Lessons

Lesson Info

Shoot: Client Interaction, Matching Ambient Light

we're back here on dh we're now in a client situation so you're not my client and we will call you handy andy what's call you andy so mr andy has come to get his headshot done and we're going to go through the shoot with him um and then we're going to review the shoot with him take a look at what we've done but before we do that mr andy has to fill out a model release so we're going to go to our model released this is this is a model release called easy release it's on that's on your iphone your ipad and uh I can literally come in here create a new model release I can I can customize it so I'm choosing my standard platt photo release I'm gonna call this creative live um that's the name of my shoot uh we are in washington um we're in the united states and and then I choose the date of the shoot and hit next and at this point I just need to fill in all the clients information so I hand hand my client this he's going to fill out all of his information isn't fill out contact information hi...

s name and he's going to go through and fill it out sign it and then once he's done signing it I can eat mice email myself a pdf of that and put it on file inside the job jacket so now I have a digital model release inside of my computer in the job folder with all the other photos so that if I ever need to use the photograph I have the release right there with it it's called easy release and it's on the itunes store yeah that way hot mind as one you know I don't know but the I like easy release I think the model release on it is fine I just took their model release and then adjust it a little bit for some things that I wanted in it and then saved my own version of it I mean it's super simple it works get the signature get a pdf it's got signature in it you can even add the photo of the person to the releases well if you'd like so if you're shooting if it's on your iphone you could take a picture of the person and add it to the release so that you actually have their mug on the model releases well so it's a really great app so it I don't even know what it cost is less than five bucks I think so fantastic out have it in your pocket so that any time you have a possible need for a model releases just right there you know carry paper with you or something like that came so he's been signing this how's that going for you ok so uh where do I put this actual signature so now we're going to do your date of birth as an adult we don't have to actually divulge how old you are and then we can choose your gender which is male and we're here ethnicity which would be caution and wait and then we hit next on then I could choose a photo of you but I don't have a photo have one over there um and then I'm uh ryan would you liketo witness so ryan no ville will witness and it's actually a good idea to have a witness that's not you because in a court of law you might actually want toe have the court believe you that this actually occurred so you're my witness so now you can see I've got all of his information here and so now we just kind of scroll down and say ok it's not signed so I click on the not sign and then you have to read that really quickly okay for consideration thing and then tap here okay and sign it all right and that's your right okay so he's just going to sign and then once he's done he'll hit done give it to the witness the witness will sign it and then you've got a legitimate model release so if you're not using if you have an ipad and iphone or something like that it's a great little out so anyway but always get a model release always and if you if you if you need to you can have two model releases one model release that allows you to do anything with the photo and on my really on my model release I specifically tell them that I can use it for any kind of advertising or whatever but I won't use it for defamatory purposes or pornographic purposes or anything like that because I'm not about to do that to somebody but otherwise I have full reign but then I have one other model release that is for someone who's a little like more private doesn't want that but it allows me to use it on ly for my own promotional purposes for me and yet I couldn't use it to sell coke or something like that you're gonna have two different model releases one for a more skittish client one for a client that or or if you're paying a model then they sure are going to give you the model release so that you can use the image because usually the parents don't necessarily come to senior session okay that you know that that's a good question so what do you do when you have a minor and you need a photo release you need the parent's signature and so um either get the parent's signature when they're meeting with you to pay you get their signature then and say this is for the shoe on such and such you can get a model release prior to a photo shoot as long as they dated for the photo shoot that would be the way to do that but you need that it's not a legal document if a minor signs it if you if you if you sent them a document they signed it and fax it back to you or scanned and sent it back that's fine as long as it's and they would have to have someone witnesses on their side the witness is important too so that there's it establishes that someone was there making sure you weren't forcing someone to sign it or whatever that makes sense so but the model release is critical because if if I can't use the images what's the point taking him so all of my weddings have model releases so if the bride and groom I can use any bride and groom because I have their model release the senior portrait always a model release so the only the only place that gets tricky is I can't show you like documentary photos of someone that I shot china side don't even speak their language lock up with an ipad and I think if you sign