The portrait isn’t… or shouldn’t be… about fooling someone into thinking you’re something you are not. Most people will sniff that out in a minute. True portraiture is about finding an individual’s moment of character and capturing that spirit… that soul… that self… on film. You hear me talk about essence quite often. That is essence. If you think about the best portraits you’ve seen, you may think to yourself, “Ah, that really is what that person is about” or “I just learned something about them that I didn’t know” or “Look at this. It represents them.”
If you are authentic in your approach to business… if you genuinely want to help your clients… then you will be successful. The majority of businesses go down the tubes within 5 years. I think that authenticity is what separates the successes from that failing majority.
A “headshot” is useful when you want the guy who sees your bus bench ad every day to recognize you when you come knocking. A portrait is useful when you want to tell someone “This is my authentic self.”
I've been taking pictures since I was old enough to be trusted with my father's old Leica. I must have been ten years old. The old man never let me use a light meter, insisting that I gauge my settings by eyeballing the sky. Of course, my photos were often under or over-exposed, because it's very difficult to make those sorts of judgments with any accuracy. There's a reason they make light meters. It did teach me about shutter speed, film speed, and aperture, though. These days, my camera does the calculating, of course, but it's helpful to know these things... and to break the rules to your advantage.
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