This is a question that comes to many people’s mind. For this we want you to go to the basics of all. The word portrait comes from portray, which means to take a picture of. Now, one can know anything you make a picture of wither on canvas, on a book, on a print or media is a portrait. Sometimes portray can be just an imagination of how you picture something. If going through the definition given in the dictionary; the portrait is a painting, photograph, drawing, etc. of a person or, less commonly, of a group of people (Oxford), a pictorial representation of a person usually showing the face (Merriam-webster).
Now, from the above definition only we can say what portrait photography might be? It is a genre of photography that captures a picture of a subject which also shows the personality of the one you capture. It is the activity or art of taking portrait photos that helps in capturing the essence of a person’s identity and attitude. Portrait photography can be candid as well as posed.
We can see people doing portrait photography in any season and maybe most opted genre in photography as it is used in any occasion. Whether it’s a wedding, an engagement ceremony, some official documents (studio pp size), sports, when a baby is born, journalism when someone dies and even in war, portrait photography is exercised. Somebody had told and it is the truth that in portrait, eyes speak, and if you capture the eyes you capture the soul.
While taking portrait photos there are some things you must keep in mind. They are basically; light, background, composition, and posing. If all these things are kept in mind and a portrait is captured the image comes with perfection. Again, there isn’t any rule of any of the aspects for portrait photography, it’s just they must be taken according to the need of the client and a photographer.
