Shooting good portraits is equal parts psychology, trust and technical expertise -- with the technical part probably being the least important.
If I had to give advice to anyone at all, it might be to know your tools inside and out, but not let them get in the way. I can go from a 125th to a 30th and from f2.8 to 5.6 while walking backwards and holding conversation without missing a beat. Add too much more to that equation and I’m paying more attention to my gear than to my subject -- not a good thing.
Strobist David Hobby talks to San Diego photographer, Bil Zleman after finding out about him through an interview on A Photo Editor. I'm interested because lately in the past few years I've moved to the less-is-more train of thought.
When I first started assisting in the 90s, I used to work in catalog houses where there was a stable of photographers with 4x5s shooting images of towels on a dresser or stack of shirts of a shelf...y'know the Sunday ads. I've always noticed everything was very technical - lights, scrims, etc. Later in Los Angeles working on bigger productions I'll see something like 20 Profoto packs set up everywhere...everything with about strobes.
A friend actually turned me to the less-is-more because he shoots pretty much natural light with bounce boards. He tells me once he was to photograph an actress and went to the hotel. There was another photography crew there and they hustle to set up lights and so forth. The assistant would run around checking lights, it was a production. My friend just set up a few bounce cards and nail the shot in 10 minutes. And his image is just beautiful.
There's nothing wrong per say with strobes and all...I still use them, I just prefer to find a different path at this time.
I found the interview inspiring and you can find it over here.
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