Practicing for my portrait class

For the first half of this semester (until the beginning of October) I am taking a portrait photography class. I've been doing a lot of shoots over the past week. Our first assignment is documentary and natural light portraits. I've been having a lot of fun doing it and am getting a lot more comfortable taking people shots and directing my models. I'm going to share a few of my favorites.

Documentary portraits were described to us as capturing the persons facial features so they can be shared with future generations. The background should be simple and the person should not have a facial expression. I converted most of these to black and white so they look more like an old fashioned portrait

My friend Brandi in front of a sculpture outside of the library -- almost felt like a senior portrait but I love the black and white

took this in color first and I love how it turned out ....

but it looks so much more documentary in black and white

and then horizontal -- she looks so intense in this one -- I love it 

my friend Sam in front of a brick wall -- I love the colors but the red takes away from him a little ...

so here it is in black and white

this is a little close for documentary but I love it except for the fact that he is squinting a bit 

loved the intensity in this one 

NATURAL LIGHT : our second assignment is to take natural light/ open air portraits. So we actually get to pose people and can use whatever setting we want as long as we use the natural/ existing light.  

My friend same again -- this was around 5:30 pm -- love the lines and the sunglasses just made it fun.

I loved the way the light dappled through the trees on this one and his expression is just priceless

I had him lean in the Adirondack chair ad love the way the light just tipped the edge of his hair and he looks pretty relaxed in this one  love it.  

we tried a lot of different places -- this is leaning against a huge sun dial -- loved all the different colors

this one was at about 7:30 as the sun was starting to set. I loved how the light was highlighting the water and pretty nice the way it fell on Sam too 

this was one of the last shots we took and was totally for fun but I absolutely love it and how the light just touches his shoulders 

My friends Jeff, Elli and Fiona -- I was planning on this being documentary but they had such nice smiles on their faces and the lighting was pretty sweet so it became natural light 

We wanted to show Elli's pregnancy -- the light on these trees behind her was just so beautiful

looking through the window in the covered bridge -- love it 

this is my one of my absolute favs -- they were walking through the bridge and I was behind them and just snapped at the right moment

across the stream. I loved how the highlight in Fiona's hair

One of the last pictures I took -- love the expressions on their faces and the dappling in the leaves 

I will be doing many more portraits over the next few weeks and will share some more of my favorites. Comments are always appreciated. Thanks for sharing with me