How to photograph yourself: the technical and historical aspects of self-portraiture

2024 Author: Sierra Becker | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-26 03:46

Self-portrait is perhaps one of the oldest forms of art. Knowledge of the world begins with self-knowledge. And it is difficult to argue against this fact. From time immemorial, artists have tried to convey their inner state by depicting themselves. Almost all classics, from ancient artists to post-impressionists, preferred to portray themselves, revealing their vision of the world through their own image, through their experiences, sensations, closing the circle of their creativity on themselves.

Self-portrait is akin to an autobiography in which the artist tries to tell about his life through visual images. Albrecht Dürer and Leonardo, Van Gogh and Frida Kahlo left behind a vast legacy of self-portraits that tell about their lives much more fully and expressively than any evidence of contemporaries and studies of biographers.

With the advent of the camera, the process of creating images has become much easier. Today, in order to create a picture that the ancientsmasters took months of painstaking work, just one press of the release button. However, the question arises of how to take a picture of yourself on your own, without the help of strangers?

There are several methods for creating a self-portrait photo. First of all (and this is the most popular, easiest and most logical option) is taking a picture of yourself in the mirror. In the case of a SLR camera, when you need to look through the viewfinder to control the boundaries of the frame, this process is somewhat difficult, although, of course, you can make several attempts and check the result sequentially until you achieve the desired quality. However, practice shows that such pictures rarely turn out to be expressive from an artistic point of view, since it is very difficult to control facial expressions in a situation where you need to follow the position of the camera, while trying not to move so as not to “fall out” of the frame. In addition, in order to understand how to take a picture of yourself in the mirror, you must take into account that the shooting should take place in fairly bright light, excluding the use of a flash, which is incompatible with the mirror. And in generally low-light indoor conditions, this is always a problem.

The second answer to the question "how to photograph yourself" is shooting at arm's length. This method is associated with some difficulties and requires training in spatial vision and remarkable coordination of movements. In addition, the parameters of the camera should allow shooting from smalldistances. It should have enough depth of field so that the background you are shooting against is not blurry and all the details are in focus.

Perhaps the best answer to the question "how to photograph yourself" is shooting from a tripod or tripod. With this method, you need to install the camera on a tripod, point it to a pre-selected place, having previously mentally marked the boundaries of the frame, press the timer and have time to take the required position within the time provided by this function. Usually it is 10 seconds, but there are cameras with a discrete timer that allows you to vary the start delay time up to 20 seconds. This time is enough to get a good quality picture. In addition, some cameras today are equipped with a remote control that can be used to press the trigger from a distance.

If you don't have a tripod, it's not a problem. You can simply set the camera on a hard, stable surface, if necessary, placing objects at hand under it to stabilize it.

In addition, today there are many devices with a rotary screen, which greatly simplifies self-portrait shooting.

Any student will answer the question "how to take a picture of himself" that it is easier than ever to do it with the help of a computer webcam. This is perhaps the easiest way, however, the quality of many webcam pictures leaves much to be desired - and the image usually turns out to be a mirror image, andpost-processing of the frame in Photoshop or other graphic editor is required.

In general, today the question of "how to photograph yourself" is more an aspect of creativity and imagination than technical equipment. Any of the described methods has the right to exist and gives good results. It just takes a little effort.