Lessons

Lesson Info

Image Review 2

One of the things I was talking about as far as challenges for me and the things that a lot of you were asking me is okay so I'm not working with professional models that know how to pose how do you pose yes the two people that I work with for the nineteen fifty shoot yesterday they were beautiful but they would notice how awkward they were because first of all they had never both of them had very minimal experience in modeling but they never pose with someone of the opposite gender plus she was a minor and it's like you boys she didn't even want to put her hands on his shoulders so this is a situation that you might encounter if you're photographing somebody and you have to find a way to get them comfortable s o it was the same thing plus they knew they were live on tv in front of, you know thousands of people so it may be even worse so the things that I would normally dio is you have a conversation with them and and when they're not on camera you have them hug and make physical conta...

ct and tell them you know, give them tips and just make them relax shrugged their shoulders was a little more challenging, but I still think I was able to get some really great images out of it and so I'm going to kind of walk you through the images that I shot, why I shot them, I don't know, I'm just going over this again in case they don't know if this got cut. Uh, this is a kite image that I showed yesterday. I've only just going to show you one image real quick. We shot natural light, so it was an aperture priority. I was shooting around two point. Oh, to two point eight um, this was an eighty five millimeter lens. And so we placed the kites and that's what most of the trouble was trying to get this kite? Just that it would frame her. I didn't want it cutting into her head. I didn't want pieces hanging out the different corners. So I think it's really nice to have a lot of leading lines, really, just surrounding her bringing your eye into her expression. So for me, uh, that is something that's really elegant and it's different and it be pretty, you know, quick and easy. Shoot if you already have the kite so you could actually kind of build up thes props that you have to allow somebody to have a post wedding or pre wedding bridal sesh. All right so I'm gonna take you through the shots real quick I am showing you a whole bunch of different images I would actually show or deliver fewer wide show them more but they would actually deliver fewer typically because I want to show you the variety of things that I shot so this is the ring shot that I was telling you about I'm shooting an eighty five millimeter one point four over his shoulder just focusing on the ring and then having her face is a suggestion in the background just a tip always close the eyes it looked really weird without a focus eyes staring at you I have a lot of those pictures so I always get this shot and so that's why I put it in here this is one of these shots it's on my posing up for ipad and iphone on guy always reference it it's kind of easy go to all right so I shot these as j pangs because I wanted them to kind of tether quickly seeks could see but apparently it still don't even tether fully the reason I mentioned that is typically I'll shoot raw and then I will convert to black and white either in light room oren photocopies in the black of my conversion so these are maybe a few things off a couple of things I wanted to mention I'm looking for the fact you can kind of feel a moment I don't want I definitely will still shoot an engagement session them looking at each other and smiling and looking at the camera, but I'm focusing on storytelling, so here I believe I was using the fifty one for and I got a really, really close so I could have the car in the background. A lot of people are always worried about backgrounds blowing out it all depends on whether it's distracting or not this background is blown up. It is lighter what's up alone out here and still have some detail, but for me, it's just setting that kind of late mood, they have the dramatic pose, but I think I think it really adds to it focusing on the hands that those aren't women tend to do klaus or kind of hold on too hard. I think that it's a nice moment, a couple of different versions I have her there came the background out of focus that's always a go to shot I have for an engagement session because it's her thinking about him and vice versa. So again, this is going to be kind of fifty one for focus on her, I'm going to put thes they're already on facebook. If you wanna check them out on facebook, I'll be putting all the images that I've shot from the sessions facebook dot com for slash lyndsey, other photography but I will be putting them on my block with the except at us. If you want to know the exact lines, it was shot and the aperture, it will be on there, so I don't have to kind of go over it to specifically now. Uh, so I went in the car, the reason that carly is awesome and if you know somebody with an old car it's great for shooting a whole bunch of different sessions, it's because it's blocked off overhead and then it's directional light it's either coming in from the windows or from the front. So here you have her looking over again shooting a really narrow down the field like a fifty one point four, maybe at two point oh, I have another shot of the rings you have storytelling when I'm doing storytelling, it's ok to not have their face and every single one or not have their face focused on every single one because really, the two you know, the shots of them just looking at each other or looking at you smiling need one or two good ones of those, but you can put it together in an album or in a wall cluster or as a slide show to tell a story um, this is shooting in from outside and I used the edges of the car to frame them if you weren't telling a story if this was a standalone image, you can probably guess it's a car but for me I don't think it works as well stand alone, but it does work well as part of a story looking into the car again more storytelling told you we should I just want to show you a whole bunch of different angles that I shot to let you know and that I don't know fifteen, twenty minutes I'm not sure how long I shot on the varieties you can get so you need a shot of each of them individually, so I have the shot there of him thiss was john point out he's like look at the reflection in the steering wheel s so it's over the shoulder have their heads together and focus on that I will tell you one of the major things that I do in photo shop is I focused the viewer's eye or in light room because what happens is your eye tends to go towards the edges of the photograph is there a lighter when you go to the area of highest contrast and so in this photograph originally I get kept getting pulled up towards the wait in the top and then had a highlight on the pants and my eyes kept getting pulled away from the center there so in late room or photo shop I darkened down the edges and then increase the contrast on the center because that's what brings my I n it's such a small piece that you need to worry about those things direct the viewer's