Kitsap Frames Photo Challenge #34: Portrait

We want you to focus on one person for this challenge and show us your best portrait shot.

Here’s the thing, we’re using the term “portrait” very loosely here. This doesn’t have to be a head and shoulders standard portrait (but can be if you so wish). This can be any photo of a person, posed or unposed but the subject must (and this is the most important part hence the bold text and the underline) be aware that you are there focusing your camera on them and only them.

Most people become uncomfortable and self conscious when they are aware the camera is focusing on them. That fact in itself changes the whole dynamic of a photo. I much prefer to shoot candids over portraits because the fact that the subject is very aware that I am focusing on them and when they seem uncomfortable and self-conscious that in turn makes me uncomfortable and self-conscious.

So choose your subject and choose your environment and get to work. Feel free to pose your subject or showcase that nonchalant “I know you’re there but I’m pretending that you aren’t there clicking away” moment. Pay attention to your backgrounds (they can make or break a great portrait) and the lighting of your subject( be it natural light or flash).

I’ll post examples of both posed and unposed portraits below in case my rambling has confused you .

Deadline for entries will be January 19th. and rules and regulations will be posted at the end of this post. We encourage you to shoot your challenge entry during the week that it is posted but will accept older photos (begrudgingly).

Here are some examples of posed portraits from our archives:

Charles Wiggins is the first State Supreme Court Justice from Kitsap County. He is standing on the deck of his Bainbridge Island law office. (LARRY STEAGALL  |  KITSAP SUN)

Rachel Soule, of Poulsbo, was an extra in UK pop artist Cheri Moon’s “One Crazy Summer” video which was filmed at Skateland in Bremerton. (Meegan M. Reid |  Kitsap Sun)

South Kitsap’s Joe rose is headed for the class 4A state tournament next month. (Steve Zugschwerdt | For the Kitsap Sun)

Central Kitsap running back Devin Dozier. (LARRY STEAGALL  |  KITSAP SUN)

Norma Davis,90,has vidivd memories of the time she was stationed in Honolulu with her Navy husband George Davis Monday afternoon in her East Bremerton studio apartment. Davis was living in Pearl Harbor when it was attacked in 1941.  (LARRY STEAGALL  |  KITSAP SUN)

Here are some examples of unposed portraits:

Seen through the window of Cornerstone Coffee in Bremerton, Ed Cain talks about when he was a 21-year-old reporter who rushed to Dallas after the Kennedy assassination and was one of the last reporters to see Lee Harvey Oswald alive. (MEEGAN M. REID |  KITSAP SUN)

Norma Davis,90, gives her cat Pretty Baby a hug after lifting her up Monday afternoon in her East Bremerton studio apartment. Davis was living in Pearl Harbor when it was attacked in 1941.  (LARRY STEAGALL  |  KITSAP SUN)

Star of the Sea congregants will be worshiping Christmas Eve with a replica of a 15th Century rocking cradle known as a Kindelwiegen. The cradle was handmade, and contains a stone procured in Bethlehem by the church’s former pastor. The tradition, started in Germany, allows worshipers to express a physical devotion to the newborn babe. It will be used for the first time at Friday’s Christmas mass. The church’s pastor Father Derek Lappe, steadies, the cradle. (LARRY STEAGALL  |  KITSAP SUN)

——————————————————-

***To recap: Every week or so we will post a new photography “challenge” to help build on all of our current photography skills and to encourage everyone to get out and get shooting (cameras not guns). While we encourage you to shoot the challenge in the week that it is assigned, we will however accept entries taken prior to the challenge assignment date. (It’s OK this time, because it’s a best-of challenge.)

When you’ve got your favorite shot, login to the Kitsap Sun Your Media Site (if you don’t already have a login, you can quickly set it one up) or click the “Kitsap Frames Photo Challenge Entries” button over there on the right side of the page and upload your image to the Kitsap Frames Photo Challenge Channel (the channels run along the left hand side of the page, again if you can’t seem to get it into the channel just upload it normally and send me an email and we’ll move it).