portraits

My name is Pep Williams, and I'm a photographer from Los Angeles. I recently shot a project with the help of Leica called "Out of Bounds." I'm one of the few photographers allowed to shoot inside a California state prison.

My name is Jason Rinehart with Hartlight Photography, and I'm a light painter known around the world for my unique light painting style. I'm always in search of different creative ways to make my images I create as unique as possible, and this is by using whatever I can find to either shoot through or shoot with.

Photographer Nick Fancher is known for combining thriftiness and creativity into eye-catching portrait lighting, and he has even written two books on the subject, titled Studio Anywhere and Studio Anywhere 2. If you like workshops more than reading, Fancher just shared this free 2-hour video of his Studio Anywhere workshop.

Last year, I had the privilege of photographing Heather and Brett Pocorobba for their engagement and wedding. I am not a traditional wedding photographer, but they wanted a real street vibe to their collection, so it was a good fit.

Here's a 17-minute video from Adorama that takes you behind-the-scenes on a "character" portrait shoot with photographers Joe McNally and Daniel Norton. The goal is light the subject in a way that emphasizes what the photographer sees in the person.

Photographer Matt Granger has been testing out the Leica NOCTILUX 75mm f/1.25 lens, which retails for a whopping $12,800, and in this 9-minute test video he shares his initial thoughts about using it.

Driving through the cities and villages of Rajasthan provides for an intimate view of rural India. The sun-drenched countryside is dotted with a resilient vegetation common to drier, desert, climates. Villagers, mixed in with cows, herds of goats and the odd camel, walk the long stretches of roads between villages, pausing for rest under the sparse shade of Khejri trees. This is a part of the tourist trail that is rarely seen.

I recently came back from a trip to India. I left the UK with the intent of photographing a culture entirely different from mine. Searching for a new challenge, I looked at India in the eyes, and I faced myself.

Unity over adversity. It’s a running theme in the story of Tombohuaun, translation “Tombo’s Wound,” a remote village tucked into the jungle of Sierra Leone’s Eastern Province. The community’s founding legend states that a villager named Tombo cut his foot on a catfish in the river, and the then chief ordered the fish to be caught and killed. Back then, as now, the community came together to put things right: they caught the fish, ate it, and went on to name the town after this symbolic triumph.

Here's a 47-minute tutorial from PiXimperfect about how to create those soft, dreamy portrait photos of children using Photoshop.

Almost a year ago I purchased a set of color gels on Amazon but never got around to actually trying them out. Recently, after watching Blade Runner 2049 and being smitten by the gorgeous cinematography by the legendary Roger Deakins, I just had to play with them. Not only that, the original Blade Runner, shot by Jordan Cronenweth, is one of my biggest influences ever so this shoot was bound to happen.

Getting someone to smile naturally on camera can sometimes be a difficult task. Here's a 2-minute video by photographer Mathieu Stern in which he shares 7 techniques for getting your subject to grin from ear to ear in seconds.

Here's an 8-minute video by photographer Irene Rudnyk with a behind-the-scenes look at her first experience in shooting portraits using a large format camera.

Photographer Mathieu Stern has been doing shootout comparisons showing how the same models look when captured through different vintage lenses. For this 5.5-minute video, Stern used the Konika Hexanon 28mm f/3.5, the Minolta 100mm f/2.5, and the Industar 50mm f/3.5.

For their ongoing "Craigslist Encounters," the Los Angeles-based photography team Kremer Johnson has been shooting portraits of completely strangers who are each found using Craigslist. Each subject responded to an ad titled "Characters Wanted" and agreed to pose for $20 an hour.

Need to take portraits and don’t have access to a lighting kit? No worries – this 4-minute video from Jay P. Morgan of The Slanted Lens will show you how you can turn a bathroom – or any room for that matter – into a softbox to create beautiful soft light.

Black dogs are commonly overlooked at animal shelters. They're the last to be adopted and the most likely to be euthanized. Photographer Shaina Fishman has taken it upon herself to shine light on this problem and raise awareness, hope, and love for these dogs.

Composition can make or break a photograph. Here's a 7-minute video by photographer Peter McKinnon in which he runs through three tips to help you improve the composition of your photographs.

When you’re taking corporate headshots, you often have a tight window in which to fit everything in. But usually you're also going to be expected to create more than one look. Jay P. Morgan of The Slanted Lens runs through his simple setup in this 5 minute video.

In this typically short and sweet 1.5-minute video from Mango Street, the photography duo run through some techniques for posing a male subject. These tips are especially helpful when posing someone who is not a model and has little experience in front of a camera.

My name is Elliott Verdier, and I'm a French photographer who recently returned home from Kyrgyzstan. I spent four months making a portrait of the country with a 4x5 analog large format camera.

What do President Nelson Mandela, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Tina Turner, Halle Berry, Gwyneth Paltrow, Pierce Brosnan, Jon Bon Jovi, Marc Anthony, Mariah Carey, Eva Mendes, Orlando Bloom, Patrick Swayze and Heath Ledger have in common? The magical lens of Richard McLaren has captured them all. And this is only a small sampling of famous people who McLaren has photographed in his four decades in the industry.