Lessons

Lesson Info

Shooting Boudoir: Using Light to Create Interest

I'm very excited to work with brooke today, brooks you wanna come on in? Brooke is a professional model and we're going to start with her with available light. Now, one thing I want to say about brooke and her being a model is I get this all the time. Jenn don't you shoot any real women? Here's the thing brooke she's really touching her good she israel, but truthfully, I want to be honest about shooting models. Yes, I do shoot models and sometimes I put models on my website because I don't always want my client to sign model releases I want to protect them and I don't always want to use their images so and sometimes they're not comfortable with that, to be honest, so there are times that I pay women to come to my studio, I shoot them and I put them up on my website, but I still take the lead imposing them I still work with them and getting what I'm looking for and every once in a while I'll find a model who really just goes for and knows what she's doing it moves around and she teaches...

me stuff, so I want to make sure that we sort of have that yin and yang, so I always look for models that are willing to take advice from me and models that I'm I can learn from I do want to thank rate of life for bringing us a seattle day with them today I don't know if you guys can tell from here but it is very grey and dark and rainy outside I was hoping for some sun today but this is real life you guys okay if you're a natural light shooter and you say well I'm natural item natural light you gotto work with what you have so I have to work with what I have today too so we're going to start with natural light one other thing that I want to mention is brooks hair and makeup we decided to go for a little more natural look on brooke today something a little more wavy and her hair versus big and bedroom me she told me herself that she's a little more natural right an earthy so we wanted to work with that versus against it even though brooke is a model I am working with what she is because I want to bring out her personality no matter who she is you're ready to start shooting all right? All right, so um maybe you can just take off your room we could see what you're wearing today let's start with that isn't a scary part but after this it's all good uh great so toss that the first thing that you'll notice is brooke is even though she is wearing some lingerie she's not overly exposed she's not wearing a bra and underwear or course it or anything like that and I'm okay with that in fact she's wearing converse sneakers which if anybody knows me out there is like my thing staple I always wear that s oh, I love that and when we spoke about war job, we really wanted to work like I said with what brooke has what she's comfortable in so this is her comfort level and I love it I think she looks awesome it's fun and it embraces her personality. Okay, you ready? All right, first thing is what you do actually flip your head over, shake your hair out and bring it up. I love my hairdresser and the make up artist everything always is perfect with them, but I don't like perfection. I think they're always should be a little bit of movement in the hair. It shouldn't be so kind of perfect into your head, so we're just kind of shake it out a little bit. All right? I'm gonna have you actually come stand right about over here for me come a little bit off the wall great. Now I'm working with my window on my right side and I have a big reflector on my left side to give me a little bit more light you can see how dark it is it's kind of okay it's not ideal but we're going to make it work and it's freezing in here I'm so sorry grace seabrook shaking she's not scary she just called um all right, so I'm going to start amusing my nikon d three s and I have on here the sigma fifty millimeter art lens um it's my new favorite lenses absolutely amazing and what I like about it is that it's an aperture of one four which we're going to need today we're going to really need teo to shoot wide open because it is so dark one thing I noticed about the shirt is it it ends right at your waist which makes you look a little bit square so we want to really be cautious of that what you're posing eso a couple things I want you to keep in mind either like hands on the waist maybe we could, like play with your shirt a little bit have a little fun with it so that this may I see some of the curve of your body otherwise you look really square and I'm just gonna actually if you could just stand like that I'm just gonna take a quick picture so we can stay one more cause you're blinking a okay can you turn your head a smidge to the window but come back a little tiny but there you go now by doing that what I'm doing is actually you could look over at mabruk filling her face with a little bit more light right now my settings are one twenty fifth of a second two f two five and my eyes so is a two thousand so it's really a dark day and here this is settings I almost never used normally in the studio I'm somewhere around one twenty fifth of a second um two five two a and about four to eight hundred s o so you can see it's a much darker day than I'm used to having in here but it's ok we're going to make it work so let's do this um can you pop your hip like all the way out this way excellent and with this leg just kind of bring it over a little bit for me as much as you can if it's more comfortable cross your legs for may let's try that that's even better now what I want you to do is from your waist down push your body back good and let's grab your shirt for me and just kind of play around with it a little bit I just want you to be careful about your posture because you're so tall and I love that but I don't want you to just kind of like people sometimes sort of just fall over I want to make sure you kind of keeping a nice posture and push back from the waist down, and then we can kind of play with it. And I want you to make sure your head is facing toward the window at all times. Otherwise I'm going to completely lose you. Which is not what I'm looking for right now. Just one thing before we start to shake out your hair one more time. Perfect. I love it, you know? Yeah. You can even look what's bring it back on that side. Yeah, maybe bring it forward a little bit more on this side, gray, because you have great collar bone and I wantto make sure we're getting that ok to turn your head a little this by just a little come take a small step toward me could not turn your head again a little perfect it looks beautiful on you stay just like that once don't move. I just want to see what it looks like. Excellent. Your eyes are so blue it's amazing like them. Um, can you push your hips back a little tiny bit more. There you go. But by doing that, what we're doing is creating some curve. I'm gonna scoot back. By pushing your hip out brooke what we're doing we're creating some curve on her side um you're a very slim woman and you have a beautiful body but we really want to create some interesting shapes on dh a shape is one of the things that we look for like we've discussed already imposing so we really want to push for that so as much as it you could do it without it hurting and then go like one more centimetre we don't laugh like that when my camera's not on you because it's so pretty there you go perfect excellent on dh yeah you khun let's move around a little bit I want to see kind of how your body moves naturally and then I could tweak you from there for what I'm looking for um just make sure your hairs out of your face that way please