POSE MALE MODELS
Effectively pose male models for striking imagery
The main difference between men and women is their body shape. Women are generally less angular than men, while the male body consists of defined angles and rigid shapes. for gekman, “While creating a man’s portrait i follow the same rules as for a woman’s one. i choose poses depending on the theme of the shoot and the image i want to create. for men’s portraits i usually use harder lighting. as a rule, there are one or two sources of light, i put up a sidelight to get deeper shadows and to make the image more dramatic. To create deeper shadows i use black panels. in addition, i use one source of light to illuminate the distance shot thus separating the model from the background.” samuel Bouget (WWW.PORTRAITSBYSAM.
COM) says, “Because often the intention behind a male portrait will not be the same as the one behind a female portrait, posing will be affected. Male portraiture is not generally considered in terms of beauty or pleasing appearance, but more in terms of conveying an impression of confidence, strength, willpower or any other quality generally associated with manhood. helping a man pose well will be easier once you have decided which impression you want to convey to the viewer. for example, if you ask a model to convey an impression of strength and confidence, telling him that this is your intention will help him a lot. You may then ask him to close his eyes (i use this tip a lot and it works very well for me) and think of moments in the past when he was very confident – the confidence should be seen in his eyes. asking him to lower his head just a little may increase the impression of strength and determination. With this intention in mind, a posing mistake, in my opinion, would be to tilt the head back a little, for this conveys more of an impression of haughtiness. Or, if the body was too slumped, it may prevent you from conveying confidence.
“if you are following me with this notion of intention, and the fact that the posing will depend on the type of portrait you want to make, i think you will understand that i cannot give you a list of poses that work best for men. however, i think we can say that some poses will probably work better for men than for women because of the impression they convey. for example, asking a man to cross his arms, to put his hand or his hands in his pockets, or do up buttons of a jacket.
“The light setups i use will be the same as the ones described for female models, but i may use harder light. for instance, the age of the model may change the way i light him. if the person is quite old for example, i may try to use harder light to emphasise the wrinkles and thus the character of the model. however, hard light may also be interesting for a younger model if you intend to have a more dramatic effect.”