Portrait photography can run the gamut in type and style—everything from the traditional “head and shoulders” shot to lifestyle and environmental, candid and street, glamour, boudoir, maternity sessions and much more. View some of the eye-catching portraits and photos of the week that caught our attention, and read the backstories on the how they were created.

Jonathan Coates of JS Coates Wedding Photography says he loves nothing more than a good silhouette and is always on the lookout for interesting spaces to create them on wedding days.

“At Thomas & Claire’s Ilam Hall wedding [in Staffordshire, England], I was wandering around the awesome gardens just after sunset and saw symmetry of the arches in this shot and loved how the warm lights complemented the blue hour sky,” Coates explains.

He says he knew that with some boosting of color in post production, there was potential for a great shot. “I considered lighting the couple with a flash and making a standard front-lit photo, but my love for silhouettes was calling out to me!” He played with the scene and angle for a while, and then really started to get excited when he realized he could frame the couple multiple times, by not only using the obvious arch they were standing in, but also by using another archway much further back that he was standing just behind.

“I did have to tidy the image up a little as there was few distractions that needed cloning out,” the photographer says. “A rogue bench ruined the symmetry along with a couple of other restricting elements. I have no issue with this, it’s obviously a set-up shot and making it the best it can be with a few tricks is fine by me. As mentioned, I boosted the colors already in the image, dropped the blacks and did everything possible to make it pop.”

Jonathan Banks says this portrait of British actor comedian, singer, television presenter and writer Sir Lenworth George Henry CBE was for an assignment with the Daily Telegraph and sponsored by British gas and electricity supplier Npower for an article in the main paper and weekend magazine.

“The idea of Lenny Henry laughing with the jacket of light bulbs evolved from the requirements of the parties involved,” Banks explains. He says the Daily Telegraph wanted a unique portrait which captured the comedian’s larger than life personality. Npower wanted a photograph that connected Lenny Henry’s comedy to energy.

“I wanted to show that lightbulb moment of when a comedian comes up with something funny, as well as the energy behind someone like Lenny,” says Banks. “I love how he fully embraced this by letting out a ‘Delbert Wilkins’ (one of his early comedy characters) laugh, closing his eyes and holding his rib cage as if it were ready to explode. We experimented with lots of different expressions but I liked this photo the best as it brought together all the elements that I had set out to capture.”

Anyone who is familiar with Cliff Mautner‘s wedding photography can appreciate his authentic, dramatic and timeless takes on the wedding day.

“I use light, composition, emotion and relationships to create inspiring wedding photos time and time again,” says photographer and Nikon ambassador Mautner.

In this image, taken at The Rockleigh in New Jersey during the bedeken—the ceremony where the groom veils the bride in a Jewish wedding—bride Dani is moved by words from her new father-in-law just moments before she walks down the aisle.

“For me, moments like these are what weddings are all about,” says Mautner. “Unscripted, honest moments are my fuel during these long, grueling days. I’ll never get tired of these aspects of the job.”

“This was a portrait I took for a couple on a summer’s afternoon,” says Jacob Gordon, based in Western Australia. “What I love about this image is that I was able to incorporate something about the location into the image. What I was able to do was frame the couple within the silhouette of a mast from a model boat. With the port city of Fremantle being famous for its maritime history, I felt this was the perfect way to incorporate this concept.”

The photographer points out that the elements of this image that he loves the most is the hand on the dress and the movement of the couple.

“There is just enough separation between the arm and the dress so the viewer can make out what is happening,” he explains. “I was able to sufficiently silhouette the couple, however I still managed to illuminate the dress which shows more detail and context of the image. The final element which adds to this image is the contrasting colors of blue and yellow. One warm tone and one cool tone which provide an interesting difference in color between each section of the image.”

Photographer Peggy Levison Nolan raised her seven children as a single mother in a working-class Miami-area neighborhood alongside other families who became a source of support and occasionally served as her muses.

“When my youngest was about three, my dad gave me an old Nikon [camera] and said, ‘make pictures of the grandchildren.’ And I got hooked. I got so hooked I can’t even describe it to you. One roll of film got me,” explains Nolan, who cites her influences as Diane Arbus, Priscilla Forthman and her son, Abner Edward Nolan.

Nolan’s work in the exhibit “Peggy Levison Nolan: Blueprint for a Good Life” at the Patricia & Phillip Frost Art Museum FIU in Miami is the photographer’s first solo museum show and runs now through August 27. 

Dig into our Photo of the Day archives for even more compelling imagery.