What is an environmental portrait? An environmental portrait is a portrait of someone who has been taken in their place of work, which is the subject's usual environment. This can be their home or workplace, but usually within the image, it reflects and illuminates the person's personal life, seen through the surrounding objects within the picture itself. One photographer who does this is Sally Mann, as seen in her photos like the one below called 'Candy Cigarette'.Within environmental portraits the subject tends to have a relaxed and calm face, in order to create an effect inside the image itself, whilst allowing the image to be emphasized due to its dramatic characteristics. Sally Mann tended to focus on a individual face within her images, to really make out the backgrounds of the character within, allowing us to see the conditions many of the subjects were brought up in.
Daily Archives: October 31, 2017
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Environmental Portraits
What is it?
An environmental portrait is a portrait taken of a person or people in a situation that they live in and a place that says something about who they are. It is often a place of work, rest or play. In simpler terms any portrait which gets us to know about the life terms, their physical and biological interactions with the local ecology, showing their nativity can be called as an Environmental Portrait.
They are interesting and easy to shoot because:
- They give context to the subject you’re photographing
- They also often give the viewer real insight into the personality and lifestyle of your subject.
Source for both the information and photo is above
environmental portraits
An environmental portrait is a photograph in which the subject is photographed in their environment which highlights who the subject is as a person - where they live, where they work or their biggest interest. The mise-en-scene reflects them and defines them as a person. Each of these photographs clearly reflect who the subjects are even in the most minimal scenes. http://www.aaronleefineman.com/portfolio/01.html
Arnold Newman – Environmental Portraiture
The work of Arnold Newman
Arnold Newman was best known for his environmental portraiture of all kinds of people from everyday strangers to big industry names. His collections of black and white photography captured these individuals in their natural environment in order to display how each individual’s environment is so diverse from another.
“For five decades Arnold Newman stood behind his camera, facing individuals and egos that have shaped the realities of twentieth century life. Emperors, poets, dancers, composers, presidents, painters and shoemakers have all collaborated with him, placing themselves in his trust to be properly portrayed.”
Here is some of his work showing how he went about his portraiture photography…
His work showed the emotions, the surroundings and the spaces in which these people are situated in everyday life.
Work Analysis
This photograph taken by Arnold Newman, is of Igor Stravinsky, an influential Russian composer. The image simply displays the basic context of Stravinsky’s everyday life as a composer, through the association of the grand piano which represents and symbolizes his musical career that has made him who he is. In a way Stravinsky has been subtly framed in this photograph by the lines and open angle of the piano, in which he is within the angle, therefore drawing the viewers eye to his and the tonal split in the wall behind. The dark tones of the piano and the composer stand out to the lighter tones of the wall behind them. This emphasizes the the parts of the photograph that could be considered most important and contextual. The image its self appears to be of an only slightly under exposed with a high contrast as the dark tones in the image stand out considerably. The expression of Stravinsky in this image captures the feelings that he would experience on a day to day basis with the constant feeling of needing to compose songs, with most days not coming up with anything new making his time monotonous, hence his tiresome expression.
Environmental Portraiture
environmental portraiture are images taken of people in their natural environments, this is commonly though of as their place of work but could also include their home of situation in their daily life. most environmental portraits focus on a person in relation to their surroundings, this could be that their surrounding reflect or contrast with the person. the point of this style of photography is to shed light on characters lives that may otherwise be unknown to us. in a way this counts as documentary photography due to the factual elements that can come from them. Rather than being taken in a studio with false lighting, environmental portraits are taken in the moments, this means lighting and settings in the image all help to tell a story about the person.
https://digital-photography-school.com/environmental-portraits/
What is Environmental Portraiture?
Environmental portraiture is portraiture which is executed in the subject’s normal environment, this emphasizes the subject’s life through their surroundings. Environmental portraits give context to the subject being photographed. Environmental portraits lie between quite strict studio portraits and candid portraits; the subject is relaxed however is aware they are being photographed.
Here are some examples found online of how environmental portraiture can be executed…
When executing an environmental portrait it is most effective for the subject of the piece to be facing and if possible looking into the lens of the camera which creates an emotional eye contact, which depending on the expression of the subject could imply further context to the image.
The purpose of environmental portraiture could be to document or display the everyday life of a certain individual, whilst they are in their usual environment.
Presenting And Evaluating Final Images
environmental portraits
what is an environmental portraiture ?
environmental portraiture is all abut emphasizing someones way of life and the connotations of their own everyday ,the portraits executed their typical environmental in order to illuminate the subjects life and environment in which makes them who they are.
The surroundings or background is a key element in environmental portraiture, and is used to convey further information about the person being photographed.
To me the images allow someone to adopt a self sense of their own story and a combination of their past and future .It demonstrates a path in which they are subdued and live and a journey that can almost be taken to live their own journey too.
for many people this would be highly revolving around the subject of their work,but unfortunately for others it would be a conclusion of suffering and or being in an area in which they are unhappy,but it is hard to tell due to the natural expression of their face.
below are some examples of environmental portraits:
This image is a clear representation of a large sense of vulnerability and struggle,how everything he has is all held upon himself and lack of possession.
wheras:here you can see a musician,subjected to a sense of overworking seen throughout his positioning, but unlike the first image it revolves around his work and his accomplishments that make him who he is.
