Harry Borden is a renowned British portrait photographer known for his striking and intimate portraits of influential figures. His work has been widely published in magazines like TIME, GQ, and The New Yorker. Over his career, Borden has photographed numerous celebrities, politicians, and cultural icons, including Margaret Thatcher, Hillary Clinton, Robin Williams, Paul McCartney, Madonna, and Tony Blair.
In my last video, I shared a condensed and highly edited version of my interview with Harry, focusing on the key educational takeaways. However, our conversation was much longer and there’s some more insights and anecdotes worth sharing. So, for those interested, here’s the full, uncut interview.
00:00 Intro
00:20 How did you get where you are?
08:25 Why shoot celebrities?
10:33 What makes a great portrait?
16:21 How to find a good location
19:54 Using props
23:22 How to direct your subject
25:48 Best focal lengths to use
28:51 How to use natural light
30:54 Black and white vs Colour
33:36 Who would you like to photograph?
35:42 Favourite shoots
39:14 Film vs Digital
43:03 Shooting celebrities vs non-famous people
45:20 Advancing technology
46:58 Outro
#PortraitPhotography #PhotographyTips #HowToTakePortraits #NaturalLightPhotography #BeginnerPhotographyTips #PhotographyForBeginners #ProfessionalPortraits #LearnPhotography #PhotographyTutorial #harryborden #celebrityportraits
——————————–
Harry’s channel:
——————————–
Links
💾💾💾💾💾💾
MY INSTAGRAM:
PATREON:
Retro Video Assets Packs:
💾💾💾💾💾💾
Retro Assets Pack 1 & 2 deal (25% off):
Lightroom Preset Packs:
💾💾💾💾💾💾
Full shop:
#1 My presets:
#2 Medium Format Film Stock:
#3 Kodak Film Stock:
#3.1 Kodachrome Film Stock:
#3.2 Kodak Portra Stock:
#4 Cinestill Film Stock:
#5 Fujifilm Stock:
#6 Film Pro:
Preset bundle deal (20% off):
—
Comments
25 responses to “MASTERING Portrait Photography | Full Harry Borden Interview”
Thanks Jamie, excellent interview and Harry Borden is an inspiration.
"As you own the copyright" – in my country's intellectual property (IPr) law, jurisdiction, jurisprudence, that is not the default. The default is that the party paying the shoot owns the IPr. As working photographer, I must write Ts & Cs that deal with this in the first place. Then when my client is a private – "natural" – person, not hiring me as a "business person" (entity), then I still have to make sure that the natural person is aware of my Ts & Cs as the law protects them against their ignorance (stupidity, if you like). In the case of celebrities, it is very likely that you get hired through their non-natural-person business entity, and now your Ys & Cs apply.
Now you "own" the IPr, however does not automatically mean that you have the right to publish (make copies and distribute these, or show even a single copy that you consider "original").
Most likely, this is the basis in most countries, but there is no international treaty on IPr, just a vague notion that "countries will respect the IPr of of people in other countries."
In my country, IPr originates from the original creation, and as indicated who pays in what identity. If the IPr is with a party that hired you, then they no doubt will have their (business) name displayed with each publication, however as you as photographer pressed the shutter release, they still have to display your name with the publication too. You can see this often with "stock" and press images.
As the contracting of a celebrity's portrait usually gets negotiated by and agent on their behalf, that would be a business-to-business situation. Now you may negotiate a price that covers, say, one publication of the portrait in one magazine's issue. Here again your status and negotiation position (and capabilities) come into play. You may be very willing to close the deal, do the shoot, and hopefully benefit in status and market potential. How it will financially work out depends on the construction you negotiate. The celebrity's party may argue that it is an honour to shoot them, that your name remains attached to the portrait to be published. If the celebrity has pop-star status with 15-year-olds, that brings nothing. Accepting such a shoot needs to build business for you. If you are familiar with the "Net Present Value" calculation in economic theory, now imagine how much you need to be paid in 20 years for a then publication of your image to have made it in itself worth your while today. That's a boatload of money. And, you may not live to see that boat arrive.
A friend, of influential in the art world family, who incidentally has a degree in law, knowing how this works, here, simply cancelled a shoot with a photographer of very good status already, for not being prepared to go back to the country's legal default. A famous photographer may have Ts & Cs and a standard contract that explains this to natural persons, reserving the IPr and e.g. claiming to retain the publication rights of your portrait as artwork, e.g. in a book on your work, or an exhibition. And you as potential sitter may not want your mug out there.
One thing does not work for everyone involved: Just Ffing Do It.
Great interview! Thank you! Loved it.
I really enjoyed this interview and the photos as well.
Good work. It helps to have someone as open as Harry Borden – he makes a great subject – but these are also well chosen questions, giving him the chance to do what he does prolifically, which is talk (in addition to making great images).
The best vid on portraiture I’ve ever seen. Thanks Jamie!
👏👏👏
I hope to see more interviews Jamie…Fantastic.
He’s colorblind!!!😂 Jamie, you ask great questions. Really enjoyed this ❤
A marvelous interview Jamie, so relaxed and totally on point. Thanks for this. 😊
An incredible photographer that has created work that is truly part of the public consciousness but also beautifully eloquent and articulate.
His insights about light are fantastic. I really got a lot out of this. 👍
"you shouldn't have to pay £3 a shot to slow down". Thank you, what a great quote. I think film is the Emperor’s new clothes 🙂
Mesmerisingly good, Jamie. Thank you 🙏
YES!!!!!!! Thank you for this!
I absolutely love the interview and his down to earth view.
Thank you for doing this interview and putting this video together. Talking head videos can be tough. His photos flashed by too quickly. My personal preference is that when doing a visual medium, I would rather see his photos for most of it and only his head for part of it. His work is far more interesting than his face. Just my preference.
Really enjoyable interview and images. Because of Harry I found your channel
I disagree with Harry regarding the idea of shooting black and white photography being perverse. Would then modifying colors in post-processing also be perverse, since it wouldn't reflect what was there? Would adding more contrast be perverse?
So inspiring! Thanks for the full uncut Jamie, really enjoyed.
This was an awesome interview!! Thank you!
I really appreciate Harry's down to earth values and approach. So grounded. Perhaps because of this, the results are on another level. Thanks Harry, thanks Jamie!
Wow great interviewing Jamie, thank you! It's interesting hear Harry warm up throughout the interview. Was the outro music a Jamie Windsor original?
Hope you are well! 😊
This is gold. Thanks for uploading the full content, it adds so much to the original video. So great to see so much introspection and intellect on show (from both parties).
Gotta love Harry.