COMPOSITIONS AND ANGLES

There's a million things to talk about when it comes to photography and today I want to tackle shooting different compositions and angles when taking portraits or editorials! I'll be using these stunning pictures of my best friend Jenna (@new_jennaration22) , which I took when I came down to visit her!

Whenever shooting photos of someone, in this specific case we wanted to tackle some outfit photos; I always make sure there's different angles for each outfit for more variety when posting on her instagram. Even in general, for engagements, weddings, portraits of any kind or editorials there should always be full body, mid body, half body and close ups from the shoulders up. I'm telling you right now, variety is your best friend. The worst thing would be shooting a session for a client and not having enough photos to send over, and not only enough photos but enough photos that are all the same in composition.

In discussion of editorial images, it's even more important to take up the task of macro shots, full body and mid body. When showcasing fashion, you need to have contrasted angles to really make the editorial interesting. For me visually, it's always so pleasing seeing a close up with a full body shot or landscape shot side by side.

Landscape vs Portrait

Experiment with the idea of shooting horizontal and vertical but in correct terms thats "landscape or portrait" For the image above, I wanted to include Jenna's surroundings with the white plants. I don't usually take landscapes, especially for postings on instagram but no matter what I at least take three landscapes just to have for some reason. I highly recommend shooting in ways where you think you wouldn't need this angle but someday you probably will.

Another thing I'd like to mention is taking pictures with a horizon line on an angle!!! HUGE RED FLAG. It's just a huge pet peeve to see images of landscapes being taken sideways/on an unrealistic angle. Double check in the view finder that the horizon line behind your subject is STRAIGHT. If for some reason you look back in post production and see that your horizon is still on an angle, that can be fixed in Lightroom or Photoshop! (look up tutorials, it's super simple) because I remember for a while I wasn't getting my horizon line straight and I just needed to keep at it until I did, so don't be discouraged if this takes a while to get a hang of as it takes a strong eye to see this little detail!

Mastering what to keep and cut off when shooting a person:

I learned over the years about what to cut out of a image depending on the composition in my view finder- the main thing is feet. For me, as a photographer I either keep the feet in fully with some space to breathe or I cut it out almost completely if not completely. When I mean cut out, I mean crop the image in the camera (ALWAYS IN THE CAMERA NOT IN POST PRODUCTION) When I crop a body, I crop from the knee's up! It's the most flattering way to capture some landscape, having some negative space and balancing your subject!

I really hope to encourage young photographers to test out this skill and see how great the results can be! Grab anyone, from your mom, dad, cousin, siblings or beautiful best friends because everyone deserves to be in front of the camera at least once! Get practicing and never stop, it's the best feeling when you progress in something that makes you feel really good :)

Love

Shivani