this they're all I don't know what you're talking about so but otherwise I wouldn't be able to use some of these senior portrait's and stuff that I was showing you it would be able to use them on creative life because I wouldn't have model release okay yeah that's exactly my question is crawling and your speaking to somebody who doesn't speak english what do you do about that great shots but I don't have a model release for then you khun using documentary purposes but not for commercial okay so do you asked people if you see them out you know if princess you're at a cool event rip off a few shots while it's happening then do you approach people and asking for a model release or do you have first or what do you do I have if if I'm shooting something I take a picture that I know is like I'm documenting in an event and I see if a little girl like doing something at a table or something and she's making a cute little doll or something I take a picture and the mom's there I can walk up to the mom afterwards and show her the picture and say I got a really beautiful photograph that my client may want to publish can I get a release from you and if she's okay with it then we can take care of it right there if and if she's like well you know I can say and I can send you a free print or you know and I can encourage them along with some kind of a monetary value to it if I really think it's a valuable image if it's not all that valuable than it's just gonna be documentary purposes and I'm in hand to the client and the client would have to deal with that issue if they wanted to publish it for some kind of commercial purpose okay thanks yeah how do you divine earning money that's it if if somehow that thing is going to be used to make money then that person needs to be paid for their image being on there or they have to have given you a release so um it's just a documentary you know it's fits in the newspaper then that's not really that's more newsworthy okay generally speaking but someone might contact you and say take that down and you'd better take it down if someone does ask you to take it down do it because you you wouldn't have any legal standing all right that's enough about model releases but I just want you to know it's really important that happens super simple and that you could take care of it really quickly and you're you're often running okay okay so now that we've come into our photo shoot we're going to I've already set this up I don't I don't ever set anything up while the client is there okay and if you're on your own set up a tripod and put it on a ten second delay and go stand in there and get the shot of yourself and use yourself as a model but if you have an assistant have the assistant standing but never set up the lights while the client is there that doesn't it doesn't again it doesn't make your client really feel comfortable about how skilled you are so the client comes in and sits down and we're going to I'm just going to do this like I would a normal client so how's going andy good good glad to see you I'm glad you're coming in how's how's business uh for this time of year but you know if we pick up in january that's seasonal uh acting really yeah ifyou're not christmas yet ah christmas shows and you're not in any christmas shows this place I would hire you for scrooge I totally would just put like a put like a dirty dirty old cap on you and yeah that'll be perfect so you were there you go tuke scrooge in a tube that's perfect I love it hey I was just talking about that strange brew oh yeah so um what are we what are we doing with these uh well I have some old school black and white head shots and it seems like all the cool kids have color one so I need a good color head shot uh okay all right um are you do you just need it for a zed card like a or do you want some horizontal tze and some verticals uh yeah like a couple of options mostly used just five ten for oh at when I show up because everything sent out electronically now for the submission right so you just need a copy with your resume stapled to it when you show up okay that's what therefore okay good perfect so understanding what therefore is important because if I'm shooting eight by tens I need to make sure allow for the crop of the eight by ten because I'm shooting an eight by twelve all right and it's also important to know if I really need to focus on turning horizontally or if I just need to be vertical right that's important so I'm going to ask those questions up front so yeah I mean theoretically you could be this way but it was all right yeah okay well folk on that but I'll grab a couple just in case you wanna put him on your website or something like that those are always nice to put a logo over here or something like that so if you would um either alternate between looking at my lens or just off my shoulder okay so just as you feel comfortable just make sure that you're so yeah like that can you turn just a little bit more towards me there you go good that's great love it okay warming up a little bit nice give me pretty serious good now slowly warm it up just start warming up the smile good they're nice very nice I love it good okay let me let me do that again so relax it just relax and if you just look down and relax and then when I tell you look up and give me serious and then we'll warm it up again okay now look up nice good now warming up good keep it good now really warming up nice good okay yeah oh I liked what I was getting it it's fine yeah okay but you notice how I'm very casual with him and I'm not telling him to move here and turn there and because he's going to naturally sit the way he looks best and I found that even with I mean he's an actor so he knows how it looks but I can guarantee you every single one of you know how you look best too because you naturally sit the way you looked you looked at yourself for years and