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Scott Nelson's picture

Self Portrait Peter Hurley Style

This is my first shot at a Peter Hurley style head shot. I want to become proficient at this so I can shoot the head shots for my local community theater and bring them into the 21st Century. So, I'd welcome your comments and critiques.

Cheers,

Scott

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2 Comments

Hi Scott,

I belong to the Headshot Crew, which is the website that Peter Hurley uses for coaching, if you are interested in his style you can join.

If you wanted to replicate his style, there are some things you are doing differently, for example:

1.- you are shooting from above, you can check his video of "all about jaw" on youtube.

2.- Your light setup. The light is not very soft, because they are small light sources.

3.- He works a lot on expression, and even though you are smiling, you don't look at ease, you are smiling but it is not a natural smile. You are showing too much teeth and could do better without so much gum IMO.

4.- You have BPS (Big Pupil Syndrome - traditional PH lingo ;)), you could let more natural light to the room so your pupils are not that big.

5.- you cropped a bit more over the head than he usually does. That's personal taste, but I think you overdid it.

6.- You overdid the whitening of your teeth, your teeth are the brightest part of the face, not even the eyes are as bright.

Good luck.

Thanks, Miguel, all your points are excellent. I'll use them as I refine my technique. I particularly see the value in the first point. And yes, it's hard to look natural in a self portrait. Looking at Peter's work, I see he seldom has such toothy smiles.