Six Simple Yet Creative Ways to Enhance Your Portrait Sessions

The most creative ideas are often the most simple ones. Here is a video a team from France put together showing you ways to enhance your portraits using cheap and basic tools that you can find at any grocery and hardware store. You don't have to worry, there is no French explanations, it's all done visually and is quite easy to follow. 

To create bokeh from Christmas lights or foil to appear in front of your model or behind them is a way to differentiate yourself from the photographers who just use a white or black wall, and it makes for more appealing images that the model, or your client, would like.

Another great idea is to have your assistant drop foil clippings in front of the model. This causes a brighter-than-snow-falling effect and makes the photo interesting. They also add a cardboard box as a snoot to their flash which causes amazing shadows and focus on the model. If the snoot has a window-like modifier in front of it, it can also look like a window is causing the shadows, so your imagination can go wild. 

Will you try these ideas, and if you have any, what DIY methods or ideas have you used to make your images unique? Let us know in the comments!

Wouter du Toit's picture

Wouter is a portrait and street photographer based in Paris, France. He's originally from Cape Town, South Africa. He does image retouching for clients in the beauty and fashion industry and enjoys how technology makes new ways of photography possible.

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2 Comments

Here's another video that I came across today with similar idea https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIRAVKnQuVw

Nice share! I like the on-location examples vs in-studio. These ideas are great. I'm going to go buy a prism right now.