years and years and years and you know what side you look best on and you know and you know how you're comfortable and I've never found a person who's been uncomfortable in the way I've positioned them that looks comfortable so the fact that he looks comfortable I mean that's a great shot because he's comfortable he he feels comfortable he's and and I didn't have to do much didn't do a lot of posing or anything like that to get him there okay so that's how I interact with a client right from the beginning but I'm all set up now we've got this thing fairly well lit for contrast these situations but now we want to go into a situation where let's pretend we're going to pretend you're a woman but not really so we want to soften him up and do a little bit more beauty so let's bring in the second light and we're gonna take this this octo bank here and we're gonna put it right over here so that now we're gonna fill in that extra shadow that we've been getting here and we're going to really soften it up a tte the same time um let me let me go this would you grab my eighty five millimeter lens so thank you so what's happening here you notice this is quite a ways away and it's going to be a far less power far less power than that's going to be so we've got our strong light here which is creating the shape on the face and then this light's going to fill in the shadows um but the reason we're changing lenses here is because the longer the lens the softer the lady's gonna look now this is not a lady but we get more pleasing soft photos out of a longer lens so now I'm going long so any time I want to soften someone up and make him looks you know prettier and then I'm going to go for a longer lens if I go wide I start to create distortions and people look a little bit more riel all right so we're gonna we're gonna start this again but now watch while we get when we photograph him with a long lens and when we photograph him with the extra light so take a look at this watch the screen and here we go for a better so we get a softer look and now I can see we're a little bit it's not it's not on here we go go yeah here we go now we're going to get a little bit more did you blink we're gonna find out if I was faster than you or not see that so we soften it up and now there's still shadow but it's very slight we've got that that backlight is still lighting him and we can turn that down so that we don't get quite as much on the nose and we'll just get a little bit of that light coming forward but that's a that's a really nice shot minus that nose see how the nose really stands out once we turn that down then when we shoot the nose isn't going to stand out as much it'll be much softer okay but I'll also look at the fact that the the long lens has now made the background a little softer and has made him a little softer and it's kind of compressed everything and also pay attention to people's noses long noses long lens right because if you have some one of the long knows the way to compress that is by using a longer lens okay so just keep that in mind but that's that's a great shot like that I'll make sure we send you so um so we're just going to keep shooting here um have you stand up behind that chair now watch what happens when he stands all the assistance need to come in and do something to light what they need to do the lights the lights have to go up to be the same is where they were on him so he's got to come up a little bit and I'm gonna move this chair forward and then if I could just get you to kind of uh just kind of lounge right there but I'm not actually photographing him with the chair I'm still going to photograph him but what I'm accomplishing is is I'm giving him another casual way toe look so that he has something to do with his hands and his feet and his arms and whatever so that I can come in and photograph him looking nice and casual and relaxed and I'm still doing a head shot but I've given him a you know a lot of what I'm doing when I'm shooting someone on trying to keep them relaxed is I'm I'm distracting them from the the issues of do I look good I distract him by making him do other things you know stand up here do this do that and then they've forgotten about the fact that they're uncomfortable right and so now they've got this needs to come in a little bit it's a little too far away from him now see I just increased the power by bringing in the light turn that way turn your whole body now look at me there you go yeah bring that chin down a little bit not that much there you go good way to go so now that we've shot all the images from this we're going to we're going to try something different and now we're going to try and match light okay so we we've just been working on a studio light situation where we control the light but what do you do when you come in to a place where you have other light sources that air competing with you so let's we're going to use this window is our light source so you're actually going to be up on this and let's put you let's move the hold on let's let's move it over there you go and you're going to just be right here at this window sill so I need that ladder so that I can be up because I don't like it it's cool to do the gangster shoot up on people thing but they don't look all that great so it's a good idea to be up at the same level as the person you're shooting so I'm gonna be up here shooting down right so it looks like he's just standing yeah so that's what we're gonna do but notice what we've got here is we've got light coming from here and that's really beautiful light I like the light so what we're gonna do the first thing that we do and we walk into a lighting situation where we actually have ambient light as we turn the flash off I walk into a lighting situation I'm going to do a guesstimate so I'm going to say okay probably if I do about four hundred I s o at three five let's see