thank you perfect so I am getting I am not full body right now because we're so close to each other. Um what I want to do is make sure that like everything I'm getting it's a it's about let me look, we're about here up, so if your hands are down here, I'm gonna lose them so let's try to keep your hands up I love when you were kind of playing with your shirt before and don't be afraid to look down a little bit at it but I don't want you to look down because then I won't see you I just want you to kind of look like you're looking down it doesn't matter to me if you see the floor, your cheekbones or whatever I just wanted to look as if you're looking down can you don't live once I get that hand there too low for may they got losing a hand so yeah I want it in the shots either kind of bring your hands up you could put it on your waist you could bring it back here play with your hair don't be afraid to give me a little movement I love movement on dh then like I said, we'll tweak it from there but it looks you're look right now is really very nice and natural and I just want you to kind of give me some smiles and have some fun you can play with the top of your shirt a little whatever you're comfortable with for me brooke, turn your head a little more to the window. Great okay, so one more thing I'm going to stop you one second when you're the front of your hand is like this it just looks like awkward so I want to either have it like this or on the side this way so I don't see the back of your hands is not that's great beautiful yeah that's perfect soc broke turned her head toward me and the new she turned it back because she knew that's where the light was hitting her so that's what so great sometimes about a model you don't always have to give those tiny little tweaks that you might with a regular client because those air time consuming they take time to say over and over turn your head turn your head models know where their light is and they go for it they know how that works so thank you very much for doing that I'm gonna back up a little smidge more normally I would have brooke back up and go up against the wall and do some wall shots but right now it's so dark over there I'm not sure if we're gonna be able to do that so maybe I'll save that for the next light that were gonna work with um let's do this can you grab your shirt on both sides this way and just kind of pull and kind of go back and forth with that a little bit um okay but pop your hip the otherway for me yeah it's better it's more flattering on you that way good take your head out of your face for me yeah, good turn your head the other way yeah, there you go good. What can I say that would make you laugh hey perfect. So I'm getting just a lot of the front of your hands I just want you to be cautious about that it's ok? You have beautiful hands, but sometimes when you're holding something, it looks kind of like this it looks like you know you don't have fingers, so I like fingers there useful so we want to keep them in big sur so let's think of something we could do maybe can you bring your arms up like this and then kind of come down? The only thing is I I only want like I don't want your hands in the same space like I want one up one down just went a little bit lower, you know? Because if you're just kind of like this tends look a little bit heavy so maybe swap your arms though so it's not blocking the light for me and then bring the other one kind of down a little bit more beautiful. I just wanna make sure we see your fingers. We need hand that's on your neck down a little bit more. Yeah, good. Just pop your hit back for me again. Take a small step this way I get going, get bring that hand down that's behind, okay, you know what I always do this hand here looks kind of heavy put under your hair like, bring your hair kind of over your shoulder. Yeah, good. And now bring it back here around you here? Yeah, and just let it kind of fall down naturally. Keep going. Keep going. I don't want you shake it out. I know it's cold in here right now. We're, like, super safe, but let's just kind of let it. Yeah, because otherwise it just looks really tight. So just kind of bring it down where it feels natural free and then maybe bring the other hands over like this, it's. Just a lot of hand. Let's. Change it. Um, let's, do this. Can you put your thumbs in your undies? Good. And just kind of like, push your tush back from there. Like, almost like you're pushing it with your hands. Good. And just breathe into it a little. Turn your head a little this way. A guy like that a lot. Good. Now look over. It means your eyes good. Can you sexy in a sexy way. Kind of give me one of these good, good stay. Just like that. I want to do that again now because I'm using a prime lens. I have to move my body, which I really like that's, part of what I love about the fifty millimeter it works for me space wise and I get to move in and out so I don't have to move her and even though like zooms air really easy sometimes and we're going to use them later to zoom in and out like this interaction especially the beginning where I'm moving in and out and I'm moving around it creates some intimacy I think that I'm doing work to just standing there and it's it forces me to be a little bit more creative it's just sometimes it's lazy to just stand there like this other times I need it like you'll see when we're shooting with strobes I'll be shooting with his doom because I don't want to change anything I just want to stand there shoot away so here I like using the fifties start plus it's not intimidating for you like I don't have this big ones on right turn your head a little bit more beautiful relax your shoulders excellent um so a little I want a little less fingers right here but put your hand in your hair just like you had it and just bring it down a little bit more turn your hand can you turn your hand more thie other way yeah let's do something like that just shake out your hair first by the way you guys I'm on my white balance is on I just realized I didn't change it before he's on daylight but it's working for me right now I like the way it looks turn your head a little this by I want your hand to be a little more natural looking bring her forward again okay do that again but wait for me to have the camera in front of my face okay? So I just want you down and kind of playing with your hair a little bit looking down for may looking down although yeah good you give me a little smile good and then I want you to look up at me so move your head out of your face I almost want you instead of raising your ten up I want you looking up at me just your eyes don't move there you look so pretty right now good give me a little laughter from there okay, good look turn your head toward the window a little bit more good. Now look up at me so I want your head turned toward the window and then just look up at me with your eyes don't move anything else? Just your eyes good let's do something um a little bit different let's have you let's have you just kind of have fun with your hair shake it out just wait for me I'm not ready on and then just be careful when you raise this arm up you're blocking the light for me so maybe we can like shake it out more and this guy just have a little fun with it almost like you just went to the gym and you took your hair out of a pony tail on your kind of shaking it around for may good yes I just want you facing air a little bit more perfect hold on sorry I'm not ready I'll give you a countdown you ready? All right one two three but I want you to engage the other hand I just want