Creatives & Coffee: How to Take a Great Portrait (in 5 Minutes or Less)

Photographer Sanjay Suchak showed guests how to take great portraits under tight constraints.


Sanjay Suchak was both the VIP guest host and the person who traveled the furthest to get to Creative Factor’s first “Creatives & Coffee” event on a rainy November morning in Manhattan.  

Sanjay is the touring photographer for the Dave Matthews Band, so he photographed the band’s show on Wednesday night at Mohegan Sun in Connecticut, then uploaded the best images for social media before getting onboard the tour bus that took him to Manhattan for the band’s weekend shows at Madison Square Garden. He arrived in town in the early hours of Thursday morning, and by the time he arrived at Round K coffee shop on the Lower East Side at 9 a.m., he needed a caffeine jolt. 

Cappuccinos and Flat Whites were poured, and the attendees made their way to the speakeasy back room to listen to Sanjay not only share his techniques and creative approach, but to also watch him in action — a creative exercise was in store. 

The Creatives & Coffee series is a new intimate monthly gathering that helps curious humans kickstart their day with a creative exercise (and caffeine). It was born out of frustration with seeing so much content online and not feeling like we carve out the time to actually do the things that stretch our creative muscles. The event was sponsored by Based In, a coworking space for creative entrepreneurs in Chinatown. 

Creative Factor Special Projects Editor Naomi Piercey and Sanjay Suchak queue up for coffee.

As the guests settled in with their coffees — hand selected by Round K proprietor and friend of the brand, Han — we kicked off our discussion on how to take a great portrait, in five minutes or less. In other words, how do you create something great when you are up against tight constraints, whether you’re a photographer who has five minutes to photograph a celebrity, or you’re building something with scarce resources and physical limitations?

Sanjay has a wealth of experience on the subject because he has photographed so many people. He has taken portraits of celebs (Tina Fey, Mike Tyson), rock stars (Public Enemy, KISS, Nathaniel Rateliff), and political icons (Madeleine Albright, John Lewis, Bernie Sanders, Condoleezza Rice). One of his most important projects was photographing the removal of the Robert E. Lee statue in his hometown of Charlottesville. The resulting portfolio is one of the most comprehensive views into the removal of Confederate statues in Virginia. 

Sanjay has photographed Dave Matthews, Tina Fey, Mike Tyson, and John Lewis, as well as the removal of the Robert E. Lee status in his hometown of Charlottesville, Virginia.

Even though the hour was early, the vibe was lively. And obviously it was captured — video above, photos below.

Sanjay, who is also a practitioner fellow in democracy at University of Virginia and mentors students studying photojournalism, said he viewed constraints as something to solve. “They give me things to work around while I get the most accurate, human representation of who someone is,” he said. 

His style requires almost zero post-production editing, in large part because of the focus and effort he puts into setting up the shot.

Here are four steps he shared about how he creates the conditions to take a great portrait.

1. Know the REAL Constraints

When shooting a portrait, it’s not uncommon for Sanjay to arrive at a location and be told he has 15 minutes to photograph a celebrity. Even worse, that location might be the subject’s office or something else equally as unappealing for a photo background. But “constraints mean nothing if the subject is enjoying themselves,” said Sanjay. He told the story about once having only 15 minutes to photograph Tina Fey and, four hours later, they were still taking photos because Fey was having such a good time. 

“There is a temptation when you are taking portraits to get the shot and get out quickly,” said Sanjay. “But it works better to form a connection with people, so they open up and you can get the shot you really want.” 

A great tip that works outside of photography is to ask your counterpart, “How much time do you have?” They (or their assistant) may have set 15 minutes on their calendar, but they actually have the whole hour open. This only works if you make the extra time worth it.

2. Un-robot the Human

To help form that connection, Sanjay said that you really have to believe something important — that no one is more important than anyone else in this world. So he often engages subjects in a conversation. Take that photoshoot he did with Mike Tyson. The boxer is not exactly known as a relaxed, easygoing person, so Sanjay started their shoot by seeking a common connection. 

Sanjay likes cats, so he asked Tyson about his tigers and that led to a friendly conversation and helped to loosen up Tyson. Sanjay’s objective is to make the subject feel human, not just a human prop in a photo shoot. 

So take a second before you dive into that next meeting. Notice something about your peer as a human that is not related to the project at hand. That opening could lead to the kind of human touch every program needs.

3. Include a Wild Option in Your Bag of Ideas

While it is important to establish the “safety” shots — the ones you know they want and will like — you should also have an idea or two that the publicist/subject/client can say no to. A better way to describe this is a “quality, non-traditional idea” so you don’t completely burn time with your client. This gives you the chance to push the edge a bit, because you might not know where the edge is exactly. What you think is a wild idea could be one the client always wanted to explore, but never had enough courage to try. As an observer of human nature, Sanjay noted there is a somewhat surprising place people like to be photographed: the bathroom. “Everyone says they don’t love it, but they kind of love it,” he said. What’s your bathroom idea equivalent? 

(Editor’s Note: Pitching a wild idea is actually how the James Bond film series came to be. The producers faced impossible odds for getting a single movie made, so they pitched an entire series that followed this international man of mystery on adventures around the world. And it worked.)

4. Be Willing to Give Up Some Control

Celebs are often told how to pose by photographers, so Sanjay takes another tactic, especially when he needs someone to be themself. He asks them how they would like to pose, and the subjects both relax and do the most unexpected things. A few years ago he asked Madeleine Albright this, and she started to pirouette. “I watched her let her guard down,” said Sanjay. “In that moment, she wanted to be a ballerina.” And the reaction you never saw coming could be exactly what you realize is perfect.

Guests took portraits of each other using Sanjay’s techniques. Here, Creative Factor Strategic Advisor Tucker Margulies poses for a photo, while appearing to take a call from someone in 1880.

While the event officially ended at 10 a.m. because some people had to head to work, most attendees stuck around and connected with someone new in our creative circle. There was a strong turnout from the creative crowd, from Sony Electronics president Neal Manowitz and photographer Zabrina Deng, to Terrain founder Steven Tupu, CannonDesign SVP Lynn McClouchic, McKinsey Editor Emily Ludolph, and Creative Factor editors Naomi Piercey and Tucker Margulies

Other attendees who didn’t bat an eye at the rain were creative director Jay Goldberg, Simons Foundation strategist Sharla Reep, TV writer Jenna Bond, landscape architect Joe Norman, and Public/Official studio cofounders Heidi Chisholm and Richard Hart.

“An event like this where I’m surrounded by like-minded people helps me grow as a creative.”

— Ryan Kraus, Founder, New Paltz Photo Works

While Sanjay had the furthest trek to get there, attendee Ryan Kraus had the longest drive home. Ryan lives up in New Paltz, more than two hours from New York City, and his dad drove Ryan down to the city that morning. Ryan is a full-time student, manages a martial arts studio, and recently launched his own photography newspaper, New Paltz Photo Works. One of the pub’s recent feature subjects? None other than Sanjay. 

“An event like this where I’m surrounded by like-minded people helps me grow as a creative,” Ryan told us. “I learned so much from Sanjay and feel inspired.”

We all did. It’s energizing to be around someone like Sanjay who is at a career apex, operating at the intersection of high quality craft and cranking out work around his passions for music, democracy, and culture. And that is the perfect way to start a rainy day.

To hear about our next Creatives & Coffee events, which will be held monthly in 2025, subscribe to our newsletter.



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