Ideas

I find I'm personally drawn to very natural portraits expressing a lot of emotion based on the personality of the subject. 

I dislike posed images a lot. 

My idea: 
Based on HMV-My inspiration campaign.

Music retailer HMV has been running its 'My Inspiration campaign' for a number of months, inviting leading stars to choose their musical or lyrical inspiration. As the campaign marks the milestone of 100 different artists.

I really support the meaning behind this; celebrities showing the world what inspired them to work so hard. 

This is Madonna's inspiration poster. This is one of my favorites because Madonna is well known as being revealing, over the top and made up hair and make-up wise. Yet in this she's her natural self, she's not trying too hard, she's portraying herself as if she's lost in the words 'Jesus died for somebody's sins, but not mine'. Those were the words that inspired her. 
I also love the soft lighting, making her face look flawless. 

I plan on using regular students to model for me, asking them to personally choose their inspiration, whether musically, artistically or for just living.









I used a model that I personally knew to do some test shots in the studio, hoping to use an image as my final piece but unfortunately I wasn't happy with the results. (below)

EXPOSURES:
I shot in RAW, on manual mode. 
All shots taken were f2.8, 1/125

Evaluation: I found that even though my model was confident but stubborn. She wasn't really paying much attention to my idea and chose to pose how she wanted. 
Technically however I'm happy with the lighting setup. 


I wanted her to convey emotion to fit in with the theme of 'being inspired'. 
I came to the conclusion that I'm going to use a black backdrop and work more with negative space so when I add the 'inspiring quotes' they will look presentable in the negative space. 
Compositionally my image won't be the same either, I've decided to not have my model positioned in the centre as it can be quite boring, I will position the model off centre, possibly to the right looking into the frame. 

Below is the lighting setup.