you to block your face good so when your head is turned this way I don't want you to be afraid to just kind of look up at me instead of just turning and looking at me even if you look out the window and then it's kind of like I want you to look at me like you still looking at me all right yeah no cure good can you give me something like this maybe bring your arm over I kind of just bring your hand up here good and then turn your head a little bit let's do something a little bit like that and then just look up at me good give me a little tiny squint in your eyes beautiful okay, I love it and I think it works so well um I want to try one more thing with you because I want to get your converse in the shot falling over um first I want to show you what one of these looks like so you get an idea of what we're doing here um and then what we'll do is I think maybe we'll do an outfit change and change a light up a little because even though I love shooting natural light in my studio it's so dark in here and we're very limited as to where I can put you today we're normally I'd have you all over the studio it's not working today so I think what we'll do is we'll bring in some constant lights there daylight balanced and they can kind of actors are window but we can have more flexibility with them because we can move them so let me just show you one of these I'm gonna change up your pose a little bit I love it except pretty do you have any objection to sitting on the floor for oppose all right so let's have you I know it's so cold and I'm making soup for but I want to get your converse and um so let me just have you kind of pop a squat I will tweak your pose by the way my step stool is like my favorite thing in my studio brooke is how tall are you? Five eleven okay I'm five one and a half five two on a good day without my heels so there's no way that I could shoot her properly without a step stool so if you're short like me or even if you're tall are make sure you have a steps because as you see I'll actually sit on it now to get her when she's lower so that's important to kind of peter balance um can you put this leg down under this one yeah that was impressive considering I'm standing um awesome and then just kind of maybe grab onto your knee for me and bring your head back this way little can you with both arms like I want a little more intimacy yeah perfect can I shake your hair out for you okay okay I barely ever ever ever touch my clients and models but every once in a while they can't see what I see and I want to make sure that they look good all right so one thing I want you to do is still keep good posture excellent or come all the way down okay um okay I don't love the way it looks on your legs so let's change it up a little bit let's see what happens if you sit against the wall and bring both knees toward me so you're kind of like vest good can you raise your knees up a little bit more for me? Can you cross your legs for me? They go that's a little more interesting perfect and then bring your face toward the window a little bit weird okay so there is going to be a little bit of distortion here because her legs are closer to me but in this case I kind of like it because she's really long and I want to kind of emphasize that I kind of like it I think it's fun so I'm doing it on purpose which is the most important thing if you're gonna break rules just make sure you're doing it on purpose c yeah just look right over at me oh my gosh this is where I need a bigger studio because I can't push his wall back any further even though I try good can you we have maybe bring your arm up to your elbow and kind of yes oh yeah perfect do something like that no I don't love the way that looks so let's change it can you rest your arm that's life the other way the other arm so bring your elbow to your knee like you did before but just bring your arm this way good and the other hand just rested on the floor I want to able to see that other arm good perfect and then can you let me see if I can change my money and go ok let's do this can you bring your knees all the way out and kind of hold on to them with your arms good let's bring your knees back down toward me okay that's better and this arm on this side here bring on top the other arm bring this by let's try that this is actually really fun beautiful good cue down that way so I want you to um tilt your head a little bit maybe this way no try this life no turn this good and just looking down with your eyes all the way down so I don't see your eyeball so if I see a part of your eyeballs it looks like this and it's weird it's like what is she looking at e wanted either down or all the way up it may great can you bring this arm on the side over a little bit more so you're not great yeah that's great just let your your hand hang good and let's bring it back a little bit more so it's not hanging as much and can you touch your arm with that hand to there we go I like that better good nice tall posture for me the book perfect get out your cover's super important now you guys know I have holes in my jeans I didn't buy them this way t think uh uh this is great let's have you doing outfit change? We're gonna change the lighting a little bit so that I could get a little more variety and what I'm looking for here we are with our second lighting setup constant lights in for this scenario I'm using titi sixes there's air by westcott there also called the spider lights what I like about these laces they have three different banks of lights so we can really control how much light we need in this case I have it up pretty high I think I have two or three banks on the yeah, I have two banks on and the reason why is because I am still getting some natural light and here this is a great light to use on its own or combined with daylight because it's daylight balance I've decided to use this versus my sky locks but also by westcott which I also have here because this gives a look of, like similar to window light and that's really what I'm looking for right now um so we are going to work with this now I have basically the same setup okay, I have broke she did now for change for me which I absolutely love. Um and actually we'll talk about her outfit for one second it's beautiful it's black which is one of my favorite colors in the world. Obviously I'm from new york but it's also fairly shir this is something you really need to talk to your clients about remember we discussed wardrobe and what your clients comfort level is so this was a conversation that brooke and I had before we started shooting today about her comfort level I also have the reflector and I added some fabric to the wall I think that the fabric will give a nice soft look to compliment her outfit and what we're going for here and now I'm in the same sir spaces I was before but I have her pushed up against the wall because I couldn't do that before and that will give me a little bit of a different look when I have a girl up against the wall it's easier for me with posing on moving her around because she could push your tush up against the wall and that gives her sort of an anchor to move around with so opposing against the walls a little easier than just standing on your own posing and try to maintain balance especially when a woman is wearing heels so that's why I made all the decisions I made here one thing I want to do is I want to see what she looks like with the reflector and without the reflector the beauty of this light right now is I have more control than I did over the window light like I said it could make it brighter or darker and the reflector