Weekly Favorite Portraits Showcase

We are back again with some more interesting emerging photographers, who are sharing their favorite images and some interesting facts about behind the scene of that image.

Few of them had been successfully running their 365 project on Flickr so make sure to follow them!

A Peaceful Place

The photograph is called “A Peaceful Place” because the context of this photograph shows that we first need to know and search for our state of peace in our minds, and then try to live and accept the society around us. This portrait in my opinion shows me calm and peace in her expression, and that’s why I named “A Peaceful Place”. The “place” that I mention in here, is ourselves, and the “peace” is the state of mind we create, as also I mention before.

The technical aspects
Camera: Nikon D5100, Location: Marquês de Pombal Palace, Oeiras, Portugal., Lightning: Shutter Speed – 1/640
Aperture – f/1.8, ISO – 100, Post-processing – In Photoshop, I only changed the levels, the exposure, and add a filter!

Photographer: Catarina Inácio

Save Yourself First

This is a self-portrait titled “save yourself first”. I had taken it in a time of confusion, heartache, and loneliness and I think I might have been subconsciously influenced by a line of lyrics from Graceless by The National, “Put the flowers you find in a vase, if you’re dead in the mind it’ll brighten the place.” This image sort of marks the time that I focused on self-love and I realized it was what I needed to start healing and moving on.

This was taken using my trusty old Nikon D3100 with the 35mm f/1.8, lit by both windows and basic indoor lighting. For post-processing, I edited this in Adobe Photoshop CS6 and played around with color balance, curves, and some minor composite edits.

Photographer: Tasha Faye | Her Flickr page | Her Facebook Fanpage

Hide

Here is one of my favorite portraits, that I took. It is a self-portrait, I took some weeks ago.
It is called “hide” and reflects nature as my favorite place to escape to. It is where I go when I need to be alone when I want to hide from worries and the speed of life in the city. With this photo, I also want to evoke associations to camouflaging.

I shot the photo with a Canon EOS 600D, under my favorite willow tree. I used an on-camera flash and even enhanced the effects of light and shadow in photoshop because I liked the look. I also blurred and sharpened some areas in photoshop and turned the image into black and white.

Photographer: Lara Minerva | Her Facebook Fanpage

The Italian guy

“The Italian guy” is a picture I had to take in just a few seconds. A complete stranger came to me in the street, asking for a portrait. He must have seen the camera in my hand… I answered “why not” and here is the result. I like this photo because of the light, the bokeh and the colors. This guy was also very cool.

Technical details: Canon EOS 550D, 50mm, f/4, 1/13, ISO 400, contrast slightly increased on GIMP.

Photographer: Maxime Noël | His Behance Account | His Facebook Fanpage

Reminder

This photo about the moment that a creator makes a cut and lets himself sink on his own thoughts. I really love the mood and the result on this photo.

Technical aspect: shot with Canon 5D Mark III + 50mm 1.8 with available light (desk lamp)

Photographer: Avi Floyd Cohen | His Facebook Fanpage

Infinities

The picture attached is titled Infinities. It is inspired and dedicated to The Fault in Our Stars. One topic that really struck me as interesting, in the book and also in the movie, is infinities. The quote that I used to inspire the image is “There are infinite numbers between 0 and 1. There’s .1 and .12 and .112 and an infinite collection of others. Of course, there is a bigger infinite set of numbers between 0 and 2, or between 0 and a million. Some infinities are bigger than other infinities.

A writer we used to like taught us that. There are days, many of them when I resent the size of my unbounded set.” This picture has a special place in my heart because it is so personal. It also happens to be a self-portrait.

Technically this photo is rather simple. I shot against a bare wall with natural light coming in from a window. The texture that you see (the bright lights) is a texture I made myself using Christmas lights. Processing was rather simple as well. The struggle for most of my photos is finding the right colors or tones so that is what I spent the most time on.

