This assignment reminded me of doing environmental portraits in grad school. I like shooting them so much more than the standard background-lights-stare-into-the-lens portrait. There’s definitely a time and place for those, but I think conveying personality through surroundings adds a lot to an image. The plan – show our president in conversation, as the accompanying story was a Q&A style story.
Serious and stern, but not angry or belittling. That was the goal. I did get some nice shots of him laughing or smiling in the course of the conversational shoot, but I’ll save those for another day. This and the top image ran with our story.
This was one of my favorite images from the shoot. It didn’t fit with our serious theme, so it’s just an outtake now. But I still like it.
Original story: On growing the IBEW