what we get here it comes through that okay so that was a pretty good guesstimate now you'll notice that it have you ever noticed that it the image comes into your light room and it's all bright and looks perfect like it did on the camera and then it goes boom and it looks crappy okay we're going to solve that next set in next hour you know on the fourth segment so when we come back from break we're going to solve that okay that's that's your welcome so we will solve that issue for you'll no longer have that problem but what happens is it's looking like room is looking at the j peg that your camera created and then as soon as it gets in the light room it's reading the raw and it's replacing the j peg with the raw and the raw has more latitude so it looks different than the j peg okay so we will we'll solve that came but what's important to notice here is that we have all this detail look at that if you if you get right in here on that history graham you'll see that that history I'm goes up and then it drops back down so we've got the details so if I hit the uh jakey here to see what we're over exposing on going to the develop module at the j key nothing we're not expo for exposing anything but you see that build up right there and right before the edge of the history of giggles and drops down so it's not over exposing anything we're not blowing out those highlights seat you can actually see the the uh the like the metal chicken wire inside of those windows up in here so got absolute full detail but if we go any brighter we lose all that information so we want to keep that information but notice I want toby is hot as possible I want to be is bright as I possibly can be and protect the highlight and that's my ultimate exposure that's what I wanted to so I walk into any given situation I made immediately make a guesstimate if my guesstimate is correct like this perfect I love it that's what I want the window to look like but now I don't wanna have to do any kind of tricky photoshopped to bring him back up so what do I do several options the first easiest option where's are not the phone cord grab the silver the first easiest option is just to grab a silver reflector and get the light that's coming from the window and push it back onto him so just by bring it you can go in quite a bit there you go so you khun that's good so now watch him brighten up sally's brighter now then he was before so let's go back and forth so there's before fairly dark and now he's a little bit brighter we've brighten them up a little bit still not perfect but if that sun were out a little bit more we might get a little bit more reflection from that and the closer he could get the more brightness would get out of it but clearly we're not getting what we need out of reflector so now it's time to bring in this let's bring in this soft box here turn that one off and lets on ly have the octo bank on turn all the other ones off so we're just going to go one light uh ryan do it from here um so we want we want to just fill in the place that's deficient right doesn't have enough light just fill it in what we want to hide her hand though right okay so we're gonna hide her hand so here we go again you got that on are all the other lights off yes okay all right so we're gonna find out what that set out perfect love it whoa oh too bright cannot remember I'm at four hundred eso that was a far cry from our two are fifty that we were at before so that light needs to be brought down at least four stops if not more good good all right good okay so now watch what's happened we've reversed the lighting and now our strong light is coming forward and are weak light is behind and we don't want that way we generally want the strongest light coming from behind and filling the front cause you want the front of your subject to be darker than the back of your subject they call it short lighting heard of that so I always want my strongest light behind so what are we out there just just actually just go watch this turn it that way turn it turn it turn it they're jared check those einstein's I think they might be on still back ones oh I don't think they're no I thought I saw it go off sorry yeah okay so now what we're doing is we're actually just bouncing in under that wall right and we'll take the shot again okay look here perfect and it's still bright so there you go that's good so but you see the problem of of of matching a light if your four hundred eso you you have a problem matching the light now I could if I wanted to increase that light in comparison I can then take the shutter speeds at one sixty all I have to do is slow the shutter speed down so I'm going to go to one hundred and now that light is going to be brighter as a result of the ambient exposure but this will stay the same because the flash is just a short duration and only exists for like that so it doesn't matter what your shutter speed shutter speed has no effect on the flash except that it needs to be in the sink speed right so what we're going to do now is I'm gonna take the I s o down the same amount that I brought the shutter speed down so now I'm getting the same amount of light from there but I am getting last light from their cause I took the I s o down let's try this again see now we're getting watch this we're going to get mawr in gamut now we're a little even a little more even if you could just turn that mohr away from him you go and we'll try one more time ready and go okay so now so now I still have that in the right exposure and now he's getting now he's dark enough that we can start playing with it all right so now you can take the exposure up one stop and we'll be fine but you notice that when we go here we have if you go up to his nose see that crest that's happening there that crest is important we want that light coming by creating a little crest on his nose which separates it from his