best natural light portraitists?

[pierods]

Hello,

can you name a few masters of natural light portraiture for me to admire? Maybe in b/w?

thanks

piero

[TheFlyingCamera]

I'd say look at Sally Mann and Jock Sturges for folks who do portraits in natural light - they're not exactly conventional portraits, but they certainly qualify.

[Pinholemaster]

Scott Davis!

Surely not me! http://www.walterpcalahan.com/Cheers...raiture.html#6

Grin.

[keithwms]

Available light shooters tend also to fall into the impromptu/street, rangefinder or press camera mode of shooting. A few come to mind.... Weegee. Winogrand. Kertesz.

A prime recent example would be Ragnar Axelsson, whose understanding of the (challenging) available light of the north is clearly evident in his informal portraits in Faces of the North, which I described here. "Rax" is the man when it comes to available light environmental portraiture, in my opinion. Though you may be looking for more formal compositions.

[Stoo Batchelor]

You would have to include Jane Bown

http://89.234.0.17/collections/searc...07814&role=art

I own a wonderful book by her called 'FACES' The creative process behind great portraits, in which she includes a little of the thought process and tech detail on each photograph.

Best

Stoo

[Chazzy]

You would have to include Jane Bown

http://89.234.0.17/collections/searc...07814&role=art

That link gets me a mostly blank page, although it could be a problem with my browser.

[naeroscatu]

Charles, the link works, I was able to get in. Quite an impressive body of work, many famous people there.

[David A. Goldfarb]

Rembrandt, Vermeer.

Of course the nineteenth-century portraitists generally used natural light. Nadar understood light--

http://www.masters-of-photography.co...sand_full.html

[Chazzy]

Charles, the link works, I was able to get in. Quite an impressive body of work, many famous people there.

It worked for me when I tried a second time. If at first you don't succeed …

[TheFlyingCamera]

Oh, don't forget Alexander Gardner, Matthew Brady, and those millions of otherwise unknown wet plate portraitists whose work most of us have in family albums stashed away in some dusty corner of the attic somewhere.