will make a much bigger difference here than it did with the window light because there wasn't that much like to begin with so the first thing I'm going to do is see what it looks like with and without here with the reflector obviously, brooke is getting lit on this side by the late and there's quite a bit of light on this side, too, so we're not getting too much contrast, which is okay if depends on what you're looking for. I want to see what it looks like without the reflector, so I'm just gonna pull it out. Um, I actually think I'm going to try it without the reflector, mostly because it gives me a little bit more contrast. Number one, number two it's giving me a different look then I got with the window and that's what I'm going for if I'm shooting a client with two or three outfits, I want to get a variety of different looks. Um, again, we're shooting in such a boring space, we have to use light to achieve that so let's see what it looks like in camera, I always say, and I'll probably say it multiple times during this course, I can't see without my camera what it looks like to my I might look totally different in camera. I'm I love the way she looks, take a picture and go off. This is horrible, we need to readjust, so I'm gonna take a few snaps, we'll see what it looks like and we can re adjust from there. So I'm still with my night conti three us and I'm still with my fifty millimeter lens I've dropped my I s o two, five hundred so let's see what we're going to be at otherwise with our other settings first I want to get work into her pose so that this way I can't see what I need to do so broke what I want to do with you is again, I want to use the walls and anchor so it's really important that you, ben from your waist down like this so you see, I'm not married to the wall, I'm just bending for the waist down. Good, I love that and your your upper body could be free. You don't have to be up against the wall, so don't worry about that too much just start with that sort of anger makeup looks so good like when I come close you're like, um, excellent, I like how you kind of brought that knee over before I love that um I want to start just with your hands on your waist now your waist is where that ribbon is, so just make sure you keep your hands they're perfect. Um what I want you do with your upper body just relax just good and bring your face toward the light now remember with the window I kept seeing your face toward the window. It's gonna be the same thing here. This is your light source, so we might switch you a little bit after, so we have a little more anonymous shots, but right now, this is about getting your face lit, so keep your face towards the light from a okay? All right, so just turn a little bit good. Now, again, I added this fabric behind her. I think it gives a little bit of softness there. Five dollars like curtains there, nothing exciting. I've talked about them before, um but I don't know, I just I feel like it really goes very nicely with this. Okay, so again, just turn your head for me a little bit. Can I shake your hair out for you? Okay, long hair is amazing because it hides so many sins also, you know, like, people talk a little bit about shooting curvy girls or thinner girls, or this and that. And I always say, I'm more scared of shooting a girl with no hair, then a curvy girl or skinny girl or anything in between because hair cover so many things like armpits or net creases or anything like that, so it always make sure the hair is pretty full. I have another expression that goes, the bigger the hair this skinny, you're the woman. I just feel like big hair. Um, helps keep women in proportion a little bit too when you're posing them. So I always like to get a little bit of volume in your hair. Just gonna fix one thing, actually, and I'm a little crazy about hair imposing because I hate fixing it. Photoshopped leader, I hate editing, as you might know. So, um, I always make sure their hair looks pretty good in person, so I don't have that ransom curl or that piece of hair sticking up later that I need to edit out because I absolutely hate doing that. All right, let's. See what we have here. Okay, let's, take a shot. This looks pretty good, actually. Good guess here. Um all right, so, there's a couple things I'm noticing first is I, like I said I was that I sold five hundred. I'm still on daylight balanced white balance, and now I'm at one twenty fifth of a second at two point eight. This is more standard to what I usually shoot with the window, but because I couldn't do that with the window and I brought in this light were able to manipulate a little bit more. One thing that I notice is that there is some fall off coming onto her arm like the the light isn't hitting her arm on this side as much as I would like so what I want you to do is just bring that arm forward just a little there we go much better turn your head this way and let's just do that again look down for me all the way down with your eyes and bring your chin out and down a little tiny but relax your mouth his breathe through your mouth good so I want to I really want to make sure brooke is when you're looking down like when you look up at me it's really easy to make a connection because you're looking at me and you could flirt with me a little or kind of give me the eyes and that sometimes when women do that then they look down they go okay so what I want you to think is that same thought like you're still flirting with me even though you're looking at the floor thank you but it's almost coy like you're kind of looking away but then I'll have you look back up with me again so don't lose that x oppression or that feeling even though you're looking down on the floor okay do you remember time much better don't move because I just wanna fix your hair who killed you just there ok bring that other arm forward a little bit more yeah perfect great. Now you see, I'm checking every few snaps to make sure it looks good because, like I said, my camera and my I see things differently. So if my eyes think it looks good and I just keep snapping, snapping, snapping and then I looked back at the camera and I go, oh, my god, I just took a hundred pictures that are awful that's not going to benefit me. So I'm going to stop every two or three pictures and make sure that my eyes in my camera see the same thing I don't like the way that arm looks, so we're gonna just move that arm. Keep your other arm here, this arm. Can you just touch her thigh and bring back just a little yet? But I want you to relax your shoulders down. Beautiful. I love that and the same thing. Just kind of look down for me. Relax your fingers that are on your thigh. Beautiful. Oh, yeah, I really like that. Turn your head a little bit more away from a good gonna fix your hair again. Okay. Sorry. Actually stages like that. So pretty the way her hair is falling to get a little detail shot it's, so important to pay attention to all the little details that are happening get different angles, all right? So look all the way down. I don't see your eyes. Relax your mouth a little and just breathe through your mouths to get a little parting of the lips. Good. And then I want you to look over at me. Good. Take the air out of your face a little bit for me. Good to put your hand back on here. Beautiful. Turn your head a little to the light a little bit more. Raise your chin up a little and then looked over at me. Rise gorgeous. Let's do this. Can you grab the curtains now? One of the things that we were struggling with a little bit with brooke with the natural light was the fact that her