Depending on your interest, you could master various aspects of photography - landscapes, portraits, architectural photography or even wild life. In this article, we limit ourselves to portraits. The different types of portraits are: close-ups, facial shots, upper body shots or environmental portraits. Environmental portraits are those in which you focus on the subject and the surroundings, thereby allowing more character emphasis on the subject.

Most often what happens is when your subject is conscious of a camera focusing on his or her face, the results are usually disastrous - capturing faces of people without being able to actually portray the expression of who he or she really is. The real skill to portrait photography is capturing the subject when he or she is comfortable with the photographer or the camera.

Many professional photographers try to capture their subject’s true essence by applying a few tricks. One example of this is counting from one to three so that the subject is prepared and then while he is set to relax himself after a couple of planned shots, the photographer takes a few, discreet shots, which most often produce the desired results he expects. In most cases, when the subject is caught unawares, the results are stupendous.

Another more common strategy professionals use is to spell out a few funny jokes that make their subjects genuinely laugh or smile. I guess you would have experienced something like this yourself, at some time.

Close-up portraits
These usually have the subject’s shoulders and head or even less, in focus. They are framed around the subject's face. These are the most common and best at capturing expressions and glamour shots. For this type, it is very important to have the light coming in from a good angle. To accentuate wrinkles or minor details, you should have the light coming from the side or from the top. To create flattering pictures, you should choose a cloudy day or try to create diffused light so that there are barely any shadows. Also, make sure the subject appears brighter than the background to reduce distraction.

For close-up portraits you should use a wide aperture (low f/stop) to make sure the background is out of focus and therefore causes less distraction. Professionals commonly use a fixed telephoto lens that’s 90 mm or higher for portraits in order to de-emphasize the subject’s nose or any other unflattering feature. It works because at that distance the nose or any other feature does not seem closer to the camera than the rest of the face.