$2 Portrait

While shooting the building on Travis I got to do the first $2 Portrait that I have done in a long time. I probably would have missed this one except that earlier I had been approached for a handout and after we walked away I mentioned to Debi that I just missed another opportunity for a $2 Portrait. So when Dennis approached I snapped to and realized that I had a camera in my hands as I almost always do.

The concept of the $2 Portrait was initiated by Thomas Hawk. The idea is not to give away handouts but offer to pay for a few minutes of the persons time to do a portrait of them. I did that pretty actively for a long time but recently I seem never to snap too when asked for a handout. There is a group on Flickr where the portraits are posted. I made a mistake when I first started and offered the $2 for a portrait. Then one fellow stuck up his hand when I started to shoot the second shot--the first is almost always a test shot to be sure the exposure is correct. He wanted another $2 for the next shot. Now I tell them that I will pay them $2 for ten minutes of their time while I take their photograph.

Dennis said he was from Wisconsin and was in Houston to go to school. He was a very friendly and personable young man. I shot a dozen or so photographs. I have a couple that I may actually like better than the two that I processed. May do those later.