Becoming a fashion photographer is a dream for many. This particular photography niche is fun and can also be a great income source if you take it up professionally. Fashion photography demands learning and practice, just like all other niches of photography.
However, capturing subjects with an equal focus on their clothing and accessories is a complex art that fashion photographers must master. Numerous little differences make fashion shoots different from other shoots. These differences make it essential for fashion photography learners to get themselves trained before entering the professional circles.
Brands and magazines now take fashion photography very seriously. It’s rare to see anyone ready to tolerate any mistake on the part of the fashion photographers. This means you need to go as far as you can in your efforts to become a fashion photography icon.
You must have a powerful camera already if learning fashion photography has been your dream since childhood. Usually, novice fashion photographers (and a few experts too) consider investing in Nikon D850 to begin their practice. This Nikon camera comes with a range of features suitable for a fashion photography learner and is very easy to use.
Other than 45.7 MP effective pixels, the Nikon D850 also has great sensors, adequate storage space, wide range ISO sensitivity, and a perfect color resolution. All these features, along with many others, make this camera an excellent package for new fashion photographers.
If you are already lucky to have Nikon D850 with you, here are some tips to follow with this camera during shoots to succeed at fashion photography.
Use The Rule Of Thirds
Even when you don’t realize it, fashion shoots are very much about composition and placing the subject at the right place in the frame. You can achieve the best focus and picture aesthetics only when your model is standing at a good position within the scene. Most fashion photographers achieve this correct positioning of the subjects by trusting in the rule of thirds.
Under this rule, they divide their selected shooting frame into three horizontal and three vertical sections. Imagine this division like a box for a tic-tac-toe game that has 9 equal compartments. Now that you’re done with this division, ask your subject to stand at a point where any two of your imaginary vertical and horizontal lines cross each other.
It’s not always necessary to have the subject standing in the middle part of your frame. Instead, you can do it anywhere within the frame you want, just if the two lines are crossing each other at that point.
No law demands a fashion photographer to use this rule every time. However, you’d yourself notice how pictures taken with this rule in action come out better than others.
Thankfully, the Nikon D850 easily allows activating the gird-screen mode when shooting. This mode divides the frame into multiple equal parts that you can consider as the three sections that the rule of thirds suggests you to imagine.
Get The Right Background
Some fashion photographers don’t consider anything in their frame except the subject. This leads them either to end up with a very irrelevant background or a background that is so messy that it gets hard to focus on the model.
Either way, not paying attention to your frame’s background can lead you to substandard shots even when you’ve played well with the lighting and everything else. When shooting a fashion model or non-living subjects for fashion purposes, try to spend considerable time choosing the perfect background.
Try to go with something that contrasts nicely with your subject and focus of the picture. Unless the subject’s nature demands, don’t go with a background that is too full or bright and is full of colors. Such a colorful background often looks good to the eye but takes away the spotlight from your subject once captured.
However, this doesn’t mean that you always go for plain backgrounds with no design element at all. Try to choose a background that looks as interesting as your models without stealing the focus of the picture. A good idea is to play with shadows and light in a manner that improves your otherwise dull background.
Doing such tricks and choosing the right background becomes quite comfortable with the powerful Nikon D850. This camera has a clear screen that shows the contrast and other such features of the frame. The composition on the camera is almost similar to how the final picture comes out. This screen, combined with the easy exposure and shutter speed setup, lets you select the most fantastic background to go with your models.
Center Your Subject
Once a while, it is okay to stick to the conventions of photography and ditch the new rules, especially if the contrast you get this way is better than anything else. One such convention you’d like practicing over and over again for fashion shoots is to place the subjects right at the center of your frame. This way, you can play well with the contrasts and background, taking full advantage of these two to make the shot look best.
Placing your subjects in the center of the frame automatically frees you of a lot of other stuff and worries. Since your subject is already apparent, you don’t have to work with ISOs and angles too much to make it elaborate. Also, the contrasts and light can easily be set up with such a subject positioning in the frame.
Again, Nikon D840’s easy grid screen set up can help you place your subject precisely in the center of your frame. Over time and with frequently using your Nikon’s gridlines, you’d become so adept that you’d hardly spend more than a few seconds centering the subjects of your shoots.
Experiment With Angles
Just like the background and positioning of your subject, the angle you choose to shoot from is also essential to make your fashion shots look unmatchable. Many novice fashion photographers take all their photos from the same angle that is usually the eye-level one. This is something that you must never do.
Instead, try to experiment with as many angles as possible, depending upon the environment you’re shooting in. Go a little bold and choose to shoot from an angle that feels like the craziest one to you. Trying out different angles usually brings a lot of difference to the lights and shadows in the same frame. It lets you choose the most dramatic and intense angle to shoot from.
Also, trying out different angles adds more beauty and aesthetics to your subject, primarily if the fashion shoot is meant for clothing or shoes’ endorsement. However, you need to know that whichever angle you’d go with would have pros and cons both. You just have to consider your subject’s look and what needs to be focused the most. With such ideas in your mind, you can select the best possible angle, ignoring its flaws.
The Nikon D850 comes in handy when choosing the best angles in many ways. It has a great battery life that goes for long to let you test different angles. Also, D850 has a very lightweight and easy to grip body. Such a body makes it easier for the photographer to place it anywhere during the shoot, thus increasing your possibilities for easily trying out some unique angles.
Use Props
Many fashion photographers swear by the use of props to add a unique flair to their shoots. Adding props to fashion shoots gives them a fun and fresh vibe. If your background if very plain or doesn’t have anything creative to do with the subject’s pose, consider placing some contrasting props in your pictures.
Besides using props just for fun, you can also include them in the frame to create an intense scene or propagate a message through your shoot. Expert fashion photographers usually spend a lot of time thinking about what props to use in their shoots and how to place them in the pictures. Many use props also can help your create some context to the shoot, making it more interesting to look at.
Despite such usefulness, using props always comes with a lot of responsibility. After choosing a prop, you have to see if it goes well with the background and purpose of your shoot. A prop should always make the picture easier to understand and fresher to look at rather than making it look cluttered.
Additionally, you might want to check if your props’ colors are going well with the subjects or are making it look dull. Keeping all these ideas in mind and then testing every prop for these factors could be difficult. Lucky for Nikon D850 users, the camera comes with good auto-focus and contrast settings to help you decide if you should be using a prop or not. Such features help fashion photographers to be on the top of their game in every shoot they undertake.
