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Bridging Tech and Creative Photography
Bridging Tech and Creative Photography
Bridging Tech and Creative Photography
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How to Shoot Better Photos for Dating Websites

Chris Gampat
No Comments
03/18/2014
4 Mins read
Chris Gampat The Phoblographer Zeiss 135mm f2 review images (10 of 11)ISO 4001-320 sec at f - 2.8

Chris Gampat The Phoblographer Photos of Katie Catena (9 of 9)

There is nowhere that someone tries to put their best face forward anymore on the internet than on a dating website. And when you’re working with people that want to try attracting potential suitors, they want to have who they are put forward. But at the same time, you can’t go over the top in any way because that will just throw off people looking at their profiles.

So when it comes creating better photos for a dating website, here are a couple of things that you’ll need to do and keep in mind.

Interview the Person First

Chris Gampat The Phoblographer Sony A99 images with 135mm f1.8 (3 of 8)ISO 400

One of the most basic things that you can do and truly should do is interview the person. Ask them the typical who, what, when, where, how and why. These questions about them start to formulate a background on them that you can piece together and translate into images. For example, maybe someone is a workout junkie and in this case you may want to photograph them riding a bike, doing yoga or something along those lines.

Some great questions to ask:

– Who is the person that you’re trying to put across?

– What does that person like doing for fun and what do they actually do on the spare time?

– When does this person usually do these activities?

– Where does this person like to hang out?

– How will you need to shoot this person? Will there be need for special lighting or anything like that?

Don’t Use a Focal Length Under 50mm

Chris Gampat The Phoblographer Essentials The Mobile Headshot photographer (3 of 6)ISO 2001-250 sec at f - 4.0
Pro Tip: OKCupid recommended the use of Panasonic cameras years ago. But we’re positive that that’s just nonsense.

One of our biggest rules when it comes to gear is to not use a focal length under 50mm. To help them put their best face forward, we strongly recommend that you instead go for longer focal lengths. This applies to the use of both cropped sensors and full frame cameras. Exceptions are the Olympus 45mm f1.8 (review here)and Panasonic’s 42.5mm f1.2 lens. Other options include:

– Canon 85mm f1.8

– Sigma 85mm f1.4 (review here)

– Nikon 85mm f1.8/f1.4 (review here)

– Samsung 85mm f1.4

– Fujifilm 56mm f1.2

– Zeiss 135mm f2 (the big daddy of portrait lenses, review here)

– Sony 85mm f1.4 and 135mm f1.8  (review here and here)

– Pentax 55mm f1.4

– Rokinon 85mm f1.4 (review here)

Go Through Their Wardrobe With Them

Chris Gampat Simon's portraits (9 of 10)ISO 2001-125 sec at f - 2.8

 

You’re probably best off going through their wardrobe with them to ensure that you’re selling who they are and not some character that they play to pick folks up. Think of various outfits that can work with the weather and with different poses. Try to involve props too if you can. Giving someone something to do can create more natural looking images.

Put Them in Their Natural Environments

Chris Gampat The Phoblographer Tamron 24-70mm f2.8 VC II review photos of Matt's portrait session (2 of 4)
Pro Tip: The only people that are going to pixel peep on a dating website are those more interested in pixels than attracting a mate

The use of props continues into making someone be natural–and putting them in a natural environment of some sort has never made more sense. If someone is a video gamer or loves reading books at cafes, try to set up some sort of shoot where you portray them doing this. It may require storyboarding and sometimes permission, but it works out.

Give Them the Fashion Look

Chris Gampat Adam's edited portraits (2 of 9)ISO 1001-1250 sec at f - 1.4

Making someone look great on camera involves a lot more than just using the latest and greatest focal lengths (and that isn’t even true at all.) It requires carefully posing them and capturing their best sides. For starters:

– Ask them to stand straight at you, then take careful note of which shoulder is the lower hanging one. Then position them in such a way that they’re evened out.

– Ask the person to tilt their head slightly and maybe even put their face in such a position that the nose looks like it is against the cheek.

– Depending on their physique, ask them to bring their chin out.

Get Rid of Blemishes, But Make Them Look Natural

Pro Tip: We recommend that you communicate with the person that you're photographing first to get insight as to what they want. Some headshots are more corporate oriented while others are for comp cards, actor profiles, and dating websites.
Pro Tip: We recommend that you communicate with the person that you’re photographing first to get insight as to what they want. Some headshots are more corporate oriented while others are for comp cards, actor profiles, and dating websites.

Talk to the person about what they think their blemishes are on the skin. And if possible, try to take out things like pimples or special marks if you feel that they’ll easily appear. But don’t completely and totally retouch the skin–this isn’t a fashion magazine ad. Instead, having a minor imperfection makes them appear more human if anything.

If something is really bothering your subject though, then get rid of it.

Proper Metadata Will Help You/Them Stop Spam Bots

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

The one biggest thing that you’d want to do is insert specific tags and keywords into the metadata of the image in Adobe Lightroom. When you do this, it will make the images that are uploaded to the web easier for you to find and track down on the web. One of my clients had images of her stolen by a bot, but I was able to stop and prevent it from happening again due to my ability to track them accordingly.

Plus, it’s just nice to be able to know where the images that you’ve created are going.

For more, please follow us on Facebook, Google+, Flickr and Twitter.

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Chris Gampat

Chris Gampat is the Editor in Chief, Founder, and Publisher of the Phoblographer. He provides oversight to all of the daily tasks, including editorial, administrative, and advertising work. Chris's editorial work includes not only editing and scheduling articles but also writing them himself. He's the author of various product guides, educational pieces, product reviews, and interviews with photographers. He's fascinated by how photographers create, considering the fact that he's legally blind./ HIGHLIGHTS: Chris used to work in Men's lifestyle and tech. He's a veteran technology writer, editor, and reviewer with more than 15 years experience. He's also a Photographer that has had his share of bylines and viral projects like "Secret Order of the Slice." PAST BYLINES: Gear Patrol, PC Mag, Geek.com, Digital Photo Pro, Resource Magazine, Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Finance, IGN, PDN, and others. EXPERIENCE: Chris Gampat began working in tech and art journalism both in 2008. He started at PCMag, Magnum Photos, and Geek.com. He founded the Phoblographer in 2009 after working at places like PDN and Photography Bay. He left his day job as the Social Media Content Developer at B&H Photo in the early 2010s. Since then, he's evolved as a publisher using AI ethically, coming up with ethical ways to bring in affiliate income, and preaching the word of diversity in the photo industry. His background and work has spread to non-profits like American Photographic Arts where he's done work to get photographers various benefits. His skills are in SEO, app development, content planning, ethics management, photography, Wordpress, and other things. EDUCATION: Chris graduated Magna Cum Laude from Adelphi University with a degree in Communications in Journalism in 2009. Since then, he's learned and adapted to various things in the fields of social media, SEO, app development, e-commerce development, HTML, etc. FAVORITE SUBJECT TO PHOTOGRAPH: Chris enjoys creating conceptual work that makes people stare at his photos. But he doesn't get to do much of this because of the high demand of photography content. / BEST PHOTOGRAPHY TIP: Don't do it in post-production when you can do it in-camera.
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