hands looks a little bit awkward. So now I'm going to give her hand something to do. This is the second reason why I hung the fabric on the wall because we want to keep her hands busy. Um, and you know what? I just want to fix this one, actually don't like how this thing is coming down. Okay, so what I want you to do, bro, is just grab like an edge here. Just grab an edge here, okay? And what I want you to do is not high, don't you hide your body? But I want you to just kind of play with it a little um you can bring it back on one side forward and just kind of keep moving around let's see what it looks like um maybe turn your body this way for me and bring you your head back this way okay so you see how your hip is popped out toward me I want you to go the other way there you go great perfect see what that looks like ben this arm a little bit for me no I'm sorry how do you know which arm is this army this army because I want to see the curve of your back so when your art when your arm is really straight down like that it makes you a little bit thicker than you really are so you don't to bend it tremendously just like a little you can even just touched her thigh yeah and give me like a little band good and just push that touch all the way back good look down toward your shoulder for me beautiful don't move I want to see that looks like don't move good you look up at me raise your chin up a little tiny bet and turn it back this way a little bit good look at me don't move I got to get up on my stool can you turn your head a little yeah okay so what I did was that little tiny movement right there just filled in under her eyes a little bit more so it's not super dark under her eyes otherwise I have to edit that later which I don't want to do the far hands for me brooke just raise it up a little bit yeah beautiful and again turn up toward the light beautiful and look over it gorgeous but I got you one eye blink in there just look over at me with your chin a little good can you close your eyes and raise your chin all the way up for me good bring it back down beautiful. Um let's switch it up a little can we let's bring this arm back this way? Let me just see what this looks like maybe turn your body again this way and grab on hold with the other fabric like this maybe just bring it back here. No, I don't love that it looks um let's switch it again turn toward me good let's have you just kind of come in and out now when you come out don't go super far and I'll lose you a little bit but maybe just come like up and down like just kind of switch it around a little bit on don't be afraid to give me a little more exaggerated movement of my camera's not going to read it if it's just slow kind of you know what I mean I want a little more exaggerated movements get the fabric moving a little tiny um so I want you to kind of uh yeah perfect I'm losing your face a little bit yeah only I don't move don't even after it's not don't move perfect look over at me good I want you to give me a little flirtation in when you're not looking at me yeah raise your chin up a little bit I love that a little less down a little bit good and then look over it may beautiful don't move I want to get it this way too you see a lot of the shots and I'm doing I'm doing horizontal and vertical because I don't know which one my client is gonna want when I'm designing an album it helps me help her choose the photos that she wants because if she has all horizontal photos I might say hey let's throw in this vertical so I'm giving her a lot of options you can see a lot of times I'm doing looking up and looking down I might be doing laughing and serious so we get a lot of variations of the same pose and it's important for me to tell her not not to move when we're working ok don't move don't move because I don't I spent a lot of time getting her in a pose I don't wanna have to do every single time I need a different look or a different expression is going to change the light a little tiny bit. I'm just going to pull it away from the wall. Little because it's looking a little hot over there on the wall, right? Let's do the same thing for me. Let me just see what it looks like one time before can cross your legs for me, that's better that light is definitely better. All right. Just give me a little movement, bro. Come up and down left and right. Good and you just keep moving. I will. So don't be, um, instead of, like american america's next top modeling where it's like click, click, click I want you just to move and I'll find the opportunities. Take the photo. Is that fair? Ok, good. So for the most part, I want you either looking at me, we're down your body every once in a while, I look up at the light, but I don't want you to blind yourself and I'm sort of mixed about how, um about models looking at the light or clients looking at the light sometimes it's really, it suits them and she's got beautiful blue eye so it will bring out the blue in her eyes. But I kind of have something called the stripper principle which I know you guys are going to laugh but you'll remember it if I make you laugh when you go to a strip club not that ideo but when you go to studio think about it a stripper who's looking for somebody's attention will either be dancing and looking at the client the customer or looking at themselves if they're off looking into no man's land it's like oh I wonder what laundry I have to do later like there's no connection okay if you're she's looking at herself or she's looking at you there's a connection there's an intimacy there if she's looking into nowhere at least tell a story is she looking out a window? Is she looking for someone? There has to be some sort of story around it but too often there's pictures that are just like a girl standing there and just kind of looking and I wonder what is she looking at now I'm distracted from her distracted from the pose so I want you looking mostly at me or down it yourself every once in a while looking up with the light okay, good okay one more thing brooke I'm sorry when you're looking down at yourself I really don't want you looking at you at all I just wanted to look like you're looking at things isn't about you now I'm jesus perfect good remember our latest here so maybe turn your body this way this time. Good, good. You just keep moving and I'm gonna find a little gem. Good that hand that's toward me right now. It's like that. I know you're cold. This is to just make sure your hands are nice and loose because this tends to look like her fingers were amputated and it's like a club hands we don't want like bend your arm a little bit for me beautiful look over at me gorgeous so you can see how I am, brooke moving and doing what she feels comfortable with, which looks best on her. I always find that when my clients move themselves if they if it flatters them it's the best, but I'm still tweaking her to get what I want her to do. Raise your chin look at me push your shoulder back bend your arm I'm still giving her poising instruction I'm not just relying on her to know what looks good. Um let's do let's take the fabric from the bottom and just bring it up on your waist like we kind of did before good let's, do some mate that just bring your hair back on this side is a little piece in your mouth I don't wanna have to get to that later and then I think what we'll do yeah let's do that good hands like this for me don't move just look down for me this way relax your mouth and eyes all the way down just taking a couple different angles here something a little bit different um you know, I always find that our biggest competitors