Okay, so I’ve been messing around with this photography thing for a while now, and I gotta say, this Ethan James Green dude’s work really caught my eye. I mean, this guy’s got a style that’s just… wow. I decided to dive deep and figure out what makes his photos so special.

First off, I started by just looking at a ton of his pictures. You know, just scrolling through, getting a feel for his vibe. He’s all about portraits, mostly in black and white, and they’re not your grandma’s portraits, let me tell you. They’re edgy, they’re raw, and they’ve got this classic Hollywood glam thing going on, but with a modern twist.
So, after I got a good sense of his overall style, I started picking apart individual photos. What’s he doing with the lighting? How’s he posing his subjects? What kind of backgrounds is he using? I noticed he’s a master of using light and shadow to create drama. His subjects always look so confident, so comfortable in their own skin. And the backgrounds are usually pretty simple, which really makes the person in the photo pop.
I started trying to copy his style a little. It is a good way to learn. I grabbed my friend, Sarah, and we did a little photoshoot in my apartment. I set up a plain white sheet as a backdrop, used a single lamp to light her from the side, and told her to just be herself. I took a bunch of shots, trying to capture that same kind of raw, intimate feeling that Ethan James Green gets in his photos. My photos are far away from his, but it was a start.
My experiments
- Playing with light: I spent hours just moving the lamp around, seeing how the shadows fell on Sarah’s face. I tried lighting her from above, from below, from the side. I even tried bouncing the light off a piece of white cardboard to soften it up.
- Posing and expression: This was the hardest part. I’m not a natural director, and Sarah’s not a professional model. But we just kept at it, trying different poses, different expressions. I told her to think about her favorite movie stars, to channel her inner diva.
- Black and white conversion: After I took the photos, I converted them to black and white using some photo editing software. I played around with the contrast and brightness until I got a look I liked. I realized the importance of the converting.
Honestly, it was a lot harder than I thought it would be. Getting that perfect shot takes a lot of practice, a lot of patience, and a lot of skill. But I learned so much from this little experiment. And I’ve got a whole new appreciation for what Ethan James Green does.
I’m definitely going to keep practicing, keep experimenting, keep trying to find my own voice as a photographer. Maybe I can get a style like Ethan one day.