Photographer: Erica Almquist | Her Flickr profile

This is one of my favorite portraits I took of my brother. This photo means a lot to me because the location was at an abandoned barn that is no longer there. I find it special. It also portrays the dark vibes to it that my brother currently was experiencing within his personal life.

The editing process I used dark contrast and also a texture to get more feel to it. I also enhanced the reflection around the glasses.

Photographer: Gio Sebastian | His Facebook Fanpage

Everything You Can Imagine / Todo Lo Que Puedas Imaginar

I do not like descriptions about my work, I think the photo has to explain itself. This portrait was shot via Canon EOS 550D, the focal length of 33, shutter speed 1/2000, Aperture of 4.5, and at ISO 100.

Photographer: Arka devbil | His Facebook Fanpage

This is a simple portrait of a black friend. She is a representation of my country and all the daily struggles we went through. Their skin is a warrior!

We traveled to a nearby town and we did a close portrait at dusk. I use a Canon T3i with a 50mm lens. At issue just changed the hue of the picture with Curves and Color Balance and also removed unwanted objects from the background.

Photographer: Hyago kayann | His Facebook Fanpage

Abandon

This portrait is part of a series I called “abandon. abandoned.”, which you can find on stampsy: http://stampsy.com/user/15606/latest/8263

For me, it transports the feeling of leaving something behind, without knowing if it is good or bad, or neither. Looking back at something that’s over, looking forward to new things to come. Being unsure about what the future will bring. A mixture of sadness because the past is the past and excitement and fear because of what’s to come.

Model is Sophia, we shot this inside an abandoned train station that had beautiful light coming through the broken glass in the ceiling. Shot with a Canon 5D Mark II and an 85mm 1.8 lens. Editing in Lightroom.

Photographer: Chris Hieronimus | His Flickr and Tumblr profile

Singer

It was a portrait session for a great musician, Feral&Stray, to her communication. I like the way she looks to the light, the movement, and her attitude. When I take a photo I always try to have movement and something in the eyes.

I took this picture with a Nikon D800 in a studio, using a box light and a reflector.

Photographer: Fabrice Labit | His Flickr profile | His Facebook Fanpage

This portrait comes from my best session with my favorite model Patrycja and favorite makeup artist Katarzyna. The thing I like the most in this photo are the emotions of the model. This session had an amazing atmosphere. During this session, people looked at us with admiration.

This portrait was taken with Sony a58 and 50mm/1.8.

Photographer: Anarchiaa

Burnt Offerings

“Burnt Offerings” is an example of the “mad heiress” style that I’ve been developing. A decaying, forgotten, moth-eaten kind of beauty. Equal parts surrealism, dark glamour, and Miss Havisham’s dusty mansion.

I typically shoot in decaying or old surroundings and go for a worn, abandoned look. The title “Burnt Offerings” seemed to fit because of the way the light illuminates the model’s striking red hair and pale skin, the rich ombre colors of the old wood, the wrecked quality of the abandoned building we were shooting in, and because images always benefit from an evocative title. Oh, and also because that’s the name of an old horror movie that terrified me as a kid!

As far as technical information, it’s natural light, with the assistance of the model’s very helpful sister, who bounced sunlight off of a gold reflector dish. I shot on a tripod to bring the shutter speed down. A few camera settings: Canon EOS 5D, Tamron 24-70mm 2.8 lens, 500 ISO, f 5.0, 31mm, and 1/13. I used Adobe Photoshop to enhance the sharpness in selected areas (chair, her hair, parts of her dress). I also increased the clarity, dropped the saturation, and applied the low key to the background. The image has a kind of “rough” look to it that I wouldn’t want to lose by making the image look slick or smooth. It’s a bit weathered and warm, like any mad heiress whose time had forgotten.

Photographer: Ben Davidson | Model Portfolio | His Flickr Profile

Sumi is a good friend of mine, I like the chubbiness of her face.