is actually not each other but cell phones that's like my biggest competition of cellphones especially when you're talking about boudoir photography because people could snap their own sexy pictures without having to be vulnerable in front of somebody else. So when I'm doing things like this like looking for different angles and looking for something a little more artist stick I'm pushing the boundaries to what somebody can do with their cell phone so they have reason to come to me besides just taking a sexy picture of themselves and sending it off beautiful can you look up at me good can we just take the hair out of your face on this side? Sorry I'm such a nag right? So you see how I'm asking her the same thing over and over again? This brings up a good point I do this with my clients to can you bring your chin out? Can you move your hair and sometimes they start apologizing to me I'm sorry I forgot and I always explain to there's no reason to apologize to me this is what you're paying before okay, this is the difference this is why I'm worth so much money it's because I'm going to remind you every single time to move your hair out of your face that's what you're paying me for so if you don't mind I'm just gonna kind of scratch it for you because I like the volume down here I don't want to lose that oh, that looks so good don't move and just bring your eyes down chin down a little bit so it's believable and relax your lips a little bit and then look up at me come on stunning you're so we're just oh my gosh good look down again relax your mouth turn your head a little bit more toward the light a little bit more a little bit more little bit more good look down for me brace brace your lips good stunning okay I think I'm going to do a little bit of a light change are you good with that? We're going to keep this late but I want to put a strip box on it instead right now we're going to use the pro photo be ones with the westcott strip box on it what I love about this light is that there are no cords it's battery powered so I don't have to worry about all the chords in the studio and I bring it out to the hallway I could use it here but we're going to use it here. I'm in the same spot that I was in before because I want to show you how I'm creating different looks in the same spot with the same client just by changing the light. A couple things I wanted to mention that I forgot to mention before is, first of all, my camera strap. I get a lot of questions about that, uh, this is made by hold fast year and it's called the money maker, and I love it. It's very sexy, I guess, on my clients all think it's fun to, uh, the other thing is, you'll notice it's pretty quiet in here, there's no music or anything, but I do normally shoot with music on either I make a playlist or I go to like apple radio or paint or whatever it is that you want to use it's fun, I usually ask the client with day like so it gets them in the mood for the shoot on it sort of takes away that awkward silence that sometimes happens when you're shooting and you're not talking and you're just thinking in your head, like, how amazing this is going on and she's looking for a little bit of instruction, it takes away that silence, so I definitely recommend shooting with music as well. Are you ready to do this, brooke? All right, so it's good. I'm just gonna throw this bond now you'll see when I turn it on see? Okay, I put the model light on and the reason why is because don't forget, I'm originally learned photography with natural light I like to see what I'm going to get it's not as easy with strobes so what you want to do is throw your model light on if you're more comfortable that way so you can see where the light falls on her and it'll make it easier to know where the light's gonna fall when your flash actually goes off. So one thing I want to mention here is at the modeling light on this light is actually very yellow it's morbid tungsten temperature it's very important when you set your white balance in camera not to go buy the modeling light, you really want to make sure you go by the stroke. So right now I'm still in daylight balance. I took a test shot and looked okay for me, so I'm just gonna leave it there. Um this light the modeling light it's a completely different color than the actual strobes, so please keep that in mind I am going to start off shooting her. I changed my, um s o two, two hundred and I bumped my head shutter speed up to one sixty it there is some natural light coming in here, so I want to be careful about how much of that I'm allowing into my photo the shutter speed will control that my aperture right now is that four and part of that reason is because I changed lenses right now I'm using the sigma twenty four two one o five this is also an art lens it's one of my new favorite lenses and this is going to give me a little bit of variation in zooming in and out, which at this point I want ok, this is our third outfit change in our section if we were doing a real session and I'm okay with being a little lazier and just kind of standing here and getting what I'm looking for, um and not having to build that intimacy as much with brooke because we already trust each other. Now, right now she trusts me I love working with her. Um another thing that you'll notice is I'm gonna actually just kind of start from here and see where it goes. It is an educated guests I'm not gonna lie to you I'm not using a light meter, I don't actually own a light meter and that's important to know because don't let these little things stop you from trying something new that's really, really important I didn't have one I bought the lights but I'm not going to sit around and wait until my light meter comes or figure out how to use mine I want to dive in I want to try them out and see how they work so I don't use a light meter I take an educated guess and I go from there so this is where we're at you ready to start trying all right let's see what we get um can you just bring your leg kind of over good I want to see this hand a little bit great can you turn your face not all the way a little bit more toward me so at this time I don't want you facing toward the light completely I'm looking for something more like a rembrandt lighting which is just a little bit of light on this side of you and more light on that side so maybe just tilt your head a little this way I could bring it back toward me yeah that's perfect. Now I can see that I'm getting that triangle pattern of rembrandt lighting on her face because I have the modeling light on if I didn't have that modeling light on I would have no idea so let's give us a twirl see we got uh okay here's what I want and you don't move in with lighter on you turn your head a little this way not not as much. Comeback. Just follow my finger. Come this way, little right there. Good. Raise your chin up a little bit for me. Okay, so, here's a couple things, um, the athletes making you look a little bit wear. So to be careful of that, what I want you to do is maybe bring this arm here good. Bends it a little time, but take this hand and yeah, oh, I love that. Because immediately what we're doing, we're creating sort of like this half circle and it's giving us a curve. And just keep your legs real tight together. If it's easier for you to cross your legs, you could feel free to do that. Also, right there. Oh, no. Your face was in a great spot. Tilted up. Yeah, beautiful. Stay like that. Okay. Turn. Say, yeah, I want teo. I'm gonna come in a little bit more so you can see strips also take a little bit longer to tweak exactly what you're