in praise of local #3

This third and final blog in my series "in praise of local" will address another of my favorite genres of photography - environmental portraiture.  It is a broad area that includes portraits made in a person's immediate or desired surroundings, with the use of relatively few mechanical or technical aides.   Environmental portraits can be found in photojournalism, sports, weddings, and in self-portraiture.  Models can be adults or children - posed or candid - and they are all around us.

Walter Chappell, 1995

In 1995, I was lucky enough to spend part of a day with filmmaker and artist Walter Chappell, shooting photographs of him in and around his El Rito, New Mexico home.  The image here was my favorite of the group, made with a Mamiya 645 camera with Kodak Plus X film.  I have since printed it using a number of different papers and developers and toners, and have also scanned it for giclee printing.  People have said he looks like Merlin or a wizard, shaman, or mystic.  Surrounded by cigarette smoke in his studio, Chappell seemed to be giving himself to the camera.  I would categorize this image as a hybrid - part posed, part candid.

Melissa, 2010

Much has been said about wedding photography.  Some photographers won't touch it.  Some, like me, really enjoy the possibilities and challenges of it.  There are many people and stories present at weddings, and I was lucky enough to see and capture half a dozen environmental portraits at a May wedding I shot.  The image of Melissa was cropped from a photograph of the wedding party at an abandoned mine with the wind blowing at least forty miles an hour.  Technically, this was a posed shot, but it was so windy that the wiggle factor was huge, resulting in this fantasy/fashion image.   It was altered with filters in Adobe Photo Shop.  The other was completely candid, taken of Joe while he, the groomsmen, and other ushers were awaiting the beginning of the ceremony.  A majority of the light here is from the window since the room overall was dimly lit with fluorescent lighting.

  

   Joe, 2010

 Here is another example of a hybrid shot of tango teachers Mike and Carrie in action.

Carrie and Mike, 2009

Natural light from west and east windows, the studio's track lighting, and light bounced from the pearl side of a fill disc combined to make a balanced and vibrant image.  

Exciting, surprising, lovely, heartbreaking.  Environmental portraiture is all of that.  It will test your abilities as a photographer,  present challenges, and make you question your sanity.  But, if you haven't already shot an environmental portrait, try it.  The magic will be there!

P.S.  Check out  www.masters-of-photography.com

for information about and the work of photographers Sebastio Salgado, Margaret Bourke-White, Walker Evans, Annie Leibovitz, Gordon Parks, and many others.

until next Monday,

DB

a passion for the image



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