Self Portraits

[Larky]

Hello.

I've just been looking at another photo forum (I'm a bad bad boy) and some people have started to post self portraits. Whilst some of the pictures are technically ok, I have this real thing about self portraits being a bit odd. With so much cool stuff about, why would you want to photograph yourself? Is it because you are too big to fit in a passport photo machine, or do people really love themselves that much?

I can't look at myself in a mirror, so the thought of editing myself in Photoshop I find creepy. I wondered what you all thought about this? Have you done it? If yes or no, why etc. Let's discuss. 🙂

As a side topic, I thought I'd mention that my fingers hurt today from over biting (nervous about job I may or may not get). Have any of you bitten your nails to the point where it hurts to touch stuff? This is an optional point of discussion. 🙂

 

[Chris101]

I have tried to rid myself of the habit of trimming my nails with my teeth. I've encountered that painful sensation of it just ripping into the quick all too often.

I'd take a picture of my finger, but damn. I would then be the subject of ridicule and shame.

 

[Papercut]

I think self-portraits can be a worthy subject, as worthy as any other. But, the vast majority (including my own) are not. Speaking for myself, I have done a whole series of self-reflections that I consider not to be art at all, but are far more like a form of "therapy" -- they have an intended audience of one (myself). I have very little interest in other people's self-portraits, as I have very little interest in listening in on other people's therapy sessions. 😉

David Hurn and Bill Jay's advice on this point was quite sage, I think: there's little sense in exploring your own subjectivity via self-portraits as the photos you take of the wider world will express your subjectivity just as eloquently (through choice of subject matter, etc.) and have a much broader potential audience to boot. I suspect most self-portraits (mine included) are born out of idleness/boredom or a lack of engagement with any other subject matter (that's a nice way of saying self-involvement / narcissism).

 

[photophorous]

I am uncomfortable with self-portraits too, but I don't think you have to be a narcissist or self-absorbed to do them. One thing I've noticed about self-portrait threads on other photo forums is that they serve the purpose of getting to know the other forum members a little better. I don't ever participate but on the whole it seems like a healthy thing. Actually, I could see how one could make a case for needing therapy based on an avoidance of self-portraits just as easily as on a propensity towards them. But I'm an engineer, so what do I know about people. 😀

Paul

 

[Leighgion]

I used to be a little uncomfortable with self-portraits, but even at the time I knew that was just a self-esteem issue. Nobody wants to look bad, and I felt most of the time I just wasn't looking good in pictures. Lacking confidence that a picture would be flattering would of course, make me less willing to be in a picture, which reduced confidence, thus becoming a cycle.

When I first was getting back into photography and got myself some better kit, I made a concentrated effort to take pictures of myself both to break that circle and just to get practice taking pictures of people, which I hadn't been doing so much of. Person just happened to be me.

The first afternoon produced some self-portraits I really liked, some of which (unintentionally) made me look cool in ways I wouldn't have thought I could pull off. Since then I've been much more at ease in front of as well as behind a camera. Self-portraiture's got obvious technical challenges versus shooting models, but I find it can be fun in an entirely different way if I look at it as a kind of performance.

It's a personal choice of course for every photographer if they want to do self-portraits, but I can't see any foundation to decide it's weird for other photographers to do it. Remember, self-portraiture yields unbeatable levels of model availability and economy. If nothing else, self-portraits are a convenient way to try out human photography when no other cooperative human models are available.

There's a project I want to do which, at the moment, I can't think of any other way to accomplish than by using myself as the model. I don't know any willing people who can play the part I have in mind and I can't afford to find and pay a model. So, at least in this case, self-portraiture can also be seen as a form of do-it-yourself.

I'm not a nail-biter, and it's fortunate for me. My nails are thin and tear far too easily, so I can't afford to do anything but keep them in the best shape possible or before I know it, one shreds and basically takes my hand out of action until I can properly trim it down.

 

[chris000]

Well, I'm just an ugly b*****d so I would not inflict anything bigger or sharper than my avatar on any of you!

