Chinese Beauty Revealed: How to Take Photos of a Lovely Girl
Chinese beauty on display in this portrait of a pretty Chinese woman.
China is a country of great beauty, and the opportunity to document the people of this ancient and diverse nation is a project well worth pursing for the enthusiastic travel photographer.
Chinese beauty is showcased in the epic landscapes of Yellow Mountain, Jiuzhaigou, Li River and the Longji Rice Terraces; the architectural splendor of the Forbidden City, Temple of Heaven, Great Wall and the Potala Palace; and in the women of Suzhou, Hangzhou, Shanghai, Chengdu, and Beijing.
I photographed this lovely, Chinese beauty against a colorful background in the grounds of the Forbidden City in Beijing, China.
Actually, I made two images: this one and a slightly more distant photo which shows the generous dimensions of her bag and her boots.
At first, those elements seemed important in telling the story of a relatively affluent local Chinese tourist. However, I opted for the closer view as it allows me to concentrate attention on the face of this local Chinese beauty.
Why I Photographed This Chinese Beauty
What kinds of faces are you attracted to?
Perhaps you favor a chiselled chin, high cheek bones or an angular profile.
It’s fair to say that I’m attracted to folks with round faces, high cheek bones and upward turned mouths.
Needless to say, I thought the Chinese beauty featured in this post had a lovely face and the opportunity to take photos of her just had to be pursued.
What’s more I really dug her comfortable, practical fashion sense. Just look at those muted colors and all that gorgeous texture in her hat, scarf, gloves and winter coat.
I also dig gals who wear hats. There, I’ve said it.
We’d passed each other while independently exploring the Forbidden City. Almost immediately, feeling a sudden need to take her photo, I turned around and approached her seeking permission to do just that.
Seriously, she’s made for the camera, and I just couldn’t let the opportunity to photograph this lovely Chinese beauty pass me by.
How Backgrounds Add To The Story You Tell
Now what about that crazy background, so full of color and texture? I remember thinking at the time that it must be a bit like Elvis’s bathroom.
It’s true that too much information, scattered around the frame, can be overly challenging for the viewer and, ultimately, distract attention from the subject’s face.
What’s more, a professional portrait is usually made with the background thrown out of focus. This effect is achieved by critical focusing, on the eye closest to the camera, and the application of a shallow depth of field.
In the case of a portrait, some might say that the more out of focus the background, the more professional the result.
Most folks dream of owning one or more fast lenses as a way to achieve a beautiful, shallow depth of field. I share that dream, but there are other options that will enable you to achieve a perfectly reasonable result with the lens you’re already using.
This photo was made at a relatively modest aperture of f/6.3, which I deemed sufficient to produce an image with a depth of field large enough to keep the entire image sharp, from foreground to background.
But look carefully and it’s pretty obvious that the distance from foreground to background is not great.
It’s true that, by opening the Canon 24-105mm f/4 zoom lens I was using to its maximum (physical) aperture of f/4, I would have produced a slightly shallower depth of field.
However, such a relatively modest change in aperture wouldn’t have made all that much difference to the overall look of my photo of a Chinese beauty.
To significantly blur the background, when it’s actually not much further away from the camera’s sensor or the film plane of an analogue camera, you’d need to ensure that the distance between camera and background is significantly greater than the distance between the camera and the subject.
Creating A Professional Out Of Focus Background
To enable our Chinese beauty to further stand out from the background I would simply ask her to move forward, one or two steps, to create a greater physical separation between her and the background.
The difference in distance between the camera’s sensor and the subject, verses that of the camera’s sensor and the background, would be far greater than what you see in the above photo.
After refocusing on the subject, and selecting a physically wider aperture (e.g., f/4 or wider), the background would be thrown significantly out of focus.
Want to abstract that background by throwing it even more out of focus? Simply move the subject even further away from the background and refocus, once again, on the primary focal point (i.e., subject’s eye closest to the camera) in your photo.
Shazam!
If that’s not possible you’ll achieve a similar result by moving the camera closer to the subject and then refocusing on the eye nearest to the camera.
Of course, every time you move yourself or your subject, in relation to the background, the composition will change. Do bear that in mind.
Should Backgrounds be Blurred Or Sharp?