cheek right and it creates that shape because the strong light is coming from behind not in front wait did you turn that up and turn it this way okay so it's still all right all right here we go now I think we're gonna be good good excellent do a favor and just lean against the back of the like with your back lean against it so turned towards me and then just kind of put both hands in your pockets or whatever feels comfortable to you there you go come up nice good look off this way so what we've done then essentially is matched our light we've come in the first thing that we do when we have an ambient situation is we photograph with no flash and figure out what the exposure is for that once we have that ambien exposure then we have to fill out where the deficiencies are and phylum in with extra light okay and and the key to a moving efficiently through a photo shoot is to make sure that you're using no more lights than necessary usually one light will do it one light with a soft box on it indoors like this will do it and when the client does what he's doing right now then you get the camera back up and you shoot again right so um always search for the ambient light first if there's going to be some once you've got that then you need to match a flash to then ambient light and if you can kate limited to one flash or none and just a reflektor that's the way you want to start okay so I know a lot of this is very basic and that's great because we start with a foundation of lighting now we've talked a lot about this morning we talked about soft boxes and power and exposure and bringing half the distance and twice the distance and all that kind of stuff so light we've talked a lot about light tomorrow when we go into photo shoot now we're going to be doing some tricky things we're going to try and reproduce soft boxes and things like that with little tiny flashes that air that big cannon speed lights okay but we're going to actually be able to reproduce soft boxes with no soft boxes okay so our goal tomorrow then is to ramp it up and do something a little more complicated with some very small lights out on location and of course we'll probably be in here because it'll be raining but we'll pretend we're on location and we will have a fake son in here with a to k light and we're going to we're going to pretend we're on location and we're going to do some of the stuff that we've done here with very big lights with little tiny lights that are super lightweight easy to carry and it's like I will literally walk around with a camera on my hip and to light sticks to cannon lights on him and it's just me me and the client walking around no assistant put this light here put this light here get the client to stand where I wanted to stand and shoot and then we can just go okay let's move and that's it that's the whole studio and we're going to take it up to five so you can literally my bags some thirteen pounds I have five lights stands and all that thirteen pounds so it's very easy to carry and very easy to do but anyway we'll talk about that tomorrow we'll get a little bit more tricky and complicated and do some fancy footwork and interesting radio transmissions and stuff those they're amazing but now what we want to do is we want to move into the process of working with the client so we'll actually take decline over and we'll talk in light room so a lot of people have to go out to like they use other programs to review their images and and I don't remember the name of those programs but they'll take their images and go to a different program and then reviewing with the client I review everything inside of light room why time I don't want to have to spend the time and effort to get to some other program to review them and then on lee and I have to come backto light room to work on those images again so I'm gonna review my images in light room with the client on location where we were shooting and then I'll be able to start adjusting him but the other thing that we have to talk about and that this is what we're going to talk about it at the first of next break is calibration and calibration is what's going to solve the problem of that little photo turning from beautiful toe weird and ugly inside of light room okay so we're going to fix that and the way we're going to do it is by starting right now the first thing that we need is this this is called a color checker passport so um can I get you to hold this for me just go stand where you stand right where you were so this is going to tell us all about the colors that exist in this space so when I photographed this color check her passport that's it that's all I need to do with that I've got my information now about all of these lights this is what a color check her passport where's my you know let's focus in on that so that's a color check her passport it's made by ex right they make all the monitor calibration equipment things like that um so I'll photograph this and that way I know exactly in this particular shoot what the light source looks like what the color of the light is so I can nail it dead on accurate I can also use this to do a general calibration on my camera so that all of the weird little nuances of colors that are on my chips specifically could be wiped away so that every time I use my camera I'm getting the most accurate color I can okay so that's the first thing is that we want some information about what our cameras getting within a given light source the second thing that we want to dio is we want to turn our camera I'm gonna let the camera see this so we want to turn our camera go onto the menu and we're going to go to um oh in this we do go to the q and I'm gonna choose what I'm shooting and I want to shoot a raw plus a large fine j peg that's it that's what I need right now is all raw and a large ape and going to the card two images same image when I shoot it right so