Yousuf Karsh was a photographer who captured portraits of prominent 20th century figures from various fields. He aimed to capture their emotions and poses in an off-guard manner to create more interesting, storytelling images. Karsh typically photographed his subjects up close to draw attention to their facial and bodily expressions, without including much background scenery. This allowed viewers to focus on the subject and imagine the context. His portraits used techniques like medium shutter speeds and rule of thirds to create depth and interest. While the images have less definition due to the era in which they were taken, this adds character relative to more defined portraits.

1. Unit 57: Photography and Photographic Practice
Research of other photographers work (P1, M1, D1)
Photographer: yousuf Karsh

3. Theme or focus of images
The photographer captured a huge number of the 20th century's most prominent figures from art,
science, politics and entertainment. Due to the fact that the actual people in the shots are extremely well
known and respected nothing else in the photographs were made to stand out. The photographer
captures the emotions and effortless ways in which the prominent person in the shots are stood or
looking etc. The photograph of Winston Churchill became one of the most famous of him, i think this is
because of the powerful expression he has on his in face and also the way that he’s stood, creating a
very interesting and historical image. With the image of Mother Teresa, it is much more close up then the
rest, I feel that this is the most emotional image and you can almost imagine her life through the
expression on her face, and in my opinion it enhances the emotion and wisdom she has behind her eyes
and again creates a very powerful historical image.
I think the photographers aim isn’t to create a perfectly posed and in depth image, I feel that he catches
them off guard which makes for a more interesting and storytelling image, making the audience able to
look at the photographs for long time thinking about not only the image but the people.
Composition
All of the photographs are taken quite up-close so to not take away from the person, we see that he doesn’t
capture more than the top half of the body, so he is able to draw our eyes to the facial and bodily
expressions. He doesn’t include allot of background, as again he doesn’t want to take away from the famous
figure, but we can see and then go on to imagine where they are for example with the Winston Churchill
photograph I imagine him to be in his office with a big oak desk and very manly, and it makes the audience
wonder and become more intrigued.
Techniques used
I think that he used a variety of different techniques to create the light on the persons face and depth, I think
he would have used a medium shutter speed to create this. And also rule of thirds to make the shot more
interesting to the eye.
Strengths & Weaknesses
I think the strengths of these shots are that they are very dramatic and captivating, but the weakness’ of the
images are that they aren’t as defined as usual pictures, this is due to the century that they were taken in, but
in my opinion it adds more character and creates a more interesting image.