Lessons

Lesson Info

Avoiding Common Posing Mistakes

Let's make posing fearless, posing a scary really I don't know how to work with this woman and don't forget yesterday we talked about not classifying women in certain body types, so I do feel like with every woman it's like a new day I have no idea how to pose this woman I have no idea how she's going to move and I don't care if you meet her person you do appreciate console over the phone or you know that she's a belly dancer you still don't know how she's going to move until you actually started working with her so every day is a new day, so yes, it is slightly scary, but we're going to just say whatever on the boss and I can do it and she's going to do what I tell her todo, right, eh? So we're gonna look at some easy ways to fix common mistakes imposing and adds an interest to your poses to keep him up a notch and flatter all body types and we're going to look at posing flow and how to make the most of each pose you guys have opposing follow that you work with it all steak number one...

shooting from the wrong angle this is a tragedy I see over and over and over again shooting from the wrong angle, so the top photo is what I see the most often like I said it's kind of the feet growing out of the shoulder pose I see it over and over and over again look what happens it's the same I didn't even move her but if I took two steps to the left look at the difference in the pose I'm giving her a killer pose and I'm taking your crappy picture in the middle I'm taking an awesome picture of an awesome post so you could be like an awesome poser but if you don't know how we're to shoot it from what's the point so it all kind of ties together um again and then I even had her in the bottom dropped the arm and look at how much longer she even looks there than that top picture I don't see any curve in that picture yeah it's great I see some cleavage fantastic but I still see it in the bottom picture no I want to see the curve of her back I want to see her shoes I want to see how long her legs are I want to see you know her chest that top picture doesn't show me any of that except for the chest I want to see everything and so just taking a couple of stuff to the left changes everything same I mean this is one of my first boudoir photos I was so proud of it where's her body she's a ce far as I'm concerned she's even have a torso. But I see this again and again and again. This is the most common mistake, I think here's another perfect one. This girl had a sick body. I mean, she worked out for this royal heart. Remember I said, no matter how long a girl's worked out or what she's wearing, it won't matter if you don't know how to pose her. You don't know how to shoot it. This is a great outfit. Great girl. It's a pretty picture. It wasn't shot from the right angle. Look what happened when I went to the other side of her same eggs. She didn't move. I moved it. All that changed. Once you look at a couple of things, look at her waist in this picture versus her waist in that picture. Totally different, right? Look at her chest. In this picture, we have highlight on her chest and then shadow and then highlight and shadow so it's giving me ups and downs here. She really only has one boob rights not giving me the beautiful contrast that this one is giving me her chest looks so much bigger in this picture than this picture. Look at her hips so small here looks like it's a little bit manly here not right because when you look at this picture first you go it's a pretty picture I would be happy with a picture like that but this is super feminine all I did was walker on the other side of her you guys like when you're posing and you're shooting you walking around them seeing what's going on your room to do I mean I'm in a tiny tiny tiny studio and I'm still trying to see it from every angle okay mistake number two arm issues remember they are the hardest to pose so the first picture I said to amanda hey can you go against the wall and should play with your hair whatnot and she looks good except that back arms so awkward you know it looks kind of stunned and so I had her pick it up and it looks good and even like down a little bit looks good to where she's kind of like peeking out there her arms now arms air framing her face it's taking away from her body but just that weird arm sticking out it's kind of weird yeah so why would you like I know you have the arm kind of in front of her head and why would you not reverse the two so that the front arm is a little lower and the other arm comes up could she was just kind of playing with me, and I was just snapping. You could okay, so so that was mostly her choice, but it isn't a choice that you would make on a regular basis just because I look at it, I think it's really lovely like the lighting's nice, the pose is nice, but I will go she's covered up half her face. Yeah, it doesn't bother me because that she's kind of just peeking out and I think it's kind of cute how it frames the face and it's playful wouldn't be my first choice of the photos. No, probably my first choice to be where her face was showing. Yeah, but don't forget remember that other picture I showed you what? She was kind of like this. Yeah, so what if I'm thinking about an album, I might put that on one page and then a couple of these like playful pictures on the next page. So it's not about selling that one photo, it might be selling that photo along with two or three others where she's kind of just moving and they're all just different enough for me to sell her all for your three or four okay, okay, same here in his first picture, great picture, nothing wrong with it, but where's her other arm doesn't bother me as much here as it did on that other picture that I showed you because it's not like there's like a little bit of arm showing, but when I had her bring her arm around, look at what it did not only now do we see the other arm and she does not have a stomach by any means but look at how much thinner it makes her look when she's kind of just covering over that area, right? You think she looks thinner in the second picture? So this works wonderful for a girl who maybe is trying teo hide her stomach a little bit just kind of it doesn't look like she's trying to hide it that's what's so great about it a mistake number three losing the face this is a very typical picture I see of a girl laying down it's beautiful should she love it? But her face is extremely out of proportion and lost look at how gigantic her far head looks compared to the bottom half of her