We took a group of antique-style portraits with our mobile phones! Everyone who saw them said they were stunningly beautiful.

Nowadays, there is a craze for Hanfu. "Antique portraits"In recent years, it has become the subject with the highest order rate among various photography agencies.

Under the photographer's lens, every girl seems to be a beautiful and elegant fairy, full of charm and rich in Chinese classical atmosphere.

Xiang Ding smiled shyly, and the willow waists touched each other as warm as drunkenness.

Leaning on the railing, I have no clue to change my shoes, and my eyes are tied to my lazy return.

——Qin Guan's "Huanxisha·Xiangmei smiled shyly"

Do you think you must use a SLR camera for antique portraits?

To challenge the impossible,

Without any auxiliary equipment, our photographer used his mobile phone to shoot a group of ancient portraits. Let’s watch the video first:

Even if you don’t have a SLR camera, as long as you master some shooting skills, you can still take beautiful antique portraits.
Today, we will take a set of ancient-style portrait photos taken by photographer Guo Pengcheng of Wanshou platform as an example to tell you how to use your mobile phone to take "beautiful" ancient-style photos for your circle of friends!

Appearing model: @girlmiao
Photographer: Guo Pengcheng
Photography location: Lanpu, Guangzhou Shooting equipment: HUAWEI P40 pro

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Preliminary preparation
The biggest difference between ancient style portraits and modern portraits is: modern portraits generally focus on blurring the background and highlighting the characters, while ancient style portraits pay attention to the matching of characters and the environment.This is what we usually call environmental portraits. To put it simply, if people want to be beautiful, the scenery should also be beautiful.

If you want to capture the true charm of ancient-style portraits, you must coordinate the characters and the environment. Photos taken in ancient costumes are not necessarily antique-style portraits.

People need to prepare?
In the early stage of planning, we mainly focused on two aspects: People and scenery.
Model Miu Miu is a very graceful and quiet girl, so she chose a green embroidered Hanfu, which is elegant and smart, and the embroidery on the shoulders is quite broad and neat.
Then, during the photo shoot, she put her hair into a very simple bun, which reflected a very lovely and simple feeling. In terms of makeup, try to choose simple and unobtrusive makeup and focus on the details of the character’s eyes and lips.

Selection of sceneries
Ancient style portrait photography not only pays attention to the classicism of the picture, but also pays attention to the artistic conception, color and expression of the picture, which need to be combined with traditional Chinese culture in order to obtain a beautiful artistic conception. and delicate picture sense.
Therefore, ancient style portraits generally need to be matched with environments such as pavilions, water, trees, mountains, lakes, bridges, etc. in order to show the characters that ancient people usually drank in the winding water and talked about their feelings. These places are good scenes for filming.

The ancient-style portraits taken by many people do not look like ancient-style portraits. This is because the scene is not chosen well, which creates the feeling of modern people taking photos in ancient costumes. Based on the above factors, we chose Lanpu, a small park with a more ancient charm in Guangzhou.

Photography officially begins!

Next, we will share with you the creation details of this ancient-style mobile phone portrait from the four aspects of portrait composition, use of light, use of props, and character posture.

Composition Techniques
We have said that ancient style portraits focus on reflecting the integration of people and scenery. Therefore, there is no need for too fancy compositions and viewing angles. Using the three composition methods of center composition, foreground composition, and framed composition can not only reflect the action and demeanor of the character, but also make it more precise. A good integration of characters and environment can achieve the artistic conception of people in the scenery, and the scenery sets off the people.

Use close-ups to focus on the facial expressions of the characters, and the central composition makes the photos appear stable and atmospheric.

Make full use of the framed scenery of the shooting environment to focus the eyes of the characters on the characters in the frame, so as to achieve the integration of people and the environment without overpowering the guests

At this time, we discovered some ancient Chinese characters on the pavilion. We used the characters as the foreground to compose the photo, making the photo more layered and at the same time making the flavor of ancient style stronger.

