I’m an architectural photographer, not a headshot or portrait photographer.
But it’s time for a new headshot, and with the current health crisis causing an extended pause in my architectural projects, I decided to produce a new headshot for myself as a personal project. No, this photograph is not the final result!
My old headshot is a few years old, and it’s time for a refresh. I have lights, a camera and tripod, a lens that would work well for portraits and headshots, the ability to control the camera remotely--including focusing--and some extra time on my hands, so why not take a shot at doing it myself? I even have a plain white background, which I occasionally use to photograph custom-designed furniture, and which also makes a perfect backdrop for a headshot.
I’m not a generalist. I see very strong value in specializing in one type of photography. For me, that’s architectural photography. The idea of working in other genres is daunting to me, and I’m most interested professionally in sticking with photographing architecture and design. It’s what I love, and it’s what I’m best at doing.
I want YOU for a new headshot!
But like I said, I have all the necessary equipment and I have the technical knowledge to make a portrait or headshot, so I went for it. What I don’t have is the non-technical knowledge and experience a real headshot photographer has, and just like in architectural photography, that’s actually far more important than the technical aspects of headshot photography. For example, I don’t have experience in directing my subject, posing them, and pulling a great expression from them. These are some of the most important skills that make or break a headshot photographer. Even if I had that experience, I’m not sure how much it would be worth given that I am the subject--it’s a self-portrait! But I’ve studied headshot photography out of a general interest in other types of photography, so I have some idea of what to do.
The key for me is to capture a photograph that looks like me. I know that sounds ridiculous. It’s a photograph--of course it looks like me. But I mean, I want a headshot that looks like me. I think of it like this. I can walk into a room, pull out my phone, and snap a shot of the space. Does it look like the room? Of course. But it does nothing to bring out the meaning of the space and the highlights of the architecture and design. It doesn’t tell a story. It doesn’t flatter the design and the space. For that higher level of communication through photography, I need to approach the photograph as an architectural photographer, not just someone taking a random snapshot of the room.
I mean the same thing here. Not just any image of myself is going to do. I need to capture myself looking genuine, real, and expressing something about myself that is authentic. A staged portrait where I’m looking at the camera and saying “cheese” is not going to be good enough.
So how did I approach this project? I tried a lot of different things. I mixed in a lot of goofy faces to keep myself loose and natural. I thought of something that made me laugh--really genuinely laugh out loud--and then I captured images around that time. These are the ways I tried to extract a genuine and natural expression from myself rather than a staged, forced smile.
I made close to 400 images of myself, but this was not just a matter of “spray and pray.” In each image I tried something different. I set the lights up one way or another. I wore different clothes. I turned one way or another to the camera. And I worked on a number of different expressions and ideas as I described above.
At the end of the day I narrowed those 400 images down to 20. I stepped away from it for a few days and took another look at the candidates. I eliminated 8 more and then presented the final 12 to some friends who have a lot of experience evaluating headshots. After getting their feedback and discussing the final options, we all agreed on three final candidates.
These three photographs truly represent me. They look like me, and they each say something about me that is real, true, and comes across genuinely. I will now be using these headshots for different purposes. I’ve shared above some additional favorites from this project, but these three are my official headshots. You can see two of them in action on my About and Contact pages and right here in the sidebar of my blog.
Is this something I want to add to my repertoire? No--I’m an architectural photographer, and that’s what I want to be. But it was actually a lot of fun setting everything up, doing the photography, and doing the retouching on these photographs. It gave me a much greater appreciation for what a true professional headshot photographer does.
All genres of photography are deceptively simple. You might think there’s nothing to it, especially these days with all the great gear. But the more you know and understand about photographing different types of subjects, the more you realize how much actually goes into the highest level of photography in each genre--and how little any of that has to do with the gear. There is just so much to know and learn, and every type of photography is different and has its own challenges and required knowledge and experience. Only by specializing and devoting a career to one genre can you become a true master of that field of photography. That’s what I continue to strive for in architectural photography. For now, though, I hope you like my new headshots!