face where her lips it's like her far heads have her face and then there's like a little bit of face you know sometimes grows like it because you can't recognize them or whatnot, but I lost her entire chin it just it doesn't look right it doesn't look like her it's not proportioned I see it a lot all you need to do is tell a girl to raise her chin and it's uncomfortable and we'll show you today how when a girl's laying down you ask raise your chin all the way up like this it feels really awkward to her but it looks really good now I see her lips lips are super sensual why would you want to take them out of the picture you know I remember that picture I showed you in the beginning when I was shooting at in my bedroom and the girl was lying down and her nose was like you know, between her boobs there's no face but there's a nose so that makes no sense you know if you just kind of shot her from the side and I think we'll do that we'll show you that here but if you just kind of shot at a different angle got a little face and it would have been a totally different picture anonymous pictures are a different thing than not including the face when the head is in the picture so we just go back again so this is what the first one was like this is the second one it's such a better picture here's another one that I took just more of an angle on the side so I'm not gonna lose the face I don't have to shoot from above her you can shoot from the side so you don't lose the face still just as beautiful shooting from above, we used to kind of have a heart to heart about the shooting from above somewhere along the line, some photographer or photographers or whoever said hey, I have a good idea when a happier girl comes to the studio get a ladder shoot over this way and although yes, it could be a helpful tip at moments people started doing it in such a dramatic way that it's like ridiculously out of proportion I'm gonna show you this is from my my first a couple of my first shoots ok? Why is her head the same size? Is her torso that's embarrassing and she has no hands or other arm, but anyway that's not what we're talking about we're talking about is shooting from above, but I was I learned, where is she looking? I don't know, but anyway, what I was learning was if you shoot from above, it flatters every woman everybody wants to be shot from above no it's bad is another I love it, her head is so friggin gigantic I can't even take it so bad, right? We want to make sure when you shoot, you're on level with your client, so when you were asking about tall clients, I keep a step stool in my office and I will often ask a client how tall she is cause I can't gauge because I think I'm six feet tall, so I will ask, how tall are you? And somebody says five to I know I can stand there and I can shoot her, but if she's six feet tall, I know I have to get on a step stool to shoot her. I want to make sure I'm not shooting here from too far above or too far below, and I think we'll talk about that again, but, you know, like celebrities like when you see in like, like I get us weekly, I love that magazine and they all look so big, but like, their legs are stunted because somebody's taking a camera and shooting up like this it's paparazzi style and they're shooting from above and they look out of proportion because they are because of your angle, so you need to make sure that you're really hitting the right angle with the clients so that you're getting everything in proportion don't forget the camera sees things differently than our eyes d'oh here we go again with expression, expression and pose mis match, so we want to make sure that whatever our poses, the expression matches, I will often make a client laugh even in a sexy manner, but I'm doing it more so like on the bed, right that's like, really fun, huh? Or we'll go through and you'll see today like I'll do more of a sexy and then more of a laughter, but I want to see sort of which which expression looks good with what pose? So I will go through multiple expressions with the same posed because when I look at it on my computer, I might say, you know what? I like the laughter with this pose, and I like the serious with dispose um, I just want to make sure, though, that you guys know when you're putting somebody like in a very sensual suppose that they should have essential face. If you're doing something fun with a client, they shouldn't be so serious, you should be having more laughter and fun. I there's a lot of mismatch is out there. Maybe we're so concentrated on the poles we forget about the expression the face needs to be posed too, cropping in the wrong place. So, lauren, this will sort of address your question. I'm going to bring up a couple more of my awesome for a spread war photos like I don't know where is that even crops the middle row lips on and it was shot from above awesome looking abroad, her shoulders are compared to her hips she was tiny, too, man, I really messed her up owing her pinky's missing this is on my web site for like two years out of it uh strange I don't know why I like I cut off her lips her elbows I don't know awesome picture here's another one let's just go right up in there and like cut off your boobs and cut off your feet and I don't know I don't know smell your shoulder what I don't know what I told you teo it's bad it's really bad here's another one I had on my website for a long time what is that even a picture of I don't know it's like I'm focused on the middle of I don't know her knuckles or heard the lingerie or what I don't know there's nothing sexy about this picture it all I was so proud of it just cut off in a really weird place why so it has to make sense you know if you're if it gets cut off for you mess things up for you know I love I just love the expression but her pinkies out of the picture she's not going to care about that it don't do it on purpose like I didn't over editing yes jen just a question back on that you love this yeah that or even the one before like what what do you think that you we're doing then that you weren't or that you don't do now is it just not okay? I wasn't observing or maybe I was I was obsessed with one thing in the photo like she has a really beautiful face I was probably so obsessed with getting that beautiful face I was forgetting about everything else yeah right the girls all love their eyelashes so I'm gonna focus in on the eyelashes which would have been awesome had I focused in on the eyelashes but I missed the mark on that and I missed the mark on the full body so this picture sort of