Portrait photography comes in many shapes and sizes, and the portraits can range from basic to very creative. I connected with the portrait classes and readings because I’ve taken a lot of landscapes and I want to progress my photography and practice portraits. The reading didn’t really describe much, but I get the general point made by the author, Lauren Greenfield, that she uses her background in anthropology to really understand the history of these old places. My five photos were made by a photographer named Edward S. Curtis who I thought was really cool because he took portraits of mostly Native American people during the turn of the 20th century. The portraits I found represent a variety of the photos he’s done. Some portraits are traditional headshots and some are more artistic, like the portrait of the person in the river. This photo is more artistic because it’s a wide shot that features the river and mountains, but the subject stands out in the photo the most. Curtis’ photos stood out to me because they were in black and white and the images were almost all Native Americans like chiefs, hunters, and people doing interesting things. Curtis captures these things in a way that the person in the shot is very obviously the main character in the story. I liked the portrait lighting workshop we did in class that was all about the lighting ratios. What’s cool about it are the different effects the lights have on your overall composition.
- gabrielkawamura
