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Lesson Info

Fashion Portfolios

So I want to quickly show you I've brought my portfolio with me here because often people ask me, what does your portfolio looked like and why does it look like it does on this pretty heavy so I'm gonna try and put it but in display I'm just going to sit for it quickly a standard size for the industry it's eleven by fourteen and I think it's some safe to say that a professional looking portfolio will come from when you got something leather and this cost me around five hundred pounds from a company london called brody's but there's also a company here in new york new york portfolio and what's great about this is straight away my brandon speaks out this is similar fund to what I used my business and if I present this to a client immediately think okay she's professional enough to own one of these so if you're a young photographer and starting this is worth the investment in gold it's gonna go into flick through and my starting image here is the observer magazine shoot and I've taught ou...

t the actual page off the magazine it's important to start strong because if you don't start strong automatic with the client's gonna be bored in this starts off to the rest of you work it's about the feeling that they have a plan approach I've included the tears shed because I feel it's important to show that I've seen in a magazine as well and it speaks more than having just the picture behind it so go it in it just flows into the stories so when I'm talking about the portfolio I'm talking about the flow of the consistency how everything kind of comes together the way that pictures are portrayed the people that might be in it as well so I'm gonna flick through and I have a slide show I want to go over about the importance of the port value as well but I'm just going to show you how kind of everything looks together on pages and you'll start to see the color the tone how everything kind of comes together and this is um directed more towards my new york audience my london book will have simpson it's targeting more towards the audience there which is more european it's more edgy it relies more on editorial work where is this have included things like this because it's important to show things like campaigns there's also great to put it in the mix that you've not just got your personal working there you've got a talking point to talk about with the client work too so going into more commercial work that's great for the market here again clean clean work that's great for the feed market here and then back to older work a spell so I can make a talking point of that natural light? How the natural light floes together on the pages studio what? Because if you don't include it, clients will think you don't do it. It's good to show a range of no around twenty to thirty pictures or so in your portfolio, but if you don't have enough good ones, limited it to about fifteen as well, ok, and I've ended it there because it kind of flows from this shoot, and I feel like I need to end it on some color in something fun and bright as well. And then, if I was to present this in a client's meeting, I'd have my promo cards from my agent in london back here or my business cards, so when they reach the end of the portfolio, they can pull it out and have something to keep for them as well. So now I'd like to talk with fruit portfolio, and then I'd like to give some critique to the guys in the audience as well. So the portfolio is a collection of best images and work ated to a client. Well, it can be both. It could be a collection of your best images, like my book, or you could reorganize it for a particular client, so if I go to, for example, in advertising agency, who is booked me to do something more commercial I won't go in with a book full of editorial work because it makes him think that that's all I can do I will take pages out I will reorganize it um I will do that you know, a couple of times a month if I have meetings so it's good to keep prints on hand that might be worthy for one a thing or two um it's great to have more than one bubka's well, I have one in london one in new york but I also I'm trying to get another book right now so that I have two different styles here so that while one is out with someone I can have one to myself to clients want to see printed or presented content they don't want you to walk in and show something on the internet or the laptop um I do have an ipad that he'd taken and that's really important sometimes because this could get really heavy with all those prints in the leather having that on your shoulder all day running around london is I get pretty bad back ache so the good thing is to have the option and if you are unsure about the client maybe asked him in the media maybe ask your agent or ask the client yourself, is it ok to bring an ipad or do you need to see a printed book and again, the main thing with portfolio is your work should always tell a story and show your personality. So my story is a mix of my personal work. Andi, my commission work and I have stories for each of those images as well. So it has to flow is a story maybe it's tone, maybe it's everything else going on? So the portfolio website the essential pages of the gallery about and contact. So when you're putting your portfolio website together it's important to have these three essential things. People only want to see these. Some people will come and want seymour, but clients just want to see this additional client list reviews or testimonials, service's, blawg and social media lengths so sometimes it's important to have those extra things onboard so people can see more of you they want to. So the essential features of a portfolio website simple design, intuitive navigation cons, consistent branding optimized images for fast loading. If your images load slowly, people are gonna tine off straight away. When I first had my website released, we simply there's a feat areas with flowed in and everyone was tweeting to me about it, a message of me and yeah, we got it fixed in the end, but it definitely times some people off into looking into it additional browser compatibility to mobile compatibility sometimes it's great to have the thing on ipad phone so people clients, khun sake. Okay, have you seen this person's work and pull it up quickly? They get really turned off if they can't do that. And sometimes people message me and say it doesn't work on this browser, it doesn't work on this so it's important to look into that and also upgrade your website to the latest internet features. A swell seeking catered to the new browses on all those kind of things to again, going back to my website from what I was talking about over here, you've got a simple design, the consistent brandon and my images flow is a story justus my portfolio does so when a client sees this online, they want to meet me and have something in here that matches that so it's consistent again with my my bio when they see this on my website, they want to meet me know this too. So when you meet someone it's important to know that whatever's on your web site has to be relevant to what you were about today. So it's, good to keep that updated and organization tips the quality of the covering, the portfolio, the pages in the prince, so I always go for a fine up prints. On a fine on paper that's high quality will last a long time I know that's a little bit more expensive but it's something that's gonna show again keeping it really professional you don't want to get a great cover and a great book and input cheap prints in there the flow of subject