eye where it should belong okay, I'm looking at again um this was shot with the twelve to twenty four inside the car and most people think, you know, I went through the lenses that I use I said I used a fifty one four years maybe five one four, twenty four, seventy, seventy, two hundred one fifty macro I didn't mention the twelve to twenty four because it's not something I usually use, but I always haven't my kid because I could create a shot like this and it's cool it's graphic it has nice negative space if they weren't awkward slash not dating an underage I would've had them kissing their or something like that that would be the story that it was telling I mean a shot of her alone and I'm focusing on framing a lot of time's important people do the head shots but if I can incorporate all those things I learned from photography whether was nature or travel the frame within the frame framing subjects it makes for a better image and then also shot there look how beautiful light is if you watched yesterday I told you why the light was so beautiful it's not just because it's direct directional right behind me was a large neutral wall which was hit with sunlight which means it's a wall sized reflector which is why it's so even in glowing on her faith uh more shots so this time it's him thinking about her you can tell this is when she starts getting more comfortable that's about how long because you can see that she's more naturally posing and she's looking back at him and smiling without me making her do it um so that's usually what I do a lot of times and shoot I'll do the really easy shots I know I'm not really going to use in the beginning just to get them comfortable something that gives them confidence really easy posing not a lot of storytelling minimal interaction just so they feel more confident um and so again this is getting towards the end so now they're actually interacting I'm shooting so that I have the car telling part of the story the background behind them is blown out does it bother you guys no it doesn't bother me them so I'm still looking at them and for me it's kind of putting a halo around them and more interactions looking at each other with the car um and then this is the shot that I believe with robin that I could cheat and then I went ahead and shot slightly differently so that I could have the car is a leading line up to them so and I'd probably have them kissing or something nuzzling probably a little more sensual on a shot like this, but I think it captures, like your kind of peeking up from a low angle around the car to capture their moment. So those are the images I have from the engagement sessions. Were there any questions that anybody had online? Who did see yesterday? If you didn't see yesterday should probably catch x, I'm sure answered a lot of those questions, but any technical questions or anything just related to that engagement you well, it's funny that we had talked about the models, you know, you're saying that they felt awkward, but katy b says I thought the models said great, not that awkward, but that's what? You were able to get it, I know, I know they were mean, they like, you know, I mean, if I die in the end, they were fine, yeah, but that's, my my, my comment to you is a photographer's that you are able tio work with an awkward couple to get those exact example, if you watch the very first shots when we're in the doorway and I'm like, okay, but your lips a little closer together because they were like this, I'm like, okay, just don't put your arm up in him and you think um but, yeah, great! I'm glad that it shows through well in the images and that's and that's what your job is and this is why a big part of photography is in the editing because you can shoot a ton of images that art good a cz long as the ones you edit and select our okay, wait, you have a couple questions? Alright way have a question um, the name just this photo, so I'm not sure who asked this, but the question is, when you shoot these themes session that require props and rentals and special buying for regular clients, not commercial clients, how do you quote them? How did they know what to expect in production expenses? How do you calculate how to charge that them? Definitely so up front how I've handled it is I have my normal fees and I actually how I handled it, I didn't have a sitting feet because it's sitting feed me, I felt like it made it feel like you'd cover everything for that sitting and it's the prices were going toe very drastically, so I chose not to do it sitting phoebus, I felt like that gave a false expectation of this sitting feet covers every cost this sitting and that wasn't true uh, what I had as I had a minimum purchase feet, so I would just say your minimum purchase, you have to spend whether it's eight hundred dollars where's, twelve hundred dollars for the session and then everything I would just quote them what it wass on, and I let them know usually what I did do is include the hair and makeup if they so choose, but everything after that was okay, if you need the dress, I could get it for you would be this cost or you khun source it yourself, and I do have access to a vintage car, they actually lend it to us for free or, you know, what would be nice if you just give them a tip of, you know, thirty to fifty dollars, something like that? So, yeah, I kept it without a sitting fi, I gave them the minimum purchase, and then I would have that include hair and makeup in it so that they didn't basically what would happen is if they're trying to be cheap and not good hair makeup well, that's wouldn't have been a shoot that I wanted, so I try to just get that out of the way. So it's already included so a clarification because we talked about this yesterday when you were shooting, but for those people who might not have been there, um, all those images were in black and white and the question a question from komo photo are all of these black and white because of the theme that you're doing? And what if your client one of them in color, would you change them? So the reason I shot black and white yesterday the shot in j peg black and white because I wanted to have the audience be able to see what I was thinking. I was thinking I would do high contrast black and white that's how I was envisioning this, you it's an old time shoot that's what I was feeling, but I always shoe in raw and then convert later to black and white so I can always change your mind and a lot of time clients will do mix black and white in color and that's that's fine as well, so I don't ever shoot j peg and black and white ever sometimes I will switches to black and white on the back of the camera so they can see, you know, I'll show them like, look, this is what I'm thinking is what I'm feeling to get people excited, especially when there's something that I know we'll work really well as a high contrast black and white and I I personally think for sales if you're capturing emotion. And you get an image of black and white and show them the back of camera. People kind of melt, so I'm keeping that in mind as well. I'm showing them the vision, and people connect with that emotion even more when it's in black and white.