24. The Unwritten Portrait Code

Having a photographer in the family has has its pros and cons. While traveling down in Mexico I noticed an interesting wall and stopped to take some pictures. My daughter was exasperated while her cousin faked a smile. Later, when I opened this one up, it made me laugh out loud.

Canon 5DMii, 50mm lens, f/3.5

SINCE ITS INVENTION there has been an unwritten code that comes with every camera. That is portrait etiquette instruction that informs the photographer and subject just what to do in order to make your picture turn out all right. While there are those who disregard or discredit the camera’s advice, the majority trust the image-making machine.

This code is based on a choice that every people photographer or portrait sitter must decide. When staring down the glass barrel of a lens, a subject has a choice of how to respond: stoicism or a smile.

Early in the history of photography, the profundity of stoicism was preferred. After a few decades, the smile was introduced and gained instant popularity and fame.

Photographers were comparing notes on how to make the sitter smile pleasantly. Most of the techniques took too much time, and pictures needed to be made! In the face of this difficulty, photographers united their efforts and in a majority vote adopted a simple technical phrase, “Say cheese.” And with that, a new epoch of people photography began.

There were those said that this was an oversimplification of things, that some smiles turn out trite and untrue. What about Mona Lisa’s discreet, mysterious look? You can’t overlook the power of Edvard Munch’s The Scream. Some outright rejected this approach and started taking pictures that were contrary to the opinions of the hoi polloi. Photographs like Einstein sticking out his tongue, Che Guevara’s defiance, and the migrant mother’s despair made some purists cringe. But the masses and general public responded with praise and they wanted more!

Beyond Stoicism and the Smile

While this is obviously written tongue in cheek, what we do really want in pictures is something that is real. That which is fake, contrived, or insincere doesn’t draw us in. In fact, fake smiles, as scientists have shown, can actually make us sick. We want expressions that come from the inside and radiate out. Even honest disgust is more appealing that a faux smile. When our pictures capture emotion that is real, this strikes a chord in the viewer and elicits something true in return.

Emotion begets emotion. Knowing this, we typically settle for fabricating a smile or a strong gaze. That’s like playing the piano and only using two notes. There is so much more music to be made. The human emotional repertoire is incredibly complex. Viewers of photographs can spot a fake from five miles away. In order to take more interesting pictures, we need to search for more subtle, wry, interesting, and complex expressive ways.

Annika waits for breakfast. Her bed-head hair and vacant expression reveal her exasperation with dad. She has given up the fight and is now pondering what it will be like to starve.

Hasselblad, 503CW, 80mm lens, f/2.8, Tri-X Black and White Film

Exercise: Unlikely Expressions

Discovering how to notice and capture a wider gamut of emotional nuance will deepen your love for the craft and give your pictures more appeal. In this exercise, we will study this range and aim to capture five strong images.

Step 1 Studying Expressions

The first step to expanding the range of expressions you will seek with your subjects involves doing a search and taking some notes. Begin by doing an online image search for expressions. You’ll find hundreds of visual charts that depict different types. Next, do a Wikipedia search for emotions. Read about the many categories and types of human emotions. Consider these activities an opportunity to refresh and review what you already know. As you view the charts and words, write down a few photographic ideas. Think about what expressions you would like to capture most.

Step 2 Capturing Unlikely Expressions

Photographing unlikely expressions requires that people get comfortable with you, your camera, and your lens. This type of photography isn’t something that you can do on command. Therefore dedicate one week to keeping your camera at your side with just one goal in mind—capturing unlikely expressions. Use a smaller-size camera and a normal-focal-length lens.

Resist the desire to take pictures of silence, strength, or smiles. Look for those candid moments that happen in between. Bring your camera on the bus, to the beach, the baseball stadium, the golf course, and more. Don’t use the camera as a shield but interact with everyone you meet. Laugh, joke, cry, and be 100 percent real. Your own authenticity with your subject will affect the pictures that you make.

Step 3 Review Your Pictures

The goal for this assignment isn’t to capture a huge sum of emotion-laden photographs. When it comes to expression, think Mona Lisa; sometimes it’s best if there is only one. Go through your photographs from the week and select a few that you like most.

LEFT While this boy and his dad talked it out about why he was upset, I made a few unnoticed frames that captured his pure frustration and sadness. Then a compromise was reached and moments later, he was smiling and skipping around the house.

Canon 5DMii, 50mm lens, f/2

OPPOSITE Unlikely expressions can evoke a surprising response. What does this picture make you think of or feel?

Canon 5DMii, 85mm lens, f/2

“The revelation will come in a small fraction of a second with an unconscious gesture, a gleam of the eye, a brief lifting of the mask that all humans wear... In that fleeting interval of opportunity the photographer must act or lose his prize.”

—Yousuf Karsh