Doll Photography

Doll Photography About.com Today June 2008 Dolls are one of the most common collectibles. Beyond serious collectors, almost every woman has at least one doll carefully saved from her childhood. Also, other art forms love to dress dolls. Sewers, crocheters, and knitters all have nearly limitless patterns to choose from to dress dolls. For photographers, doll photography is a great way to practice human portraiture without hiring a live model.

Taking doll photographs is very much like human portraiture but in miniature and many of the same techniques apply. By following some very simple ideas you can improve not only your doll photography, but your human portraiture as well.

Watch the Background
A doll dressed in a beautiful ball gown is going to lose mystique if your entire sewing room is shown behind it. A backdrop is a wonderfully easy way to improve the background of your photographs. Simply draping material behind your subject will do wonders for the background.

Use Angles to Your Advantage
Get down on the doll’s level. Shoot from eye level or slightly below eye level for a more pleasing look. Also, don’t always shoot everything from directly in front of your subject. Turn the doll slightly sideways (just as you would a human model) and turn the head back towards the camera a bit. A diagonal angle between the camera and body create a very pleasing situation for the camera. Remember that photography is a 2 dimensional medium recording a 3 dimensional subject. The angles help convey a sense of dimension.

Lighting
Just like a live model can have oily skin, doll faces tend to reflect light as glare. To combat glare, use a diffuser or reflector in conjunction with your flash. Set up your lighting at an angle rather than straight on to the subject. Experiment with lighting from behind, above, and at 45 degree angles to find the look that you find most pleasing to you.

Get in Close
With humans and dolls, a shot of a tiny subject lost in a sea of background isn’t a very striking image. Get in close to your subject and fill the frame. Use either a 3/4 torso shot or fill the frame with the entire doll. Your subject doesn’t have to touch the edges of the frame but should occupy at least 80% of the space in the frame