I thought today I’d finish off the portrait tips I posted at the beginning of the week. Once again I’m not going into much detail, the purpose of this post is just to give a taster of different techniques and to get your own creative juices pumping. This is all about giving a twist or a bit of spice to your portraits.

6. Camera Position
Experiment with your camera at different heights in relation to your subject(s) to get a different point of view. Shooting from a low or high perspective is also a great way to adding leading lines into a shot.

threehundredandthirtythree by Simon Pollock (gtvone)

7. Eyes
A good pair of eyes can make a portrait, they can convey so much and hide so little. Play with eye contact between lens and subject but also try portraits where your subjects attention is elsewhere maybe looking away from camera.

Girl and Dolly by Louise Turner (Susan & her 5d)

8. Shadows and Silhouettes
Sometimes less detail equals more interest. Shadows and silhouettes of a subject are a great way to suggest what a subject looks like without having to provide the details.

day 30 reject by Stuart Mackenzie (disco~stu)

9. Costume
Hey dressing up isn’t just for kids!! Let your imagination and wardrobe run wild and transport your subject into an alter-ego or legendary super-hero. A great way to interact with your subject. Lots of fun!

FDF Ego Puff by Paul Broome (aka fwumpbungle)

10. Action
That’s right get them moving- jumping, skipping, bouncing, walking, dancing, running it’s all good. Play with slow shutter to get motion blur or fast shutter to freeze the action. Consider making a montage of a series of shots over a short period of time to present the action from beginning to end.

Karate Kid by Nathan Pask (aka bigcrustyape)

Thats all folks!! 10 ideas which hopefully have given you some thoughts to add interest to your portraits. I hope you’ve found them useful…..please let us know if it has inspired you to try something different and post up a link in the comments here so we can see the results.