Portraits that Matter to You...

You know how mechanics often have broken down cars, carpenters often have leaky roofs and painters often have scratched and dented walls? The same can often be said about photographers, who never seem to have beautiful portraits of the ones they love. Well, a few evenings ago we turned the TV off, set up a portable studio in our living room and took a few portraits of ourselves. A friend of mine recently gave me a beauty dish, so it was a great opportunity to try it out. 

I decided that for this portrait of Tash, my wife, I would use the diffusing sock that came with the beauty dish, just to soften the specular highlights a little. Add a hair light, a portable fan and her lovely, smiling face and Voila! A portrait is made! While there, we did portraits of Annabel, my stepdaughter and I even shot my mother-in-law....with a camera....OK? Don't call the cops just yet. The image above is the jpeg, pretty much straight out of camera, resized and watermarked in Picasa. 

If you are a photographer and you are reading this, thinking 'Ya know (insert your own name here), I don't have professional portraits of my husband, wife, partner, my children, my parents, my friends....',  well, here is an idea. Turn your TV off and spend an evening with a bit of lighting, a portable backdrop and your camera in hand. Its gotta be better than watching those stupid reality shows. This is YOUR reality. Capture it, honour it, live it.