looking for. But I still think it's worth it in the end. Turn your face a little toward the lake right there. I love it however here's the thing I'm a little unsure right? I came tweaking you and now you have a little bit of unsure in your face like we've lost that trust that where right? Like you're like, I'm not sure if she knows what she's doing bryce where ideo just taste a little bit of time to tweak it so I want you to just relax a little bit and because your expression and the last one was a little like like this so just trust me and if you go away that I promise we're going to get exactly we're going for so give me a nice little hip pop this way good lovett stay just like that yeah I love it the expression is so much better already perfect. Um can you put your hand on your waist on this side and relax into it a little tiny bit yeah there you go. Perfect good, beautiful. I like the little face tweaks that you do sort of just a little angles um it looks great I want you to ok, so your mouth is sort of like in a half smile I want you to be more serious or give me like a real laugh, but I think right now we're going for a little more edgy serious okay, we just show you by the way, what I'm talking about do you see how it's sort of an expression between it's not committed to a smile but it's not committed to being serious either? It's sort of somewhere in between yeah, same thing even here this was the I'm not sure if you know what you're doing but I swear it's radio all right, so just bring your hands up maybe a little bit. Yeah, I don't hear good and just bring it out a little more like that. Um, can you bring it down a little bit? So I see a little more of your arm it's fabrics covering your arms I want to see a little bit more skin good. One more thing can you lift your hair out of your face for me here? Just bring that leg right over. Good. I want a little more energy in your body. Maybe is the word I'm looking for, like a little more tension. So, like you're really pulling think almost like more fashion versus portrait I want some tension from you this is a different look than what we were going for before good don't well, let's see what we got that looks really stay just like that one second I'm gonna come chasing now I love that I have my zoom I complain with that chin up a little bit more turn a little to say also, one of the things I wanted to mention, as you see in all of these set ups, I'm really just using one light. It makes life really easy just to have one light I can use another, I have to pro photos, I have two td sixes, but sometimes for the ease of time and energy, just great to throw one light on somebody and, you know, you could make it work with one light, especially when you have such a tight space like ideo I liked what you were doing just now. Clients do this all the time. I'll stop to make an adjustment and they'll start doing something really cute. I'm leo, don't move. I get my best opposing ideas from my clients or what works for them. So let's, do something with that. I just really want you to exaggerate that hip is much as you can for me. And just maybe pull like this way a little. Give me that tension. Good let's. Do it again with your chin. You were kind of facing this way and then coming up good let's do can you pull it this way? Let's? Just say, um, but, you know, bring both hands, maybe down more let's, see what that looks like? You see also I'm not afraid to leave myself vulnerable to a client to say oh let's see what that looks like I'm not sure what it's gonna look like. I want her to know that if I need to make a change it's not her it's me I'm the one saying okay, you know, I don't like the way it looks I put you in this pose let's change it up a little bit. Um, can you let your shortfall and leave that hand there and with this hand kind of pulled down on your shirt like I want some tension like it's really like pretend like it's really hot in here on you can't wait to take this off of it so hot even though it's like twenty degrees um and just relax your fingers a little bit so I want to see fingertips good, you know at that hand let's wrap it around your waist good this hand let's bring it under your hair a little bit more get and just kind of let it fall. See what that looks like. Can you take this hands around your waist and put it up on your yeah, get it like that I don't love the arm up and that's my fault so let's, do this let's wrap both hands around your waist like almost like you're giving yourself a hug and then drop your shoulder and raise that shoulder up a little bit higher so it's just kind of like a switching good can you cross your legs for me? Yeah get it like that and just be careful about the tension like I say you're kind of smashing or I'm like I don't want that much attention actually you know what this hand here you could bring like this so bring it on the inside of your arms I don't say yeah there you go I like that much better relax your fingers yes so much better is so much more natural uh remember we talked about also like the eight points opposing and checking that each part of her body looks good before we take a picture so I'm checking her fingers I'm checking her lips of checking her waist I'm checking her arms every little part so what happens is what's happening is you looks like you're giving me the middle finger because you're so that's perfect much better okay that's a little tiny detail but you know what, guys? You're gonna go through your pictures you go oh man, if I'd just told her to move her finger this would look so much better and to tell you the truth, it does look so much better than her giving me the finger so I want to show you one other way I like to use the strip light, and that is to I actually ask brooke to strip my ass your dick off her shirt so we could see a little more definition in her body, but I'm also going to do is have her step a little further away from the wall that will dark in the wall behind her. So again, it gives another totally different look, um without having to change too much and I'm going to drop the light a little, we're going to a little detail shots with her, so let's, do that come over a little bit more? Yeah, perfect again at this point, I'm just kind of guessing where I want the light to be and then we'll take it from there, I'm feathering her body so in other words, the light is not directly on her it's kind of just going across her feathering out from the box, so we're going to try that. What I want you to do is put your hands on your side, put your thumbs in your undies for me and just really nice and tight like, yeah, perfect and just kind of popping out and just keep that legs nice and tight together I want you to look down this way perfect, I'm goingto love your hair, okay? One of the things you want to be careful with long hair is it doesn't block her chest too much. Um, we just want to be a little careful with that here we're just paying attention to lose little details, make a big difference to down a little bit more, okay? And eyes all down for me okay, don't move it's a little bright for me up top so I'm gonna lower the light a little bit more, see what that looks like okay, so here I'm only I'm actually not getting her whole face in the photo still a little bit great stride I'm actually getting a whole face in the photo, but when I crop her making sure her lips are still in the picture that's really important for me lips there really sensual and if we cut her off at the next is gonna look really wide up top okay, I need to make some changes because I feel like I'm getting too much light