18, 63kg weight class) was 155kg, which she broke by lifting 180kg.

Lighting problems

On the day of the shoot, there were some issues with the lighting: I wasn’t able to use a flash because the Danish national TV station, TV2, was also filming and the gym itself was very poorly lit. I’m not a big fan of shooting at high ISO’s due to the associated noise and general lower image quality, so I decided to use fast prime lenses, wide open.

Photographer-subject relationship

As a portrait photographer, I have learnt that my best images are when I’m close to my subject. In order to get a truly emotional response, the photographer needs to occupy the same world as the subject – a maximum distance of two metres away. This means that lens focal length should be in the range of 35mm to 50mm.

Camera set-up for the shoot

My three favourite prime lenses are 35mm, 50mm and 85mm (all fast at approx. f1.4). I used the 35mm for this shoot as it allowed me to include an environmental context and also stay within two metres of my subject. I could have framed my chosen angles with either the 50mm or 85mm, but it would have required me to stand too far away. The 35mm captured the scene very naturally and added a great deal of realism to the images. 

As the gym was poorly lit, a correct exposure was achievable at f1.4, 80th second at ISO 400. Shooting at f1.4 can be restricting in terms of its limited depth of field (DOF); however, a 35mm with a subject distance of two metres means the DOF is adequate around 15cm - pretty much the depth of a face. I really like how such a selective focus puts emphasis on my subject and controls the draw of the viewers gaze.

The results

The image in the blog is from the shoot. I wanted to capture the subject and her surroundings but also include the TV2 journalist. I positioned myself three-quarters towards the subject to give depth to the image and to allow her head to be cleanly framed by the white wall. Additionally, this positioned my main subject on the right-hand third and the journalist on the left-hand third, which gave compositional balance. The journalist is soft yet his attention is on the subject and this draws the viewer’s gaze to my intended point of focus. Shooting through the foreground gym equipment adds a further dynamic to the image.

How do you achieve good results when shooting portraits? Please let us know in the comments.

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Written by: Robert Irving

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