DC Portrait Photographer

Headshot Vs. Portrait… what’s the difference?

Here in DC, everyone needs a top notch professional headshot for their business profiles like on LinkedIn and other social networks. But what exactly is the difference between a headshot and a professional portrait? Luckily Kristina has extensive experience shooting both styles of images and can easily deliver the kind of image that suits your needs. Sometimes, though rarely, portraits can be cropped in to create a headshot type look, thus supplying the subject with two different kinds of images from a single frame. But because of Kristina’s intense headshot lighting setups, usually the lighting is just out of frame and so you’ll get a better product if you light and shoot your headshots and portraits separately.

Headshot

A headshot is usually cropped closer in.
Emphasis is on the face only.
Dynamic lighting used to illuminate the face.
Includes sparkle from catchlights in the eyes.
Background should NOT distract from the face.
Top of head usually slightly cropped out to achieve a closer connection with the person viewing the headshot.

Portrait

Wider Crop includes more of the upper body.
Lighting illuminates the face and body.
Clothing choice is more important as more of it shows in a portrait.
Background needs to be incorporated into the image and blend well.
Top of the head is not cropped out.
Shooting on location is permitted since landmarks and environment play a role in the portrait’s messaging.

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DC Portrait Photograper - Kristina Sherk

Kristina has been a portrait photographer since before she graduated college. She started her career in Burlington, NC while she was at Elon University. It started as a way to make extra money, but she soon fell in love with capturing portraits of people. She quickly became the go-to student for anyone in the performing arts who needed headshots at Elon University.

After graduating, she moved home to the DC area and started working for a photojournalist in Washington DC. All the while seeing portrait clients on the side. It didn’t take long for news to spread and she found herself having more clients than she could keep up with.

Flash forward to today, Kristina has two thriving portrait businesses; one geared more towards professional headshots and this one geared towards portraits. She owns her own studio in Bethesda, MD, just 2 miles from the Washington DC line, and recently expanded her space to keep up with demand.

Over her 20 years in the business she has discovered all the most amazing places to capture portraits around DC. Two of her favorite rooftops to capture portraits in front of the Capitol dome in Washington DC can be seen here on this page.

Kristina closely guards the locations of these photo spots as to make sure she keeps an edge over her competition.

When it comes to Lighting and Background Choice, Kristina has more experience than most other headshot photographers. Almost weekly, she will hear the same story from clients; “My cousin’s son has a good camera and I thought he could take my headshot. Boy was I wrong!”

What people don’t realize is the amount of knowledge it takes to actually light a face in a flattering manner. It took Kristina years to dial in her lighting techniques. After almost two decades of mastering her craft, she has it down to a science now.

Often, when she shows up for corporate headshots at an office in Washington DC or Maryland, at least two people will come in for their session and make a joke about being so ugly that they are going to break her camera. She just chuckles because she knows what comes next. After a quick posing and posture lesson, and some smile coaching. They come to review their portraits and are blown away by how they look better than expected.

What Kristina wants people to know is that this doesn't happen by accident. It’s thanks to the nearly two decades she has spent learning the proper ways to light faces.