Although there are defiantly very beautiful and unique color portraits, for the best portrayal of your subject, you should consider black and white film for your portrait photography. Black and white film, although only using shades of grey, helps the viewer to focus more on the essence of a subject rather than on what colors are in the portrait. There is a timeless quality to black and white film that takes your subject out of the day that photo was taken and into the world of universal experience.

What About Apples And Oranges?

It is a true argument that comparing black and white film to color film is like comparing apples and oranges. If your artistic inclinations – or the insistence of your clients – lean towards color film in your portrait photography, by all means, listen to your muse and go for color. But if you want you subject to look its best, then black and white can give your portrait photography that crowing touch.

Annie Liebovitz is arguably the best living artist of portrait photography today. And yes, she used color film. She is most famous for her celebrity portraits, especially for the cover of a naked John Lennon curled in a fetal position beside a motherly (and fully clad) Yoko Ono.

For her, she sees her subjects through the way they gesture, the way they use makeup or no makeup, the clothes they choose to wear (or none at all) and the props she brings to them. She can capture the inner essence of a subject with color, but also with her eye for how that subject fits into the world.

The Test Of Time

Consider your cultural memory. Many black and white images dominate the portrait photography studio of the mind. Although color portraits of both Albert Einstein and Adolf Hitler exist, you most likely remembered the black and white portraits first. When you think of World War II, perhaps you think of the dropping of the bomb on Hiroshima. Both color and black and white film exists of the mushroom cloud.

Which one is reproduced more often as it seems to somehow be more chilling – the black and white one. Although the subject is a mushroom cloud and not a face, the black and white image of the mushroom cloud over Hiroshima is one of the most unforgettable examples of portrait photography in history. It not only captured the pivotal moment of World War II, but put a face on all of our fears in the years to come.