I'm not sure about self portraits generally, but it is quite interesting to see the faces of members on an internet forum where you don't ever have chance to meet the vast majority of them (and given some of the spats that sometimes take place on here that might be a good thing! 😀)

 

[spikey]

I do not bite my nails, hey I don't even put them in my mouth - I know where they have been 😉
Have a few friends who bite though, and there seems to be no solution for them apart maybe de-stress, and how do you do that in a stressful situation.

I do work with mirrors, reflective survaces and tripod, sometimes self timer, sometimes long exposures ...
All started with comments of partner, kids - 'there are no pictures with YOU in it'
I may not like what I see in the picture - but everyone else sees me that way, and has for a while. This is what I keep telling myself (started it when I saw myself on video and HATED it - still not happy, but accepting)

 

[taldinar]

I have found taking self portraits is a useful exercise. I learn both about taking portraits and how a model should behave without having the stress of directing another person. I have also found that whenever I go places everyone I know leave their camera in the bag or at home since they all depend on me taking pictures. As a strong believer in photographs as documentation of lives lived I do want some taken of me and my life as well.
When people complain about how they always look terrible in pictures I tell them to relax and think nothing about it. Thinking about how terrible you look in pictures makes you look terrible in pictures. And, by the way, you do look the same in real life so why take yourself so seriously when it comes to pictures? Taking self portraits I prove to everyone that the same applies to me.

 

[OurManInTangier]

Self portraits have been as much an artistic exploration of life, the world and a process of self discovery as any other art form down the years. Think of all the artists who have explored themselves both internally and externally in the form of self portraits, they very rarely produce anything that would immediately make you think of them as 'beautiful' people.

Rambrandt painted many studies of his changing face as he aged and found it fascinating; I'm 35 and certainly fascinated by the changes in my own face, I can still see the boy that I was twenty years ago but there are also stronger and stronger signs of the man that I'll ( if I make it ) be in another twenty years. When I wash my face and look up into the mirror more and more of my face stays facing the sink, my winter plummage is taking hold with an inexorable march across my head. I'm also far more aware of the character, the strength and the weaknesses that I possess than at any previous point in my life.

I don't make self portraits of myself as I simply don't have the desire to, perhaps one day this may change, perhaps I am far too vain and should avoid self portraits at all costs...I don't know. What I do know is that I don't think I could agree that self portraits are borne of vainity or are simply self indulgent tosh...they certainly can be and could arguably be so in the majority...but some are able to peel away the projected image and the 'wished for' persona to be left staring at the truth or at least some 'truth' that lies within or upon the surface or even produce a blown up, theatrical and grotesque vision of what they see or perceive about themselves.

I suppose to produce a successful self portrait you must be unflinching and thats pretty hard to do, I know I wouldn't so much flinch as duck...probably why I leave it to those more honest than myself😉

 

[j_fletcher]

Hi,
I'm somewhat between two point of view when it comes to self portraits.
On one hand, i think they are a useful and inexpensive way to practice techniques like portrait lighting and printing of portraits. I also feel that they can occasionally be a very intimate form of self expression.
On the other hand (and this is more of a personal gripe), i feel that the self portrait, if over used can become an exercise in nothing more than vanity (see, for example, the amount of over processed 'moody' and 'arty' self portraits that can be found on flickr.)

 

[Larky]

"Think of all the artists who have explored themselves both internally and externally"

They explore themselves internally? With a bendy camera thing or squatting over a mirror?

Oh dear, I may have gone too far. 🙂

I think for me I just could not find a picture of me interesting or worthwhile. And the post work required would wear out my computer. 😉

 

[NathanJD]

I take self portraits from time to time although i usually as a reaction to a situation or need as apposed to a desire to do so. I don't like how i look right now and i'm changing it (loosing weight).

As an interesting aside, I find my self portraits more intersting in retrospect

 

[OurManInTangier]

... or squatting over a mirror?...

Looks like you're aware of my work....or at least where it comes from!

😀 😀

 

[Al Kaplan]

I shot my first one with an Olympus Pen on Kodachrome II back around 1962. I look older now but I still look like me. I had my first beard in that photo, and a thick head of hair. Beards come and go, the hair is still thick but has a bit more grey than I'd like. My chin was completely white when I last shaved off the latest beard incarnation a month or so ago. I guess it's the lack of a white chin more than the lasck of the beard itself, but the girls tell me I look much younger without it.

