This last weekend I attended a large state convention where I was able to show off our campaign site designs as well as take a bunch of nifty photos of famous people drinking cheap beer, (and way too much I might add) but that is a tale for another day. Anyway, as I discussed website my strategy for campaigns, a common issue became apparent, and that was “where do you start”. The answer is obvious; the photo of the candidate is the main focus for the site, so we need to start there.
Posing for a political photo isn’t the same as posing for a yearbook. I have had candidates send me shots of them with their fist under their chin, or some other typical goofy graduation pose.
What I thought I would do is walk through some things to consider related to the main photograph as you prepare for a race, and its obligatory website offering.
Camera Resolution
First of all, it is possible to shoot the photos required for the website with any modern digital camera; even the little pocket sized ones. Now, I use a Nikon D300 for most of what I do, but if you are trying to do this yourself, don’t consider the task impossible. The main thing to keep in mind here is to always take the photos at the highest resolution possible by your camera.
Now, most folks assume that because it is the web, and you want the photos to be reasonably small to keep the site speedy, you also need to consider the artists workflow. The deliverable you receive from us on the website will indeed be a small file, but if we have a large resolution original that leaves us wiggle room for lots of things like retouching and cropping.
When a photo is retouched, you have a lot more flexibility if the original file has lots of information (aka 5+ megapixels). Common retouches can include removal of blemished, pimples, fixing eyes, stray hair, and the occasional “man hands”. Some campaigns require a lot more, like reduction of weight, removal of chins, adding arms (more on this later), and fixing closed eyes or painless removal of that third eyebrow. If I only have a small original, most of these changes are just not possible, so keep the files large when you submit them to us for the site knowing they will be reasonably sized later in the process.
Lighting
There are entire books on this subject, but for the people trying to do this on the cheap, there are some great short-cuts you can follow to get a “workable” result. Now, don’t expect a miracle, but there are some things you can do to get a photo reasonable enough for retouching to salvage. This will be the number one area where you can destroy all of your efforts, so you should consider light to be your main challenge (and no, you’re on-camera flash does not count).
First, always shoot in a place with plenty of light, and that light should be from the same type of source. For example, if you are trying to take a photo in a conference room with florescent lighting, and you open the shade to let in daylight, you have now made life a lot harder on me. Florescent lighting is traditionally greenish, and makes people looks sick. If I correct for that, the sunlight you just let in takes on a weird huge, and if I correct for the sunlight, the florescent goes the other direction. Keep your light source of the same type and you will be fine.
Brightness of the light is really critical with the small point-and-shoot cameras. They do evil things to people when you don’t give them enough light. Often this will result in a very grainy photo. My advice to you is to get outside into the shade of a building, or ideally on a cloudy day. Never shoot in direct sunlight as the person will squint their eyes in a very unelectable way. I would place the person about 4 or 5 feet from a brick wall or some other common colored background and take the shot. Since we often remove the background, it will not matter what you place there.
If you have the brightness problem solved, you should not need to use your EVIL on-camera flash. These flashes just make people look awful. If you must use it, it should not be the brightest light source. This is called a “fill flash”, and it helps to eliminate shadows but makes a poor main light. If you have a flash that can swivel, I would place a white wall to my right, and the person about 3 feet from that wall and shoot the flash directly into the wall (it needs to be a white wall, as a colored wall will reflect colored light). This will cause the entire wall to bounce the light back to the person, and these shots can look wonderful. This is effectively turning your small flash into a huge soft light source, ideal for portraits. This is also why clouds work so well, as they turn the tiny sun into a large soft light.
Poses
Posing for a political photo isn’t the same as posing for a yearbook. I have had candidates send me shots of them with their fist under their chin, or some other typical goofy graduation pose. My advice to them is to find another photographer that understands the gravity of the race.
When getting your photo taken you should bring a few different outfits. A business suit should be your main one, and then a nice collared shirt or polo for men, and women can choose another less formal outfit. Jeans are permissible depending on the race and the mood the campaign wants to send to the public. Dress for the position you want to win, not for the position you have today.
Here are some poses I suggest, and often they will yield at least a few useable shots.
Full body – this includes the feet and hair, but you should get in close as a lot of grass or sky isn’t going to help anyone and if the candidate is to small in the photo, you are going to limit the retouch ability of the shot. You should have them look camera right, at the camera, and then camera left with a serious face for a series of three photos. Then I would repeat these three shots with a happy smiling face. One of them will probably work depending on all those other factors the campaign manager wants to consider.
Three-Quarter Body – These are some of my favorite shots. Don’t cut the person at the knees though; I would hit them at mid thigh. Again, look right, center, and left with the serious and smiling theme above. The three-quarter shots are nice for internet ads as well as the masthead of the website.
Bust Shot – These are your typical “head shots”, but with one important caveat, you need the shoulders. DO NOT crop the shot and lop off an arm. I have had to put arms back on people that had a photo cropped in too tightly to the face, and it takes a lot of time. For use on a website, you need to have arms so we have flexibility. I would crop the photo in the viewfinder at nipple height and include the shoulders. Again, do the facing described above for a total of at least 6 shots at this distance.
After you finish with the battery of photos above you should consider adding some action shots. Waiving, talking, gesturing, wild gestures, and so on. Get creative here and have a lot of fun. Some of the best shots come while people goof around here and many are useable.
Once you are done, I would have the person change and then start the process al over again. Perhaps placing the hands on the hips, in pockets, and so on in the above shots can make them less mug-like and much more “election like”.
I hope these brief tips give you better starting points for your candidate photography. Nothing will ever cover you as well as a professional, but if you don’t have one maybe you can get something usable in a pinch.
Scott E. Detweiler