Taking great portraits is as much about social skills as it is about technical capacity. If you can first see thru your subject’s eyes, and understand them as a unique individual, and then display and intensify their best qualities, this willreally make your portraits stand out.
Here are a few of the best tips :
If employing a tripod, compose your portrait and then take one step only to the side and forward from the camera. Don’t look through the viewfinder. When your subject interacts with your camera, the result could be a cold or dead rendering, but when you engage your subject through eye contact, expression, gestures and words, the result may be a warm and candid reflection, charged with mood or emotion.
If you are not employing a tripod, you need to redouble your effort to maintain repeated interactions with your subject.
Permit your subject to be themselves. A girl dressed up in fairy wings for a special picture is really adorable, and I believe there’s a place in this world for charming. However contrast this with the young girl who just likes to dance. You put her in her everyday garments, stand her in front of a plain background, put on her fave music and say to her,’can you show me a way to dance to this song?’ you ought to have no problem in capturing unending expressions there.