In an effort to understand what our clients go through, I subject myself to the same conditions as they do. I usually do this in portrait sessions with Allan hence I get to have those impeccable profile pictures and cover photos on Facebook. I try to understand how a person will receive the instructions from a photographer so I can help our clients relax in front of the camera. This is also the same for headshots. I have been through a couple of headshot sessions so I know exactly how it feels to be directed to come up with a great headshot image.
On this particular occasion, it was different. I was at the back of the camera directing Allan in order to come up with a good headshot photo. Being behind the camera is nothing new to me. I’ve been a second photographer to Allan in all of his weddings so I do understand a thing or two about what it is like to be a photographer. That was in the context of a wedding. This was now a headshot session where I have to produce a genuine, honest-to-goodness photograph of the person who has been doing this for sometime. It was a daunting task and so I had to pull out whatever I have learned from the hours I have been observing headshot sessions.
This is my conclusion after this session: a headshot (the way headshot photographer Peter Hurley does it) is an entirely different discipline altogether. Nowadays, people can easily claim they can be a wedding photographer or a portrait photographer. Just throw in a few filters and put the subject in a nice background with some props and they can get a client or two. But I don’t think it is the same with the Peter Hurley way of doing headshots. Every micro expression is exposed and magnified so that the directing skill of the photographer is tested in every shot. Of course, it does not help that the subject I was photographing has been doing this for quite some time. I now have more respect (in fact, more than ever) to the people who have become associates of Peter Hurley. Watch this space on who will be his first associate in this part of the world.
Note: Identity Headshots was formerly called Fotojorno.
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