I love portraits with significantly out of focus backgrounds. However, in this case, I wanted to encourage you to explore as much detail in the image as possible.
That's why I made the image with everything nice and sharp. It may not look as professional as other portraits. However, even if it looks like a snapshot, it's a very well made snapshot.
Many years ago, in a galaxy far, far away I was a traditional wedding/portrait photographer. Over the years I photographed around 250 weddings and over 100 family portraits.
As my studio was in a small country town I needed to do a range of work to keep the cash flow healthy. That involved school and kindergarten photography, debutant balls and even a funeral.
Almost without exception, photos of individuals or couples were made with the background thrown very much out-of-focus, particularly when made in the studio.
But it’s been a very long time since I worked as a traditional wedding/portrait photographer. Thankfully, I’m no longer constrained by the look or current fashion trend associated with that kind of photography.
I’m still all about making beautiful, life-affirming images. However, if I see someone lying in the gutter, I’m more likely to pick them up than to photograph them in a negative manner.
And when I do photograph poor and disadvantaged folk, I always do so in a way that explores notions of beauty, empathy and hope.
I’m motivated to explore the possibilities life offers us, rather than by seeking out sensationalized opportunities to photograph the dire state in which we sometimes find ourselves.
Likewise, I’m much more interested in what people have, rather than what they don’t.
That’s why I’ll always choose to create beautiful photos that explore love, compassion and hope, even when documenting the lives of the poor and disadvantaged in our world.
Exploring Beauty: Know Yourself And Your Audience
As far as my picture of a Chinese beauty in the grounds of the Forbidden City is concerned, I wasn’t making a traditional portrait of the subject for her or her mother.
What I wanted to create was an image more closely aligned to the traditions of documentary photography and photojournalism, and the potentially wider audiences associated with those genres.
Because of it’s descriptive qualities, the background against which I photographed my subject was almost as important as the Chinese beauty the photo is based upon.
Frankly, it seemed that the best way to explore the relationship between subject and background was to render the scene with lots of detail.
That’s why sharpness, from foreground to background, was required.
After being granted permission to take the photo, I noticed the young lady beginning to put that colorfully covered guide into her bag.
But I liked the way the colors, on the front cover of the guide, connected and contrasted with the colors in the background.
Given my previous training and experience as traditional portrait photographer, I would have seen that guide as being a distraction, but in the documentary and photojournalistic tradition including the guide could work on two levels.
The guide helps tell the story of a local tourist visiting an iconic cultural site. And that’s probably how a commercially orientated photojournalist or editor might see it.
But a travel photographer, like myself, working within the documentary tradition, is more interested in the visual relationships explored and the connections between similarities and differences in such images.
Chinese Beauty: Parting Is Both Bitter And Sweet
Almost immediately after I’d taken her photo, this pretty Chinese woman was called away and disappeared from my life.
But our relationship, brief as it was, lives on here through the photo and the story which describes how it was made.
Could I ask you to take another look at the portrait?
You’ll notice that the background color is predominantly yellow and orange. Those two colors are considered harmonious, as they sit right next to each other on the color wheel.
Both yellow and orange are warm, happy colors.
And, in Chinese culture, yellow signifies happiness. I remember thinking, after paying so much attention to this yellow brick background, that around the corner a yellow brick road might await me.
That attitude was all I needed to continue on in search of that metaphorical path and the wonderful photo opportunities it might provide me.
And it’s that promise, after many trials and tribulations in my own creative journey, that continues to push me onwards and onto the next encounter.
That’s why I’m always interested to see what’s lyes ahead, beyond each hilltop and around each corner,
Have you ever heard how people can be referred to as being either a glass half empty or half full?
To me it's just a glass. Sometimes it contains water, on other days beer.
Frankly, I'm much more interested in what's in the glass than in any notions of scarcity, whether perceived or actual.
My own life experiences have taught me this essential fact, albeit through many difficulties and very bitter experiences along the way.
In that regard I hold onto the memories of meeting so many interesting folk, like this Chinese beauty, that I’ve had the pleasure to photograph along my own journey through life.
And those memories only fire my imagination for the meetings, adventures and photo opportunities that are yet to come.
Please feel free to share this post widely and wildly.