When I discovered just how easy it was to include myself in the photos I was shooting with a 15mm lens I kind of went nuts for a few years. I enjoy the acting part of it, and I'm fascinated at the brain's ability to still come up with some pretty decent compositions when it's forced to view the world from a different physical place using the camera's eye.

Sure, I get accused of vanity and egotism, but there's more to it than just recording my face. It's more like a diary of my everyday life, me at the places I visit, with my friends, with my children, doing all the things I do from working in my darkroom to fishing. A couple of years ago as I shot some pix of me in the darkroom with my new 15mm lens I remembered some forty year old self portraits I'd shot in the same darkroom when I'd just purchased a 19mm lens. Now "both me's" are in my blog.

As far as a "formal" self portrait, carefully lit and posed, nope, never done that.

http://thepriceofsilver.blogspot.com

 

[lawrence]

You'r so vain, you probably think this photo's about you...

You'r so vain, you probably think this photo's about you...

I like the point about Rembrandt -- if they were good enough for him they're good enough for me

there's little sense in exploring your own subjectivity via self-portraits as the photos you take of the wider world will express your subjectivity just as eloquently (through choice of subject matter, etc.) and have a much broader potential audience to boot

This kind of 'guru-quote' makes no sense to me. Why should there be a broader potential audience for the other photographs I make? Supposing all my other photographs are of stag beetles, how would they 'express my subjectivity' (whatever that means) any better than a self-portrait? Maybe there are plenty of people out there who are into self-portraits and maybe they're the ones I want to reach?

There's a book of self-portraits called "The Camera I", which I'd like to recommend to anyone brave enough to be seen reading it 🙄

 

[Al Kaplan]

Thanks for mentioning that book. I'll look for it. I most likely even take a photo of myself reading it. 🙄

 

[Papercut]

lawrence,

Not sure why you had to call it a "guru-quote". I don't agree with everything Bill Jay and David Hurn wrote, but that point I did -- I "cited" them so that interested people could go read it for themselves if they so wished, not because "if it's in print by so-and-so it must be true".

As for your question, if you are passionate enough about them to do a series of photos on stag beetles then that would, indeed, express a very great deal about yourself (i.e., your subjectivity), would it not? And the way you portrayed them (dead? dying? grotesque miniature monsters? vital links in an ecological chain?, etc., etc.) would tell me even more about them and you. How is this a hard concept to understand? 😉

Finally, I didn't categorically reject all self-portraiture. (Read my first sentence again, please.) I think almost all photographers do take self-portraits from time to time; it's natural I'm sure and I do it too. But if one's choice of subject is consistently oneself, then I think my original point stands: either the photographer is bored or she has nothing to say about the wider world. I don't say this to condemn them, merely to state the reason for why I have little interest in viewing others' self-portraits: I'd rather see what they have to say about the world rather than themselves. This is the same reason I'd rather read Rushdie's novels than read his diary, or view Weston's prints than read his daybooks.

But, in addition, I think that I'd understand a lot more about them (as people) by seeing what they choose to photograph in the world, and how they go about photographing it (i.e., what they are passionate about and how they express that), than by looking at their self-portraits. 🙂

I get tired of the photographic equivalent of "identity politics" -- endless self-portraits by people who want their personal identity to stand in for a whole group of (often marginalized) people. There are some exceptional works in this vein (Mapplethorpe), but I find a lot of it very tiresome, derivative, and boring. I also get tired of the flickr trend of a hottie (male or female) with a camera taking moody/sexy selfies and getting a ton of "you're so beautiful" or "you're such a great artist" type of comments. In cases like these, I suspect the photographers do not have anything to say about anything -- but I suspect this is not you, and hence there's no need to be defensive. 🙂

I like the point about Rembrandt -- if they were good enough for him they're good enough for me



This kind of 'guru-quote' makes no sense to me. Why should there be a broader potential audience for the other photographs I make? Supposing all my other photographs are of stag beetles, how would they 'express my subjectivity' (whatever that means) any better than a self-portrait? Maybe there are plenty of people out there who are into self-portraits and maybe they're the ones I want to reach?

There's a book of self-portraits called "The Camera I", which I'd like to recommend to anyone brave enough to be seen reading it 🙄