Langford's Basic Photography -

2 good chapters on light, the first is how light behaves, it's principles and how it is fundamental to the making of images.

The second chapter on light is geared toward lighting equipment / set up and practical lighting problems.

Both books i've mentioned about light help you to understand how light works / effects your images and how to capture it / use it to help improve form, shape, texture and depth.

Light Science & Magic - 

A great book to learn to understand light, explains where to place camera and lights to get the most from your subjects, reflections and family of angles. Gets a little bit technical - but explains it very well with examples and projects to copy to actually see the results.

Frank Meadow Sutcliffe - based in whitby, taken around 1875

http://www.joeyl.com

Less controversial as the last post (LoL)

Think he has a great grasp on the use of light in all his images, whether it be his commercial photography, documentary photography or his portraiture.

http://www.joeyl.com

Joey Lawerence

Some amazing images, and yes we will get the comment that these are not portraits but a form of documentary photography. But is that because the images were taken in another country about people we are not accustomed to seeing, because if you gave them a camera and asked them to take portraits of each other, they would produce similar images - but they would not be documentary. If they came to this country and took images of us they would class that as documentary - yet we would just call it portraiture.
So does it depend who's taking the photograph and where

Masters of photography - Diane Arbus (documentary, 1972)

Didn't get to see many of her images, but was more listening to her thoughts and reasons on her own photography.

youtube - Darkness & Light
dvd on Richard Avedon, awesome look in to the life of a great photographer. It's over an hour long, but well worth watching. Seen it a few times now, but could watch it over and over again.
Just makes you want to buy some of his books, but the prices of some of them - jesus, unreal.
It's good to get an insight as to how he works, thinks and goes about getting some of the most famous portraits ever taken, watching how he built a rapport with his subject and what he actually did and said to get some of the emotions he captured.
His images aren't just photographs, they are works of art and as such can't be just classed as portraits.

Portraits taken with my Bronica - 120 film, scanned in at low rez
taken a few month ago, which really shows with the inexperience in my choice of lighting and back drop.
but my focus was better than with todays Hasselblad

 

 

A few portraits i took today.
I tried to fill the frame with the subject
and not let any background or surroundings in to the frame

http://www.picturecorrect.com/tips/photography-studio-lighting-setup-tips/


The lighting set up may be the most important part to consider, to help obtain the affect your after

Various Basic Lighting Set Ups

Pieter Hugo

Appears to be more documentary, but still appeals to me due to his content and approach. Is it individualism / trying to be different or just using the basics or what is supposed to be the norm and giving it a twist

Jono Rotman

Did an awesome series of images "The Mongrel Mob", which I really like and keep going back to, but after looking at more of his images I think you can see a certain similarity and personal style

Hunger Mag

(can't see the eyes)

My next favourite magazine, and not for the written word, but every photograph within. What i would personally regard as some amazing portraits, some of which maybe classed as fashion / glamour, but when cropped in and the main point of focus is the subjects eyes and you can do nothing else but stare right back in my opinion is what makes me like this type of photography. IT'S ALL IN THE EYES

Hotshoe

My favourite photography magazine, with some of the most awe inspiring portraits I have seen, maybe not to some's taste, but none the less credit has to be given to the final images.

Dorethea Lange

My personal opinion
I believe this to be a very good 'portrait' photograph. If you didn't know the photographer or about the image itself - where and why it was taken, you would class it as a portrait and not documentary photography. I believe it's because your told that it is part of a series of documentary images that you accept it as one.
If i replicated the set up in a studio, or outside with a portable back drop and then displayed it with other portraits, what would be the discerning fact that it could be a documentary photograph, unless you made it part of a series of images that were meant to depict a time / era or an event.

Portrait

Portray - to show or describe someone or something in a particular way

portray someone as something

to make a picture of

depict

enact

to reveal

to expose

represent

from Latin prōtrahere - "bring to light"

Ian Macdonald

Local photographer with over 40 years shooting in and around Cleveland

Using a large format camera

Great book on the Redcar Blast Furnace

well worth a look for inspiration - first brought to my attention by Andy Dunning, there's even a documentary on his work

Shizuka Yokomizo

I really liked the concept and images capture in "Dear Stranger", getting the subject in their own environment in a pose they chose at a set time - not knowing who was outside taking the photograph

I enjoy taking candid portraits as I feel you capture more of the subjects identity, emotion and even dare i say - get to know them from the image.
This is all going to have to change in the studio as I am going to have to build up some sort of rapport with my model / subject to get them relaxed and I'm going to have to be in control of exactly what i want them to do, how to sit or stand, where there hands will be and what I am trying to put across in my final images.
whole new daunting world for me - interaction.

Again, I'd spoke to my subject, but only started taking the images once they had relaxed and forgot that I had a camera in my hand

My subject knew I would be taking his photo, but I tried to take more natural images rather than him staring down the lens waiting for the shutter with a false pose. Trying to capture him, rather than him dictating what he wanted the image to portray.

Do portraits need to show the subjects face, or can it still be classed as a portrait

http://www.andydunning.com/album/black__white_portraits?p=1&s=UA-15453457-1#2

http://www.andydunning.com/album/black__white_portraits?p=1&s=UA-15453457-1#2

You really need to check this portrait out

my NCFE college tutor is the photographer, but oh who's the subject

Portrait Photographers to check out

Yousuf Karsh

Eve Arnold

Edouard Boubat

Philippe Halsman

Cecil Beaton

Irving Penn

Anton Kratochvil

Mary-Ellen Mark

Annie Leibovitz

Very famous portrait by Steve McCurry
but
would it be classed as documentary

and it's all in the eyes

Lionel Deluy

I must look at his images on http://www.krop.com/lioneldeluy/#/83786/

at least once a week