Photographic portrait, the secret is to get involved.

Maybe it's Pulcinella's secret, all right, but the success of a portrait very often depends on the ability we have to get involved in our subject.

We learn to interact, we will take a better portrait

The beauty of photography is that it is not an exact science, but which, fortunately, has a strong creative and personal component, capable of intercepting or even arousing the emotions of the beholder.

It is precisely this less rational dimension that has little in common with technique that often determines the success or otherwise of a shot.

How many times have we observed a portrait, ours or taken by others, and, despite being technically perfect and carefully composed, feel the more or less distinct sensation that something was missing?

Unfortunately often and many times it is not the fault of the subject, but rather the lack of empathy that we have managed to develop with those who posed for us at that moment.

Extreme features for a successful portrait

The portrait is a sneaky photographic genre.

If we think about it, almost all the portraits are very similar to each other, yet some manage to emerge and strike us more than others.

Why does one portrait strike us more than another?

Let's discard the portraits of famous people, where what often catches our attention is their status , and try to analyze what are the characteristics that make a portrait successful.

Surely, we are more interested in the portrait of a face that offers extreme somatic characteristics , particularly beautiful or particularly ugly, but also singular, out of the ordinary.

This is why a face is not enough to have a portrait .

However, this is a component that we can only train ourselves to recognize and over which we have very little jurisdiction, other than the obligation to photograph our subject consciously, emphasizing its physical attributes.

The portrait as a metaphor

In linguistics, a metaphor is a figure of speech that implies a transfer of meaning. Bringing it within the photographic language, we can speak of a metaphor when the subject of our shot suggests an alternative meaning, for example a homeless person for poverty, for social inequality or a crawling newborn for innocence.

The portrait can be a powerful metaphor and very often it is this type of shot that arouses the greatest interest.

The success of the shooter, when grappling with a metaphorical portrait, is linked in a particular way to the ability to accompany the shot with some fundamental elements so that the viewer is able to grasp the connection to the deeper meaning, without, however, these semantic trappings distracting.

In this case, much is left to our ability – to our vision .

In fact, it will be our ability to choose the most significant details, the ability to make clear the relationship between our subject and these details, as well as the ability to find the right balance between subject and context, to determine the success of our shot.

We learn to establish a relationship

I've never taken a single portrait without trying in some way to establish a relationship with my subject and it didn't matter if it was reduced to a few smiles or a chat.

First, because I am someone who talks a lot – even too much, say Magda and Maja. Secondly, because I believe that trying to get to know and establish some relationship with who I'm about to portray makes him feel, on the one hand, as much as possible, more at ease, on the other it allows me to get to know him better, to observe his expressions face and its emotions.

If it's a planned portrait, I take the time to get to know my subject a little more. Net of models, actors or public figures who have developed a certain habit of posing, being portrayed always triggers a certain amount of anxiety, even though the session has been previously agreed.

In the case of a planned portrait , I always try to allocate some of the expected time, to have a chat, without the embarrassment of pointing the camera. Chatting that it is my habit to prolong even while shooting.

It may seem a bizarre and unsubstantiated reasoning, but I assure you that, due to some unwritten law of photography, much of what the person I portray and I tell each other in those four chats before and during the session, somehow, will also emerge in the shots,

Having a chat costs nothing, if not just a little time.

But be careful not to transform them into a third degree. We would achieve exactly the opposite purpose and that is to make our subject feel uncomfortable and he will be eager to say goodbye.

On the other hand, when the portrait is the result of an impromptu situation , for example a fortuitous meeting, first of all I guarantee myself permission to shoot, but then I don't hide behind my Nikon and liquid my subject with a couple of clicks, even if it were of a theft.

Obviously the type of relationship and the quality of the interaction that can be established in an extemporaneous portrait depend on the situation, the place, the possibility of speaking common languages, even if I remember shots I am particularly fond of born on the spur of an exchange of simple smiles, sometimes accompanied by gestures.

It is said that a stranger who agrees to be portrayed is then willing to spend a lot of time with us. In this regard we must be quick to understand how much we can dwell and we must be equally quick in performing the arithmetic of the shot and in choosing the composition. The rest of the time I use to establish a connection with my subject, at whatever level this is allowed to me.

Only by chatting do we discover things . Sometimes these things reveal unthinkable, unexpected stories. Stories worth telling. But that's a whole other matter.

Interacting helps bring out the stories behind the face

Yes, it's true, this is kind of my obsession, but even the most boring woman or man on this planet can hide stories or aspects that are singular, in some way significant, or in any case interesting enough to be told.

If we don't ask, we'll never know.

True, a story doesn't always manage to emerge in a single portrait, but sometimes a story can also be a simple detail, an expression, a gesture, a pose, a sign or a scar.

The silent photographer is not allowed to listen to stories because he is afraid to ask.

Portrait, between the psychology of the beholder, the poser and the shooter

I said it, the portrait is a sneaky genre, it requires more sensitivity than technique and this, by itself, offers minor guarantees for success.

The portrait is as if floating in a hypothetical triangle, whose vertices represent the psychology of the viewer, that of the poser and, of course, that of the shooter.

We have very little control over the psychology of the beholder, we have some resources related to photographic language, the choice of subjects, the use of the portrait as a metaphor, as well as some archetypes that can prod the notorious collective imagination.

For the remaining two vertexes, a lot depends on us, on our ability to empathize with who we are shooting, on our ability to lead the interpersonal dynamics and bring the subject to show us his emotions, his thoughts, something more than the mere facial mask.

In short, the portrait is not a genre for the shy.