Photo Friday - 5 Ways to Instantly Improve Your Environmental Portraits
Learn these composition tricks to create more powerful outdoor photos
In photography, we like diagonal lines. Therefore, place your subject with their shoulders at an angle to the camera.
In this photo, I used a shallow depth of field (DOF) to blur the background so it wouldn’t compete with the subject.
The subject’s hair is full, creating a frame around her face. That frame sets her apart from the background.
I left too much room around the subject because I was far away from her. That created too much headroom at the top of the frame and too much of her arms and distracting sleeves at the bottom.
I changed the aperture (narrowed it) one stop, which brought the background into focus a little bit. Then, I simply directed the subject to tilt her head slightly in this photo.
The shallow depth of field (DOF) and hair framing the subject’s face separate her from the background.
Raising the shadows softens the look and feel. I also straightened the horizon.
We created a relaxed, friendly feeling with the subject’s body positioned on an angle, leaning on her left hand, and featuring a slight head tilt.
While the background is more in focus, her hair frames and separates her from the background.
While this 2/3 profile is good, there is nothing to separate her from the background, which is too much in focus and competes with her nose and the back of her head.
The subject is almost centered, with mostly empty space behind her. Cropping closer to her back would place her in the right third of the frame, allowing plenty of “nose room” as she looks out of the frame.
Nose Room
Nose room refers to the direction the subject is looking. Imagine a line extending from the tip of the subject’s nose toward the direction they are looking.
Leave more empty space in front of this line than behind the subject’s head. It makes the image feel more natural and dynamic, while also allowing the viewer’s eye to follow the subject’s gaze, thereby enhancing the narrative or emotional impact of the portrait.
Takeaways
A shallow depth of field (DOF) separates your subject from the background, making it less distracting.
Leave empty space in front of the subject, giving them “nose room” to make it more dynamic and natural.
Raising the shadows softens the look and feel of an image.
Effective cropping places your subject correctly in the frame.
Head tilts help your subject look relaxed.
Did this help you see the elements in portrait photography? Let me know your thoughts.
Photo Friday is a weekly critique of a photograph I captured. I discuss elements like composition, lighting, and color balance so you learn how I “see” and pick up tips to improve your images. If you'd like to participate, please send me one of your photos, and I'll review it in a post on Photo Friday.
Read last week’s Photo Friday. It’s about…cheesecake!
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So interesting! It seems simple, but when I think about doing this on the fly, it feels like a lot! Which aspect is a good one to start with for beginners?
What a great lesson in photography! Thank you, Julie. I learned so much about what will make my photos stronger!