Today as I was looking through a book on Edouard Manet I remembered the influence painter Diego Velazquez had on his work. Manet was influenced by Velazquez to do full body portraiture. I have been thinking a lot of how I want to do my "Forgotten Laughter" (children living in poverty) series of portraits. I think my main portrait style will be a full body shot like Velazquez and Manet. There is such a beauty and simplicity to this style of imagery. I love the look of a person standing in their environment or standing against a neutral background. That sense of space and seeing the persons whole body works well for me.
My thinking is to use a 5x7 camera with the long vertical. I will shoot in vertical format with a wider lens a 120mm which should give me a bit of distortion when I compose up close to get the full figure. The boxer photo made below was made with a 90mm and 4x5 camera, the 120mm and 5x7 should give me a similar look, just with a longer vertical.
I could photograph children living in poverty in their worlds. Doo-Aye full figure standing in the dump. A child living in Klong Toey full figure standing in front of her slum home. A young boxer in the gym full figure with boxing gloves. All could be strong portraits. We can all learn form the great artists of the past, studying their work and improving our own is both fun and exciting!
 |
| Self Portrait Diego Velazquez (1599-1660) |
 |
| Self Portrait Edouard Manet (1532-1883) |
 |
| Muay Thai Boxer, Bangkok 2012 by Gerry Yaum |
