Creative Portraits

Creative Portraiture often refers to images that go beyond a single frame taken within a camera. Often creative portraiture combines images and other elements to create a final result also known as composite images.  Some people refer to this as images being “Photoshopped” as this approach tends to apply to images that have been heavily edited whereas other approaches may remain more or less “straight out of the camera”. 

Creative portrait photography comes in many forms. Capturing creative images involves innovative and creative thinking – seeing things differently, thinking differently.  You also find that you come up with new solutions which adds, and has added improvements to my approach to portrait photography.

Through effective use of lights, creative portraits can be created “in-camera” but most creative portraits start in post-production. You can utilize simple changes such as a touch of color grading for a more cinematic look and you can end up with elaborate post-work editing to create a contemporary piece of conceptual art. There are no restrictions to creative portraits except your own imagination.  Sometimes when editing and just changing a ‘blend mode’ creates a unique perspective and creates a work of art.   Attached with the blog is an example but more detailed examples can be found on my Facebook page Mike Evans Photography.

To idea behind creative portraits is to stimulate the viewer’s mind and almost force it to delve into the image. This is achieved by activating their mind’s need to fill in gaps of missing information and for them to add to their own visualization such as an ambiance or a  mood. Each person’s visualization will be contrasting and the emotions that they get out of the image will be different - very similar to looking at a piece of art - which is reality is what it is.

Fundamentally it’s about creating a story or creating a fantasy. It’s all about adding a little more depth to portraits, or more interest and breaking away from the plain studio headshot or body pose.