portraits

If it sounds too cheap

1 Comment

A Toronto-based mining company just found out that if it sounds cheap, it probably isn’t a bargain.

In February this year, a mining company requested a quote for business headshots of six executives for its new web site. I quoted about $1500 which might be average for a job like this. The company replied that it had “decided to go in another direction.”

A few days ago, the same company e-mailed to ask if my February quote was still good.

Before replying, I went to the company’s web site and saw six business portraits. The photos’ EXIF data revealed that these were shot by another Toronto photographer in late February, about two weeks after my quote was turned down.
Continue reading →

Photographer or Psychologist

No Comments

A portrait photographer’s primary job is to make their subject feel good about themselves. Sure, you also have to do flattering photos. But if the subject doesn’t feel confident about themselves, they won’t like the photo results.

Why might they not like the finished pictures? They might think their nose is too big, their jaw is crooked, their eyes uneven, their hair not right, their smile not good enough, or any of a hundred other things.

A person doesn’t see themselves the same way as others see them. This is partly due to lateralization of emotion: a photograph shows the real us and not the reversed mirror reflection that we’re used to.

It’s also due to expectation and hope. We expect to look as young as we feel and we hope to look like a movie star. We expect to look better than average and we hope no one can see our flaws.
Continue reading →

Portraits and self-esteem

No Comments

It’s long been known that portraits boost the self-esteem of children. Family portraits are the most effective but sports and school portraits also help. These portraits have to be on display in the home and not left on computer hard drives or hidden away in drawers.

If you have young children, including adolescents, be sure to get many portraits done throughout their early years. Formal family portraits, sports portraits, school portraits and casual portraits. It’s important.

And it’s not just for children. I’ve seen the positive effects that good portraits have had on girls in their late teens and early twenties. I’ve also seen what can happen with older women.
Continue reading →

Average Good Looks

No Comments

Do you think these two people are attractive?

 

The woman’s face is a mathematical average of 55 female business portraits I did last year. The man’s face is an average of 50 male portraits. The headshots used included a wide variety of people ranging in age from early 20s to early 70s.
Continue reading →

The Science of Business Portraits

No Comments

If you’re reluctant to get a new business portrait because you think you don’t have the looks of a movie star, then science is on your side.

A 2013 Princeton University study (link to PDF) found that a person with average facial appearance is perceived to be more trustworthy than someone with above-average looks. In fact, the perceived trustworthiness of a less than average-looking person was found to be about the same as for a very attractive person.

. . . we found consistent evidence for the notion that face typicality is an important determinant of perceived trustworthiness . . .

We’re also more attracted to average-looking faces. Many thousands of years of evolution have hardwired us to prefer average looks. Remember that most actors and models are only average looking (link to PDF) and they just have better stylists than the rest of us :-)
Continue reading →

Platform Photography

No Comments

Canada’s 2015 federal election is days away and each party has released its platform. Let’s compare them from a photographer’s point of view.

The Obvious

• Green Party platform is 44 pages and 5.8 MB in file size.

• NDP brochure is 81 pages and 5.1 MB in size.

• Liberal Party platform is 88 pages and 10.6 MB.

• Conservative Party brochure is 159 pages and 37.4 MB.

That alone might be very telling.
Continue reading →

Prize-winning News Coverage

1 Comment

Yesterday at 5:50am (Eastern Time), it was announced that a Canadian scientist from Queen’s University, in Ontario, had co-won the 2015 Nobel Prize for Physics. By 6:20am, or maybe even earlier, news media were calling Queen’s University media relations people to request handout pictures of the new Nobel Laureate.

Queen’s University was prepared and news media around the world had a portrait of the university professor emeritus on their web sites shortly thereafter.

The Nobel Prize-winning professor did his research at the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory in Sudbury, Ontario. News media called the lab early in the morning for handout pictures of the scientist and of its research facilities.
Continue reading →

css.php