from the windows so one of the changes that I made was I pulled the light and broke away from the wall. The reason I did that is because now that as much light will be on the wall behind her and it will look darker like a dark red almost black, depending on what your settings are and how you using the light at this point, I'm feathering the late on her. I don't have the soft box directly on her, but instead sort of skimming her body to show some definition in her body, which I love because she has some great abs. She has beautiful collarbone, so I want to get somewhere detail shots in here and give a totally different look and things that we can put in her album later. That will show, like those little details. Also, anonymous photos. You know, we talk about the fact that my clients are always asking for anonymous photos. This is a great opportunity to do that and create something a little bit more artistic. Um, so you ready to do that? All right, what? I want you just put your hands on your hips and just put your thumbs in your undies and just really get me some nice pushback of your hips. Good. Don't bring your chest back. I want nice posture. Just want you back with your hips. It kind of brings out those stomach muscles for you. And I want you toward the light with your chin down a little bit. Just relax your mouth a little. Not too much, I want you, I like your lips or together, but just not tight. Um and just look all the way down with your eyes your whole face is not going to be in the photo however when I crop her I'm going to make sure her lips are in the picture we never want a crop on the shoulder line because she's gonna look really wide or at the net because she's gonna look decapitated so I want to make sure I have a least lips in the picture let's see what this looks like and I will read you off my settings once I know it looks good okay I actually really like that don't move for one second I'm going to move her hair away from her cleavage don't forget we're boudoir photographer as we'd like to show the goodies and if her hair is covering everything we're not gonna be able to see that that's not as much fun um okay so I've got eyes on two hundred and my shutter speed is two fifty at four again with the twenty four um one o five lens from sigma the art lends don't move we're gonna do that one again yeah it's fantastic you're good like that for a minute rock okay eyes down for me good I want to do one thing can you bring your arms down a little bit more perfect let's bring this one all the way down and then just bend it a little bit perfect see what that looks like okay, I don't like it as much, and I'll tell you why her arm is so close to her body that it is making her body look much wider. So let's bring a little separation perfect just like that. Good. All right, I'm gonna come in nice and tight, making sure that I'm not cutting off her fingertips, which sometimes I dio and I want to cry about later and I'm focusing on her lips can you pop your hip the other way for me? Good, I want teo I feel like it's a more flattering polish for her right now because I'm getting some detail shots and what I'm going to do also is kind of walk around her a little bit, pop your head the other way for me again sorry and see where my shot iss turn your body a little straighter to the wall there we go. Um this your shot is not always where you think it is, chin all the way down and looking down for may sometimes it might be on the other side. So what we need to do is take a picture here and then take a picture here and see where are flattering parts are we, you know, there's sometimes in hidden surprises like I really like coming on this side, even though it's not what you think I like kind of seeing that dark side and I think it's more flattering for her I want to do that again I just want youto move your hair out of your face I could see a little more of your lips but keep your face down this way good you can even just kind of maybe touch your stomach a little just like that don't move that's stunning you close your eyes or at least put your eyes all the way down um one thing I want you to change up the hand for this for me bring it down on your thigh a little bit more and bring it forward a little like I want to see yeah, perfect. Just like that. So this hand here on that's closest to me can you bring it down a little more? Put your thumb in your undies like I want to believe you there's no reason anyone would just kind of have their hand their good pop your stomach back your tush back. Sorry one thing I'm gonna change with your hair and just keep your eyes all the way down for me, okay? Beautiful. Oh, this is so pretty rook you're gonna love this and I could see where the light's hitting her with the modeling light so I know that I'm gonna get this right see how I move? Even when I use a zoom lens. I swear I'm such a mover. I'd like to move around when I take pictures. Can you do me a favor? Don't move anything except for your head. Bring your head towards me and then go down this way with it. I have no idea what this is gonna look like. We're gonna just see if it's flattering and I'm gonna try to get a little bit of light on her face here. And just like all the way down with your faith. Beautiful. Turn your head a little more toward your shoulder for me. Good. Looking down for me, gorgeous. I love it. What do you think of this? Yeah, yeah. This is really flattering for your body will look great. Thank you so much for modeling for me today. This is just a a couple of ways that you can use just one spot in a simple studio to make sure you get lots of very books. And they're all really easy. Just one light. Anybody can do it. I promise. So today, we not only learned about how to use different lighting setups, constant light. Natural light and strobes we also learned about what it's like to actually work with the model. You can see that even though my model was amazing and she has a very good idea of how her body moves, I gave her a lot of verbal instruction. This is one of the hurdles I find that most photographers have a hard time overcoming. Do not be afraid to tell your model or your client that they're blocking the light where their light is coming from or that they have to move their hair ten times that's what they're paying you for that's, what makes you worth your money? We as photographers think that taking the picture is our job, but it's not our only job. Our job is to set the pictures up properly and make sure that our clients are happy and that they look good in the pictures that were taking. So I hope that you saw how I did that today. Talking also helps ease your client or easier model, they getting good feedback from you there, knowing if they're working the right way or if they're moving the wrong way, they want that feedback anytime I start getting quiet, the first thing a client will say to me is, is this okay? My doing this right, and you saw that today. I'm brooke had one moment with an expression where she wasn't sure if I knew what I was doing, or she was doing the right thing, and I reassured her. Don't worry, I know what I'm doing. I'm going to make you look amazing. I just need a few minutes to tweak it, so just talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. Don't be afraid of it and practice your posing, communication, this arm, that arm instead of left and right, or the top arm, the bottom arm, whatever it might be. Just the more practice you get with us, the better you're going to be and it's so important. I can't wait to invite you back into the studio to seymour, what we do here soon.