Headshots. What a funny thing. What do we need headshots for...and what's the difference between a headshot and a portrait? When I agreed to do some headshots for a student of mine last May I didn't really know what I was going to do. She is an actress and needed a variety of headshots. I found out they are a varied thing now-a-days. There was a time, way back when I was in photography School that a headshot was an 8x10 black and white studio picture usually with a rim right from behind making the edges of the hair white. Oh have they come a long way now. Most headshots are not all that different from commercial studio portraits---portraits that are a portrayal of who we want to be or who we think we are or who we want to present ourselves as to history(and our friends who we give copies to). They are representations of our exterior self.
When I seek to shoot a portrait I'm trying to find that person within and have that person show through. Often, I think, its not what the client ultimately wants -we want to keep some of ourselves in a closet, hidden from the world. And who is to say what is a true portrait-the person?(they are too close to their deepest thoughts and fears to truly know or be objective), the photographer?(he or she barely knows the subject really and often puts their own feelings and self into the picture by asking for certain gestures or poses). Or is it people who know the subject who can tell? I took a picture of a man years ago and after he died his family asked me for the picture because it captured the essence of my friend. It was a snapshot really, but it conveyed this man's character better than any posed portrait could. That is what photography should be about. Though I do like to play with lights and try to capture moods too--whether it is real or not...I don't know. Photograph by Richard Sayer
When I seek to shoot a portrait I'm trying to find that person within and have that person show through. Often, I think, its not what the client ultimately wants -we want to keep some of ourselves in a closet, hidden from the world. And who is to say what is a true portrait-the person?(they are too close to their deepest thoughts and fears to truly know or be objective), the photographer?(he or she barely knows the subject really and often puts their own feelings and self into the picture by asking for certain gestures or poses). Or is it people who know the subject who can tell? I took a picture of a man years ago and after he died his family asked me for the picture because it captured the essence of my friend. It was a snapshot really, but it conveyed this man's character better than any posed portrait could. That is what photography should be about. Though I do like to play with lights and try to capture moods too--whether it is real or not...I don't know. Photograph by Richard Sayer