Candid Photography 

Candid photography is by definition taking pictures of people when they are unaware.  It can be very difficult to catch your subject off guard because most people will react when you point a camera at them, some will strike very artificial poses and others will shy away from you. Taking candid shots may appear easy but nothing could be further from the truth. So what can we do to get those great natural looking portraits?

At our portrait photography studios in Londonderry a technique I often use is to get my subject in the position I want and chat about the weather, the latest big movie, sports, anything except photography, at this point I don’t even have my camera in hand. Get the idea? Try to get your subject to relax. Next I pick up my camera, still chatting away and tell them that I am just checking the settings. At first I don’t even point the lens at my unsuspecting victim. Nine times out of ten the person will forget about the camera and I can get a couple of sneaky shots before they even realize what I am up to. Very often these completely natural shots are the ones that get chosen.

 

A good portrait relies on the intensity and angle of light as much as on the subject; however, you may not always have as much control over these as you might like. This is particularly true of location shoots or in wedding photography. In the studio as soon as a flash or strobe is fired, the opportunity for an unguarded image is often lost. To get around this I will fire my lighting units without my camera, testing my settings again, so that my subject gets used to the idea of sudden explosions of bright light. Then I continue as above with my camera in hand. Where possible though I prefer to work using only natural light so there is no give-away burst of artificial light.

You will notice that I haven’t mentioned camera settings yet. To quote a very successful portrait photographer “Portraiture is 10% camera skills and 90% people skills”. For the beginner the automatic settings on your camera will work perfectly well for candid photography. It is far more important to learn how to get your subject to be comfortable in front of the camera than to be completely expert in the nuts and bolts of your camera’s workings.

For the more advanced user the choice of settings will be determined by the end result you are looking for. I always use AP mode (Aperture Priority) and let the camera control shutter speed making sure that I have an acceptable value, usually no less than 1/125, by adjusting the ISO value myself. I use wide apertures e.g. f2.8 to create an image with lots of out of focus area so that the viewer’s gaze is drawn to the areas in sharp focus which will usually be the subject’s eyes.

Try these techniques for yourself and you will soon find that taking candid portraits can be more like having a coffee and a chat with a friend than a full on photo session. Remember, have fun!