matter, color and times which is stored in here as a flick through how did they compensate so they flow into each other whether it's the headpiece she's wearing may be the girl on the next page has the same common maybe it's the color in the background or maybe it's the tones and the image or it flows from a black and white to another black and white set on the size of the portfolio and I think this it is really important a standard size it's eleven by fourteen if you want to go bigger that's great you're the one holding it and carrying it around if you want to go smaller, then that's that's fine too on change print order to cater to different clients so again changed the print order up if you have a client demand you for a job and they're different to what you usually do change your work in order to caters to them in the media so you have a talking point so it's not confusing in the meeting okay guys, I want to talk to you maybe about some critique of some of your image is there a possibility way have those ready available ok. Yeah so christina I would love to go for you I think we have one image to go free for each of you but it's just to kind of give my feedback and how I see it ok. Hey, what was your thought process behind the shoot I'd love tonight? Um well, this was kind of a moment that just sort of happened accidentally. I was directing her eyes having her hit hit put our hands behind our head and she just kind of did this thing to sort of stretching. I was like, wait a second pause for a moment and I just really tried to explore that triangular images the designer designed the which was earl selkoe designed the earrings and the uh the shirt and I was really inspired by the way her elbows and the earrings and the shirt and the shape of her body and general just all sort of had this symmetrical triangular composition. Okay, what we shall lighting technique behind this it was just one soft box and reflector on the other side and a little bit of natural light coming in through the window. Okay, I definitely love the composition here. I think the or anything just looking at immediately is just the way that the light falls under the chin it's just going so her chain ends here but she's got that gap of shadow maybe just working with the lights on maybe the light should have been slightly higher and the skin just a the bottom here just where I think she's got pearson's I would just end to the skin but I love the composition I think your choice of model is fantastic and I like the tones he's given it to that high key time well she feels too right yeah okay so tell me a little bit about this this is just a personal shoots for a friend she want a promotion on my facebook and I just really wanted to capitalize on the natural sunlight coming in it was early in the day so we have a nice low lighting coming through these cocktails and again just kind of having her explore different poses okay, yeah began the color tone is great I think the light maybe just with flight over exposure I think maybe just controlling that a little bit better and maybe playing around with perspective with a wide angle so whenever I used to shoot cornfields what I used to do a lot back home I'd always go down into the cornfields maybe shoot through perspective toe add a really interesting perspective so that's something that was a portrait for her I think that's great but I think if you were to experiment a little more a play on perspective angle how you could have got her to pose um maybe it's something reminiscent to more fashion pose kind of thing until you tell me what was your thought process and what the shoot was for this is my friend marcie jefferson she uh just got signed with st martin's press for a publisher novel and so we were doing author headshot okay this was playing around with me just wanting tto play with the light and the light and time a beautiful subject and I just wanted to play around so these are I told you that she its historical fiction this isn't appropriate for historical fiction but cover yeah, you know jacket but I liked it anyways so um so we're just just not your kind of usual thank you. No, I do alone anymore yes and family a senior and seniors in high school so just ahead she's just very willing model I just had wanted to try the back light in the when you talk about pumping up the I s o get that I immediately thought of this picture it was like that thing closure and I was using a reflector um to kind of writing up her face okay and get the light behind too so I'm what what poison did you do to the skin? I did um I used a rab loud totally rad actions okay? They're pro retouch it okay, they released although I think I think the composition is great. I think the light works really well, I would have been castle with the reflector about how it hits this highlight here. Just put it away from the face, maybe a little bit, maybe moved her towards a different direction, and I would just be careful of using blurring techniques on the skin. Um, if you want to get something that that works really well and it's quick, I would recommend, like, portrait professional me because it's still keep some of the texture and it's a quick way of processing. I know that for what you do, the retouching thing, you're not going to spend as long as I am, and we're touching, but hopefully some of the little techniques with the cloning and that kind of thing will that's good to know when I got done her actual yeah. Ok, I will keep that in mind when I said that. Okay, so what was your price is behind? This is an interesting image. Uh, for a while there, I got into a projection. You made a lot of experimenting things that I did. So we're just a friend of mine, and it was a test shoot. Basically, we shot like thirty minutes five minutes thirty thirty okay, on what the light what was that? Was it just purely from projector from the projector? I think that's a really interesting um, definitely, this is something I could see in a magazine. I'm really impressed by what I see if I love the way to position him with his head down. Was that the same emotion the way this consistency with the eyes of the girl and the guy's eyes going down as well? I love the black and white there on dh, even though you're thinking outside the box with the projector. I've done that also, and no hard as good results. But this is a fantastic image. I don't think I have a lot to to say about it. And this is another one of yours. Okay, so tell me a little bit about this. It was also in the same same month that I shot all of these is also projection and which was a friend of mine. And then another friend might be the hair makeup. So, yeah, way just did the trying different things. There was more of a the makeup artists, uh, idea she did the hair. There is a bowl, okay. Um, there are anything I would say about this is just the harshness of the light. I think it worked for the styling in the last shot, I think the way the silhouette worked, it's almost film you are. I think, for this, maybe having her from the side would have been stronger or using a softer light or a more controlled flight. I think just because you've got this shadow on the side here, maybe with the technique on the skin as well, you feel on the left side how it's kind of a shadow just down the face here may be using that technique where we add light to the skin or just control in the projection light. So it's more on her face as well. I think it's just about control and maybe using retouching techniques to tidy up the hair. Because when you have sculpted hair like that, I think it's really good to show that it's sculpted and perfected as well.