Environmental Portraits: Juan

Juan used to be a dancer working on cruise ships and we set up a portrait shoot just before his departure for Japan, where he now teaches English. The photo shoot took place in Juan’s flat, a natural location for environmental portraits.

Multiple copies of the same person on a couch with different expressions — Three sides of Juan.

The “multiple personalities” pic above is always a fun one to do. Thee exposures and a bit of Photoshop.

We then moved to a different set up we called “dancing on a couch”. The photograph below is my favourite.

Dancer on a couch with dramatic lighting — I used a single light to camera right to give shape and dimension to my subject

I had recently acquired a smoke machine for a music video and I just couldn’t resist the temptation to bring it along and try a number of set ups.

Male subject on a couch with smokey background — The haze created by the smoke machine adds mood to the already dramatic lighting set up.

Finally, Juan wanted a photograph that illustrated his life over the past few years. This image is my favourite of the whole shoot. I try to think of a few photo ideas before a session so we can get started right away, but I had not anticipated anything like this last photograph.