in the middle of nowhere it doesn't make sense it's not about her face it's not about her body what is it about this just doesn't make sense so the photos they'll have to make sense even though boudoir is sort of fantasy and they're not logical all the time they still have to make sense this photo doesn't make any sense whatsoever she probably loved it she probably bought it I was probably so proud of it, but not anymore. Yes, I have to say that I'll probably start taking more time to think during my sessions I'm doing that now, but I feel the same way like if I stop shooting or I stop moving, you know they're going to think that I don't know what I'm doing, but I can't multitask I'm not very good at it, so if I'm constantly shooting and I'm not taking any time to think about it that's that's what I'll say will cut off their feet even though I know better um so I think that's a really good tip yeah and nothing wrong with cutting off feet I take five hundred pictures in a session and I show them about a hundred so I'm sure I cuddle feet too but I would rather you do it like once out of you know this six pictures you take and go shoot I cut off her feet let me go to different that's why you need to stop and look you know take two pictures look oh garbage I shot this at the wrong angle let me just go this way you don't know unless you look and I have a lot of experience but I still look every two to three pictures at what I took unless I'm like in a mode or she's like moving and like tea you have to stop and look and I laugh myself sometimes like I never ever make my clients feel bad or feel uncomfortable but I'll look at the vicious ago oh that's bad uh supposed be my first day on the job all right let's try that again you know like I'll make a joke out of it because it's funny I myself who cares it's digital get rid of it and do it right the next time you're not going to know if you do it right if you don't see that you're doing it wrong yes, sure or like me, you don't even realize until you're editing the photos because you didn't look during the session and you can't change it and that's what I'm saying when you go men, this is such an amazing shot except her leg is this way and cut it off here if I had just seen that and I just thought about it dean, your clients are going much appreciate much more if you're like, we need to do that again because I screwed up but you looked offthe um and I want to make sure we capture that awesomeness that could be just one more time. We're gonna be like yeah and the chin so there'll even do it better the second time because you already told them they look awesome. So I kind of do the you looked awesome, but we need to do it again or men who nailed that let's do it let's move on to the next thing you know, just be honest, they're not perfect at their job. Why should you be perfect at yours? Can you quickly just walk us through how maybe you would do something different on that photo than like che knows that the matter is single? Yeah, this pose is not terrible there's basically two things I would do differently about this photo I would take it further back uh, I probably used a fifty millimeter here, and so because I feel like the first three years of my life, I never took my fifty millimeter off my camera. Um, and I was probably so I would have moved back. I would have stepped to the left of her and got in the more of the profile and what I would have done. And I'll show you how we're gonna do this when we start shooting is I would have separated her knees a little bit to create a little bit more interest there and a little more curve and her booty. And I'll show you how to do that later. It's not a gigantic difference than what's here, but it makes it yannick difference in the photo, rick from serenity boudoir. I had another photographer, teo, tell me to not show a woman's armpit ever, but I see that I find that in a lot of poses and that people do show those. Do you have an opinion? Um, yeah, I hate armpit is so if you're like, for example, if you're posing somebody against a wall like a good thing to do is if she has her arm up on the wall, just sort of turn your body, your armpit is against the wall versus like out. Like that? Because then it just looks like they're smelling the armpit. Another thing is, if a girl has long hair, always bring it forward and it kind of covers her armpits, which is nice. Um, yeah, be careful of the armpit too can't always avoid them like to say, like, you're never going to show an armpit in a picture ever is ridiculous on dh some girls have fairly nice arm pits that are not scary and you can photograph on this fine, but if they forgot to shave or it's not looking so cute under there definitely make sure that you hide it. And do you ever get stuck and renowned oppose ideas? Um, it seems to happen to us, mother photography all the time. And what are your secrets to getting out of that rut? Yeah, I d'oh, yeah, I dio and I like to read magazines. I like to go on pinterest and look for ideas, their opposing ideas there shooting with the model is always a great thing, and we're gonna talk about that tomorrow. That's partially. Why do you say stylus shoots? Because I learned poses from models um, one of the things we're going to talk about and that, you know after our break is watching how woman moves naturally because I learned a lot of great poses from my client's uh yeah we all get into rots it's totally normal it happens to me all the time and what about if when you are just actually like in the session and you go blank well you're not going to go blank anymore because I'm going to teach you about posing and so look at that second teacher proposing flo and so that's gonna help a little bit so when you draw a blank you go okay, well, I have my like fifty best pose is I'm gonna draw from cool because we all have off days too sometimes it's not even about thinking some things you just don't feel being there or you know you have something going on at home like my son might be home with a hundred three fever and I just kind of want to get out of there and I'm distracted that I know I can go to my toolbox and say ok poses I need you today let's go you know, and it is it's funny really fast. A couple of people have mention on facebook you're giving me all these tools from my tool box and I use the expression all the time because the tools that we need are most often not the ones we have in our camera bag they're the posing and the communication and the ideas. And so I have a stack opposes in my toolbox that I can count on anything.