“A portrait is not made in the camera but on either side of it.”
Documentary-style photography does away with all the stale and stagnant forced smiles and awkward and embarrassing posing. Though I still capture what some would call traditional portraits, this is usually achieved as a by-product of a relaxed and informal style of shooting, that leaves you feeling you weren't even having your picture taken at all. For any portrait, I think it's essential to be able to capture the natural essence of someone in one shot and you have to be relaxed and feeling yourself in order to do this. As Paul Caponigro said "It’s one thing to make a picture of what a person looks like, it’s another thing to make a portrait of who they are". I strongly concur.