The large-area environment proportions and low-angle framing give the photos a quieter atmosphere, showing elegant, tranquil and grand ancient-style portraits.

The use of light
Modern portraits often use artificial light to fill in the light, but when shooting ancient portraits, you need to make full use of natural light for creation.
We chose to shoot after 3 pm. At this time, the light is not that hard and it can also reflect the character’s skin texture.

Since it rained a bit that day, the light was relatively dark. But the advantage of shooting on a cloudy day is that the shooting light is softer, so the skin color of the characters is better, and there will be no large shadows, which is also conducive to post-retouching.

Because the light was dark, the photographer asked the young lady to raise her head many times to prevent her face from being underexposed and lacking details.

Professional light-filling equipment is rarely used when shooting on mobile phones. We can make full use of the small fan in the hands of the model to fill-in light on the face to achieve the purpose of brightening the skin color.

No fan was used to fill the light, the left side of the face was darker

White fan fills in light and brightens cheeks

The gods were kind, and the sun came out halfway through the photo shoot. At this time, we used backlight shooting to make the outline of the characters in the photo more prominent. At the same time, the backlit leaves also add to the atmosphere of the picture. During post-processing, appropriately brighten the character's face to ensure skin color and make the environment more beautiful.

You can also add smoke effects in the later stage to make the photos look more fairy-like.

Shooting with straight light has a relatively flat light, but can reveal the facial details of the characters and portray the dignified and quiet characteristics of the model.

Props Use
In addition to makeup and clothing, props for shooting antique portraits are also very important. When shooting ancient portraits, the most commonly used props are: flutes, fans, small lanterns, paper umbrellas...
Due to limited funds, I only prepared two props this time: an umbrella ( 25 yuan) and a fan (Miaomiao brings his own). However, model Miu Miu uses these two props with ease.

A small fan can be used to cover the head or gently cover the face, reflecting the shyness of the character and making the picture more vivid. Sometimes, it can also be used to add light to the face. It really has three uses!

A paper umbrella is also a good choice. When shooting, it can enrich the picture and make the photos less monotonous.

Commonly used postures
Model postures are completely different from the modern shooting style. You can’t hold your waist, hold your chin, extend your hand to make a V, jump... these are all prohibited.
The atmosphere of ancient style portraits should reflect elegance, reserve, and tactful emotions, and express the leisure, freedom, and ease of the characters. So the range of movement must be small! Be restrained! Be dignified!
The common postures of ancient portraits are: leaning, supporting, lifting, supporting, sitting, lying, looking up, and looking.

Portraits in ancient costumes should not only look similar in appearance, but more importantly, look similar in spirit!
In this photography creation, we referred to a lot of costume TV dramas, calligraphy and paintings in advance to find the common postures of ancient women.
When shooting,downcast your eyes with a shy expression and avoid large movements. The photographer constantly guided the model Miu Miu to imitate the postures of the ancients, with every frown and smile just right.

Looking at the cold smoke in the corridor, who can explain the sigh and low voice?

Wake up and feel pity next to you, shake the fan to disperse the clouds of sorrow.

Looking back at the Prime Minister, looking forward to it, so beautiful and touching that it makes people pity

When shooting in a sitting position, try to spread your clothes as much as possible, or sit with your back straight and put your hands together on your lap; or lean on the railing and hold your forehead with your hands, showing the sentimental temperament of ancient women.
Don’t be too straight when shooting while standing. Relax your body and lean forward slightly naturally. Stand with your feet in front of you, with the back foot gently standing on tiptoe. Don't look away at the back foot or the front. If you want to be more lively, you can also try spinning in circles, flicking your sleeves, etc. You will see the playful and sweet side!

Today, when mobile phone photography is popular, it is actually not difficult for ordinary people to take a set of ancient-style portraits. You only need to prepare carefully in the early stage and pay attention to the details of the characters' clothing, props, makeup, and composition. Maybe you will fall in love with ancient-style portraits.

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