The Cinematic Portrait
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© Alastair Batchelor
I'm often asked about my approach to achieving the cinematic aesthetic within my portrait images. Since it has become something of a buzzword over the last few years, I thought it would be interesting to take a look at some of the factors that can determine the cinematic look within photography. It's important to note that art is subjective, and these are merely my own insights into what I feel creates that ‘filmic’ look when capturing photos of people.
When it comes to my own work, there are a number of things I take into account, that when combined, lead to a very specific aesthetic. As portrait photographers, we are always aware of the following things: our subject and what they're doing, our location, our light, our composition, and how we process our images. These are all important factors for everyone, regardless of style. But what am I doing more specifically within each of those categories?
The mood, expression, and positioning of my subject, whether captured candidly or posed purposefully, is something I'm always aware of both at the time of shooting and when selecting images afterwards. I look for some kind of emotional intensity or confidence in the expression. It's hard to put a finger on exactly what that ‘something’ is, but it's usually clear when reviewing images after a shoot, when one just seems to pop out of the screen and grab my attention. However, unlike when I'm shooting acting headshots, I'm not so focused on trying to capture the true personality of my subject as much as creating an image that almost feels ‘otherworldly,’ as though it's still from a film or TV series.
Shooting in varied locations not only helps keep my portraits interesting but also adds a whole palette of potential atmosphere to create and experiment with. Bars, underground stations, rooftops, home interiors, large open spaces, and more all provide a captivating setting in which a person's portrait or fictional scene can take place.
Closely tied with this is my choice of lighting. Often, this isn't a premeditated choice at all, as I use available light 90% of the time. But the most important point is that I like to use ambient light that creates a sense of drama. If it's naturally occurring, then I like extremes; the last rays of golden hour, blue hour, pockets of daylight combined with some sort of available artificial light, etc. I love shooting at night, and/or with only available artificial light, dimly lamp-lit bars, neon signage, street lights, etc. I do always carry with me a very small palm-sized RGB LED light, which I sometimes use in combination with other available artificial light, perhaps as an extra splash of colour, or to create a ‘rim-light’ on the subject. With the right positioning and expression from the subject, on top of using this kind of lighting and location, I'm usually on the right path to achieving the cinematic look I always desire.
Sometimes the head and shoulders headshot style framing is all I need. A closeup view of the subject and their expression, with just enough of a glimpse of their surroundings to create a sense of environment and atmosphere. But often by stepping back just a little more, we're automatically creating more of a scene for the viewer. I often like to ask them to freely move around while I'm chatting away, allowing me to fire off a round of shots to see if we can capture anything candidly. This can be a fairly hit-or-miss approach, which is why I often then ask my subject to recreate a pose or expression based on a frame that has caught my attention
© Alastair Batchelor
Finally, comes my post-processing workflow. While I don't believe that you can simply create a cinematic look by purely editing alone, I find that for myself this is an extremely important process and one that I'll happily spend many hours completing. The biggest component of this is the colour grading. Having done all of the basic RAW processing in Adobe Lightroom, the bulk of my colouring happens in a neatly organised folder of layers titled ‘GRADE’ in Photoshop. By using a combination of selective colour, luminosity mask toning, gradient maps, and grain textures, I can get to the desired result that I usually picture in my mind before I start. I'll also often create a few variations of the colour grade (in separate folders) and view these on my phone at low brightness to decide which I feel is the most impactful.
By toning the highlights and shadows of my images in opposing or complimentary pairs, I find the sense of depth that you can add to a picture is fantastic. Certain hues of different colour groups feel (to me at least) more invoking of the filmic quality I'm always chasing; most notably Teal, deep Reds and Oranges, muted Greens, and warm skin tones. Not only does my use of film grain also evoke a sense of cinema (and of course, 35mm film), but I feel that the texture it adds is so pleasing and important to creating further depth and interest to the image.
In the age of pristine digital quality, for me something has been lost. Perhaps it's that element of analog imperfection that you see from films projected onto the big screen or the bumps and curves of brushstrokes you see when viewing a painting up close in a gallery. Though to some it may seem counter-intuitive, this is why I like to add back a small level of imperfection in my colouring and added texture layers when processing the images in their final stage. This means I can still shoot with the convenience and resolution of digital photography but attain the evocative and exciting style that I love to see from the perspective of a viewer.
Alastair Batchelor
To see more of Alastair’s work: www.alastairbatchelor.com
