Environmental Portrait Photography Ideas
Portrait photographs captured in a studio with a good backdrop are always nice, but some photo projects require you to capture more of a story with your images. One of the best ways to create a story through your photography is to use environmental portraits. Coming up with environmental portrait photography ideas, however, can some times be a challenge.
When we look to develop environmental portrait photography ideas, you first need to understand who your client is. Are you photographing an engagement shoot for a couple, or are you taking product photos to represent a brand? If it’s for a brand, ask yourself, what are the values of this brand, who are their products geared towards, and what does the brand truly represent? Once you establish who you’re taking the photos for and what their brand is all about, you can then determine who their target audience is. With all of those pieces of information accounted for, you can then develop some solid environmental portrait photography ideas for the project.
If you don’t want to do all of that brainstorming, however, I’ve got you covered. Below, I’ve outlined some environmental portrait photography ideas to help you conceptualize your next lifestyle portrait photography brand session. Keep in mind that these are just general ideas. Each one can be broken down into smaller niche scenes for the brand you are working for.
The Great Outdoors
Having an extensive background in travel photography, I have always enjoyed creating environmental portrait photos in the great outdoors. Large mountains and giant trees in the background create such great drama and depth within photos, and foreground elements, such as grasses, rocks and roots, add nice texture.
The great outdoors also works, of course, for brands who create outdoor apparel and equipment - you wouldn’t take environmental portraits of a surfboard brand in a studio, would you? Of course not! You’d likely take environmental portraits of their surfboards being used out on the beach to really help encapsulate the brand and what they represent in your images.
The great outdoors doesn’t need to be exclusively used for environmental portraits for outdoor brands. Many different types of brands can benefit from having nature in the background. As I stated above, the natural elements of nature help create depth and texture within a photo. These elements can be used to create a certain feeling or emotion in your photos. They can also create a sense of remembrance and association with the brand’s potential customers.
For instance, if a coffee company showcases images of their coffee being enjoyed on a dock in cottage country, the image may invoke that relaxing feeling that so many cottage goers experience when they’re up at their cottages. Just because coffee isn’t an “outdoor product” necessarily, doesn’t mean the great outdoors can’t be used to create environmental portraits to invoke a sense of emotion!
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Office Spaces
Depending on who your client is, office spaces can be a great way to portray business professionals in their natural environment. Sure, photographing cubicles may not be the best way to sell a story through an image, however some offices do really showcase what a brand is all about.
For instance, manufacturing companies often have machines that make the products they sell. By showcasing the people of the company utilizing those machines, you are helping to convey the story of how their products actually get made. This creates a human element for the brand. It also invokes curiosity in the customer, as they become privy to the complexities that went into the end product that they enjoy.
Other office spaces, like design firms, often have very trendy and modern layouts. These layouts can not only showcase designers working in their place of business, but the spaces tend to photograph really well too! This isn’t limited to just design offices either. If your client has a really nice office space and you think it’d work well for some environmental portrait photography, ask them if they’d be open to having a photo shoot there.
Interior Spaces
In addition to office spaces, interior spaces in general can be great for capturing the story of a brand, product or service in an image. There are so many possibilities for environmental portrait photo ideas inside. Think about kitchens, living rooms, libraries, sporting venues, cafes, restaurants, grocery stores, etc. The list goes on and on.
Again, the same rules apply. Make sure the interior spaces you chose for your environmental portrait photos makes sense for your client or the brand you’re working with. The one thing to keep in mind with interior spaces, however, is lighting. Depending on the lighting scenario (you may have natural lighting from windows or terrible fluorescent lights), studio lighting may be required.
This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, as studio lighting allows you to dial in your look. It also means you don’t have to rush to snap a photo while the natural lighting from the windows looks good. Studio lighting allows you to take control of the lighting situation and snap photos inside for as long as needed under the same lighting conditions.
Streets and Cityscapes
Street photography has been a popular form of photography for a long time. Why? Because every city or town has it’s own character and charm, and no two city is the same. Every street, every structure, every person and every moment is unique. Thus, street photography provides a solid canvas for some highly original environmental portraits.
When taking environmental portraits in cities, keep an eye out for leading lines and geometric patterns. These lines and patterns can be used to visually lead your images towards your subjects. Also, keep an eye out for interesting textures. Buildings made from concrete and brick add lots of texture to an image, and reflections on windows can add a level of depth that’s hard to match in other scenarios.
Barns & Farms
If you’re looking to create more of a country vibe in your photos, barns & farms can make great environmental portrait photography locations. You may even be able to add in a horse to your images at some farm locations.
Similar to the great outdoors (mentioned above), barns & farms will add a great layer of depth to your images. From the grasses, rustic fences, hay bales and the barns themselves, to the rolling fields behind them, there is no shortage of details and textures at these facilities.
I will say, however, that barns & farms do create a fairly specific look and feel to your images, meaning they will not work for everyone or every brand. If you’re doing personal environmental portraits and your client loves horses or the country lifestyle, this setting could certainly work. Also, for brand work, you may be able to incorporate this type of scene as well as long as it fits with the brand’s values and story. Get creative, and keep this environmental portrait photography idea in mind.
Conclusion
Environmental portrait photography allows you as the photographer to not only portray their subject in a scene that suits them, but also helps tell a story. Whether you’re taking photos for an engagement shoot or a brand, the scene that you choose can be as important as the subject, as both come together to create the final image. When you have an environmental portrait location selected, try to incorporate different components of the scene into your images. Think about the elements in the foreground and background, include a few textures, and utilize leading lines when you can. When you do all that, you will have environmental portraits that showcase your subject, and truly tell a story.