I'm gonna shoot one shot here so I've got a raw and a j peg on this camera card right now and both of them should be going over to our computer right now so I'll have two versions the j peg and the raw which image is being shown on the back of the camera j peg that's a jpeg and then the raw is what we see changing constantly inside of our computer so what we'll do is after after break we'll go in and use that color check her passport that we shot and we'll use this raw and j peg to compare and we will calibrate our camera to our computer and to light room so that every time an image comes in from your camera in delight room if you liked it on the screen you're gonna like it in there okay that's important because you constantly everybody has that issue right everybody shoots and they like oh that looks awesome and then goes to light room and it looks crappy and they think I shouldn't shoot ross no they just don't understand how to use the calibration to make sure that the raw is looking like the j peg okay the only time you need to take a picture of the color checkers when the lighting has changed significantly enough to change the color of the light because the color checkers just giving us a color of light change situation that's what is it's measuring color of light and so if if I moved the flash so that it's barreling off a different wall and that wall might have different color balances to it then yes but if I'm just moving the lights around not really necessary I just it's a light source that you have to concern yourself with if I go outside absolutely that would be a good time to take a picture of it and it's so small it could just fit in your pocket and so your assistant can have it in this pocket and just all your assistant has to do is just grab the color checker and while you're shooting just go and then you're you're good now there's a question though that needs to be answered and that is efficiency wise and you know I'm interested in efficiency but efficiency wise is it better toe work in post a little bit to tweak something if it's off or is it better to completely interrupt a shoot like for instance if I'm photographing the perfect moment at a wedding between a bride and her father would it make sense is it worth the efficiency in post for my client or for my assistant to run in and go during the perfect moment at a wedding where the bride and the father are like crying together something absolutely not there is no value to that I will fix it in post I will deal with it and post if there's any color issues at all which they probably won't be because I'll calibrate the camera for general lighting conditions anyway it's it's when you have a photo shoot where the lighting is controlled and you have the ability to do that without interrupting the flow that's when you do this but there's too many people that depend so heavily on this kind of stuff that they will literally interrupt important things to do it and that's not a good idea efficiency can only go so far and at one point you have to be willing to sacrifice a little efficiency and post in orderto to shoot in a way that doesn't interrupt the flow of the photo shoot a question from fashion tv in singapore how would you balance ambient light with flash if it was a night scene how would you handle the light still so I assume we're talking about like lights you know like city lights and streetlights and things like that if that's the case the first thing I do is I take a picture with the camera no flashes I just get a ambient picture and I just look for how how long do I have to keep the shutter open or what I s o do I have to go to in order to get the amount of light spilling off the bridge lamps or the whatevers and once I have that and I got the shimmer off the lake or I've got the the skyline lit up the way I want it then I will bring in and add the photograph in fact that's a it's a I have a photo that I can show you right here where we did just that so um I was in china and we were doing some portrait ce and I'm going to show you a set of portrait ce right on the waterfront this one so that is one flash one cannon artie six hundred flash and burning in the ambience that's it that's all it is not complicated at all know assistant needed all I had to do was I walked up that the family's not even involved I walk up I take a picture of the skyline and it was I think it's like sixteen hundred eso let's see let's see exactly what our settings are um so we're gonna go the meta data down here and this is sixteen hundred eso flash fire and I'm at one twenty fifth of a second at five five five because I need the different people to be in focus okay so at five gives me enough of a depth of field to get the little kid on the right and focus and the dad on the left and focus so it's just barely enough but it's enough and that's all I want the one twenty fifth is that sixteen hundred s o at one twenty fifth I can get the buildings to burn in I'm a one twenty fifth because I don't want a lot of camera shake and now I have to add the flash without the flash their dark but because I can take the flash and move it off to the right and nice and high it doesn't look like it's a flash it looks like it's some you know stray light and you'll also notice that I put the light on the right hand side not on the left hand side but on the right hand side because that's where the light is coming from from the waning son the waiting son see how this side of the building is light on that side of dark so that means that this side of the face should be light and that should sight should be dark so I'm trying to match the light that currently exists so that I hide my hand as much as possible now can we all agree yeah it's flashed okay yeah it's flashed but it looks more natural because the light is coming from the proper direction and it's matching the direction of the light back here