As Bob has said, you are aiming very high indeed by going for results like Dawoud Bey. But aim high and settle for your best shot.
I agree with advice to have the subject interact (be interviewed, have a conversation) with a third party and you can grab shots during that. I have gotten many nice portraits that way, though the subject will be looking away. You can also wait for a lull in the conversation -- especially just after a big laugh -- and say something like, "hey XXX, look over here for a second" and grab a shot or two. I disagree that Dawoud Bey's shots are all window light. From the well defined circular catch lights I'd say that he employs either a simple umbrella or a circular (octagonal) softbox, quite large diameter. Then he carefully adjusts the exposure to mix in the ambient light to be a stop or so under the key light. The effect is very noticeable in #19 where you see a pronounced catchlight and strong contrasty shadows below the subjects arms. But you should concern yourself much more with good expressions than the lighting. A weak expression well-lit is easily trumped by a great expression not as well lit. Just make sure that you don't rely on crappy overhead fluorescent lighting. Use window light, preferably not strong sun, add a reflector on opposite side, and you'll be fine. Good luck! On Tue, Sep 23, 2014 at 8:20 AM, Eric Weir <[email protected]> wrote: > > I’m serving as volunteer photodocumentarian for a youth development project > in the community in which I worked before retiring. The project brings Emory > University students together with middle and high school age youth from this > extremely diverse low-income community around storytelling—collecting > stories, composing stories, presenting stories; stories of the participating > youth themselves—many are refugees and have dramatic stories to tell; stories > of significant adults in the community; and through the latter stories of the > community. > > The director of the project has decided he wants decent, interesting > portraits of the youth for an assignment he wants to give them. He has a > model, a wonderful book of simple, interesting, and beautiful portraits of > high school youth done by a professional photographer, Dawoud Bey. > <http://www.dawoudbey.net/index.php/photographs/class-pictures/> I did the > best I could without notice last week. I spent the hour and a half of the > session getting in the faces of individual students. Gradually the students > I got comfortable with what I was doing. I have not finished processing the > images yet, but I sense that there are going to be very few that I would > consider adequate for the purpose. > > I think I’m going to have to do something different this week, which is the > last opportunity to get the portraits before they are needed. I’m thinking of > taking a tripod, setting it up somewhere it the room in which the project > meets, and pulling students out one-by-one. That is going to be challenging > enough, but I have no idea what to do to get interesting photos, photos that > are at least somewhat revealing of the character of the subjects, once I have > the kids in front of the camera. > > I am frankly intimidated by the director’s model, the Dawoud Bey book. No way > am I going to be able to do anything lie what he has done, but something like > what he has done is what is wanted/needed. Suggestions would be appreciated. > > Thanks, > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > Eric Weir > Decatur, GA USA > [email protected] > > "Our world is a human world." > > - Hilary Putnam > > > > > > > -- > PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List > [email protected] > http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow > the directions. -- -bmw -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
