Portrait Photography Tips

Follow these portrait photography tips and your portraits of people will come out terrific. These tips can be used on group family portraits as well as pictures of individual people.

There are also many links at the end of this article
on posing tips and ideas for families, babies and children.

In this article, I've included a few portraits of one individual to illustrate the techniques. You can apply these techniques to individuals within a group or family portrait to improve the overall pose.

Keep it Simple

Look for simple, natural backgrounds that are not distracting. Don't get too elaborate with lighting schemes. Look for natural, existing light that compliments your subject.

Use props

In this photo for a high school senior, we used his bat as a prop for him to lean on.

I sat him on the bench in the dugout facing toward the field which became my light source.

The brick wall inside the dugout provided a nice, simple non-distracting background.

In this full length portrait, I didn't have him standing straight with both feet on the ground and both arms dangling at his sides.

Both of his arms and his left leg were angled to create some diagonal elements and create visual interest.

You may also be interested in additional ideas for taking pictures of individuals with more on: Portrait Photography Technique.

Try getting creative when you take family portraits with these photography tips. There are a few links at the bottom of this page with related topics.

Plan the clothing for your portraits

What you wear has a big impact on how you look.

Take a minute to think about color coordinating with other people or with the background in your photo.

Your portrait photography will look like it was shot by a professional photographer when care is taken when choosing the right clothing to wear: Portrait Clothing

Add a Little Lean

Generally, it's not desirable to have your subjects shoulders at exactly the same height.

Having your subject at a 45 degree angle or leaning a bit in one direction will help you avoid this common photo mistake.

In this prom photo, I had my subject place his foot on the second step up toward his back porch. I then had him lean forward and rest his arms on his knee.

The leaning forward pose is traditionally a masculine pose. I then had him turn his head to his right just a smidgen and him look back to the camera.

Perhaps it may seem a bit unusual. You may have to step out of your comfort zone, but you should try to test your photography creativity and read this photo article on How to Take a Self Portrait

These are a few portrait photography tips that will give you a good start. As always, it is my wish that you have fun while you're getting educated with tips on taking digital photography.

Best wishes,
Photo Tip Man

p.s. Portrait Photography Books. In addition to this Better Digital Photo Tips web site, other great sources of information are tangible, printed, portrait photography books.

Artistic Portrait Photography. Digital technology has made photography more artistic and less scientific. Advances in photography have leveled the playing field for creativity to explode with portraiture.

Portrait Photography Guide. This is a downloadable guide with portrait photography tips and tricks, covering specific posing techniques for the body, waist, hands, arms bust-line and shoulders. It also covers lighting styles and has a creative section with 20 ways to take stunning portraits.

You may also be interested in a more specific kind of portrait photography tip: Beach Photography Tips or maybe natural Outdoor Family Portraits.

You may also be interested in reading about posing of groups of people: Family Portrait Poses.

Basic Family Portrait Poses. If you are seeking information about basic family portrait poses you will benefit by reading this.

The samples on this page were for an individual. You can see some family portrait samples and get some creative ideas for family group photos here: Family Portrait Ideas.

You can get more ideas for posing a family in their own home environment here: More Family Portrait Ideas.

If you want a few general tips on outdoor family portrait photography, then try this page about Family Portrait Tips.

Clothing for Portraits. This is the second part of the article on portrait clothing and has 10 specific tips on clothing and the other things people wear in their portraits.

Pictures of babies are always fun to take too. Getting the hang of knowing what portrait pose to use for each age group of babies is important. Here are two easy Baby Poses to copy and get great baby pictures.

Photography Poses. If you are interested in how to photograph people in a group of 3, you may want to read this.

Photos of Old People. For some thoughts on photographing the elderly, go to this article.

Portrait Poses for Children If you prefer to do photography of young children, I wrote an article on portrait poses for children.

Can you tell that I have a passion for taking photographs of people? I got my college degree in professional photography, but only took one course on portraiture.

My courses were more oriented toward the technical side of developing, printing and darkroom techniques with still life subjects and not people.

After graduation, I reluctantly took a starting job with a portraiture company and quickly developed an interest in photographing people instead of stationary objects.

Family Portrait Pose Ideas. Here are more portrait photography tips related to posing a family portrait.

Posing Families. I just added this article on posing families. It has two sample photos and a few tips on retouching family portrait poses.

Family Portrait Gallery. You can also get some ideas for family portraits by viewing a gallery of family portrait photography.

Family Portrait Photography. I just added this article on evaluating family portrait photography. What skills should a family portrait photographer have mastered to be a great photographer?

If you were searching for what to do when planning for a family portrait, you can go to: 5 Family Portrait Tips. This is information on what to do when planning a family portrait.

Happy Shooting
Photo TipMan

p.s. As you can see above from the long list of articles on this photography site that I've had a chance to write, there a lot of photography tips available. In addition to portrait photography tips, I divided the other portrait-related articles into two main categories.

They are: Photography Poses and Family Portrait Ideas.

There is more related content on those pages as well as a bunch of links to more information. So I apologize for not having them in a perfectly logical order, but hey I'm a portrait photographer, not a professional web designer. Just click around and you'll find what you're looking for.

Maybe I'll put all of these in a photography book someday.

Back from Portrait Photography Tips to Digital Photo Tips Home page.

Interested in Outdoor Portrait Photography?