Portrait, what an obsession!

I decided this will be the year of the portrait. I never really studied portrait photography, but I felt it could be a lot of fun (and it is). I didn’t tried much before, because I had to overcome my first fear, which is to approach a model. Obviously not because I am embarrassed to talk with a nice lady, but because I don’t feel I am good enough to justify bothering someone. Luckily I met Debora, who isn’t a model, but likes to be photographed, so we decided to try!

We were prepared to shoot for hours, but instead we realized we had only 40 minutes, just the time for her to start to feel comfortable. I also realised I made a ton of mistakes after the photos were taken. However, as result, I started to review my lighting knowledge, realising I forgot a lot and started to study posing. Wow there is so much to learn about modelling, very interesting stuff! Topic that will let me understand even better how lens and lighting work in practice.

The whole session was shot with the Pentax K-1 and the Pentax FA 50 mm F1.2. The 50mm is gorgeous on a Full Frame. I also noticed how fun is to shoot portraits with a prime, really, I was continuously moving around and Debora was amused by it. That’s why I am now torn between to buy a 85mm or buy a 70-200 2.8f. I own already a 35mm, a 50mm and 105mm, so 85mm would be the only lens I would miss as I wouldn’t shoot longer than 105mm.

Eventually I think we took a dozen of photos that were relatively flattering for her, but still full of technical issues. These are the best 4:

Looking forward to shoot more now that I am understood my mistakes!

These are the resources among the ones that I read/saw last week which I strongly recommend to you to see in case you are interested in portraits:

Frequency separation has became the most important tool in my retouching workflow now!

Every tip from you is welcome!

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