I wanted to keep it very simple with some emotional sprinkled on it. Clicked with Canon 7D using 18-135mm with available window light and a small lantern which gives a warm tone. Exposure 1/125 l f/5.6 l ISO-400 Done some color correction, added some purple tone on hair then added yellow and blue tone for entire canvas.

Photographer: Anoop B Vyas | His 500px profile | His Facebook Fanpage

Red lines

This photo is a representation of my imagination, it is very important for me. Sometimes I love to play with the photos, also the red lines remind me of the connection between mind and photography. For this photo, I used a tripod and a Canon Eos 600D with a Canon 50mm 1:1.8 II lens. The light is natural and came from the window of my room. The diptych and the red lines were created in post-production with Photoshop.

Photographer: Chiara Baldassarri | Her Flickr profile

I’ve always wanted to do something in a vintage mood, and the model, my girlfriend help me out. I asked her to put this hat (from 3 we grabbed with us) on her head and to lift her eyes to the sky. The result is that gorgeous look and the shadow on her face. This was shot near a forest. Clicked with Pentax LX, natural light, Ilford FP4+ Sooc.

Photographer: We are just a moment in time

Tom Act1.5

For my work, I travel a lot around France, and sometimes outside. When I travel, I really like to find people from that city to make a shoot. Most of my shots are at night in places that I don’t know. We walk around, look for ambient lights, specific places to shoot.

Nothing really special about this picture. Like most of all my photos by night, I put everything in manual mode, focus manually on the screen. For the post-treatment, add some sharpness, a little of contrast on the background and re-size in 16/9 :)

Photographer: Luizzitos Paartra | His Facebook Fanpage

Connection with nature 1

This is’ a portrait of a friend of mine, who started in the middle of nature, in a pine forest in the Maremma (Tuscany, Italy) It ‘s not a shot was planned, but rather dictated by the light, inspiration and since.
I have tried to describe the connection between humans and animals, so different but so alike.

I used a Canon EOS 550D + 50mm in the late afternoon (17.30/18.00), with natural light. For post-production, I used 3 different programs, “Digital Photo Professional” for. Raw, “Photoshop” for the addition of the owl and “Perfect Effect 8” to set the tone.

Photographer: Francesco Giovani

Bulb

When I look up to the sky, I see so much… The stars and with them the past. I also realize how small we are compared to the endless universe. Who has already seen the Futurama’s episode “Godfellas” will understand more? However..above me the past. And behind me the highway, the too fast now. All compared in one picture…

On the field, it was cold and dark. 30 seconds I was standing in the car lights and couldn’t see anything. Sometimes I thought I would see something or someone in the distance and then it was creepy. So I took my stuff and went quickly into the car. With squeaky wheels, I drove home. At home, I didn’t really change too much..only the curves and the exposure.

Photographer: Katja Ivanchenko

Eblouie par la nuit

I’ve taken this portrait of a very special person, my best friend. It is not so much of a deep message here. But the moment when we took it was special to us both, the model and me, because we talked about how we have driven apart from each other and that we should do more together so we picked up my camera and walked to a nearby field at my dads’ house (the field doesn’t exist anymore, which makes me kind of nostalgic).

It was the biggest fun since a long time. Also, I was proud of this picture because it showed me how much I could achieve with photography and editing because the result differs so much from the initial image.

Camera 1000D, the location was a flower field nearby, f/4.5, 1/250, ISO 200, 50mm. I played around a lot with the curves, at least two times I changed the colors, I added a lot of contrast, of course, skin retouching and then I went crazy with dodge and burn, par example I made her chin standing more out than in the original version with burn and I used the Brenizer method.

Photographer: Chantal Olivia | Her 500px and Deviantart profile

What I like in this portrait is the way the three faces and the hands-on them blend together, creating a slightly surreal scene. There is not a clear message behind it. I want to leave its translation open. To me, it just visualizes the things in my head.

I used a Canon 550D with Pentax SMC-a 28mm f2.8 lens and the light of my window. The post-procedure included multiple exposures in Photoshop and some curves along with the saturation.

Photographer: Deda

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