Good reads: Cinematic Portraits by Pete Wright

I recently purchased myself a photography book after someone brought it to a recent class. Cinematic Portraits by Pete Wright is a fabulous how-to guide for creating old-school, Hollywood style, film noir portraits. It’s in-depth and informative with loads of helpful information.

My film noir portraits of Emily

What’s covered

Pete Wright sets out to cover everything you can think of from the history of film noir, using different lights and modifiers. One, two and three or more lighting setups. He discusses in length the position and uses for main lights, hair lights and kicker (skim) lights. He also discusses the differences between broad and short light and which is better for men and women. Also discusses in length the differences between lighting styles, Rembrandt, Loop, Butterfly etc. and which is preferred for men and women.

Prepping for your shoot

The author goes into detail about preparing for your own shoot. There are chapters on fashion for men and women in the 1920s and 30s, covering clothes, jewelry, hats and more. Chapters on staging and building your own sets, scouting for locations. Chapters on finding and working with models, hair and makeup artists and designers. Ideas and tips for posing, both men, women and couples.

Putting it all together

Pete also discusses his postproduction process, printing and displaying the finished images. He also touches on building a business, finding clients, networking options and so much more.

About the author

Pete Wright is an international award-winning Master Photographer and writer based out of Bradenton, Fl. As a fourth-generation artist and second-generation photographer, Pete got his start as a professional and college sports photographer in the mid-90s covering all levels of sports from NFL, NBA, NASCAR, and Rodeo to NCAA Division 1 sports. Eventually expanded into weddings and portrait photography with the opening of his studio in 2003. Outside of his client work, Pete has an extensive body of fine art photography and uses his free time to create new works which he considers to be his chicken soup for the soul.

The book is available on Amazon. I was so inspired by reading this book I have begun collecting props, costumes, etc. for staging my own film noir images. The images in this post are from my latest studio session.

Our verdict

Cinematic Portraits by Pete Wright - 5/5

I really enjoyed this book. I found it very helpful and full of terrific tips and ideas for creating absolutely gorgeous cinematic film noir portraits. Highly recommend it