Lessons

Lesson Info

How to Create Wow

what makes a great photo. And I think that there are four key elements. Okay, Um, and these four key elements is one of subject. What is the subject matter? OK, to light. How is it lit? Three. Composition four. Your environment. What's the situation where you're shooting at? The stronger each of these elements, the better the image. Okay. And for me and I used Teoh submit of lot of images into competition and I and the way I would evaluate things I said, You know what? If it's if it's strong and three out of those four, then I think I've got a really strong image to submit for competition. And, you know, sometimes there's some element in one of these elements is so superior that that image can stand on its own with just one of these elements. But that's a very, very rare photo. I like to try toe like have at least three out of the four. And there that very strong. Okay, Thus subject what is the subject to me? The subject is the main idea of the photo. OK, what is your main idea? So wha...

t I say is when beauty strikes the subject. Just get out of the way and freakin take the picture. Because don't we all experience that when we have this beautiful subject that we we we get the photograph and you're looking through the camera and you're going Wow, this person is beautiful. I mean, they could do anything they could be like picking their nose right now. She looks awesome. Click, click, click. And we just feel like, oh, man, where it's such a groove. I mean, this is just like, wow, the best session ever, because that person is just so darn beautiful. Anything that we take, it looks good. Beauty is very, very compelling. Subject matter. Oh, by the way, did its anybody remember that? Power Rangers? Yeah, she's the Yellow Power Ranger bythe second Siri's. Yeah, And I did her wedding s o. That was but elite photographers know how to capture beauty, and you can simply do that. So when I when I review photos and and people have me look at their work, I look at the beauty content with it because beauty can just move a person so quickly. It is so attractive. Uh, and it has a very compelling, compelling quality to it. Well, how do we, Max? The beauty of of a subject if we agree that beauty is Wow, that's the awesome thing. How do we maximize the beauty in a subject? Any ideals? Yes, Um, probably the posing. Posing. Okay, the art of portraiture. And that's what it ISS is. The secret to making money with photography is to make people look beautiful. If you could make people look beautiful, you can make a smudge money as you want in this business. And that's what portraiture does. It ranges those elements of the human body to maximize that person's beauty. Now, what about, you know, portraiture? Do you guys ever feel stuck with opposing is like, Oh, my gosh and doing the session. I got him doing the same poses every single time. It's like, Man, I really need Teoh get on creative, live and watch download some kind of like posing thing cause it's getting really stale, right? Do we all feel that right? So when you feel stuck with their posing here, some kind of, uh, keys, emotion, change the emotion. Okay, so, uh, well, well, how you create emotion. What is emotion? First of all. So one thing about emotion is that it actually what you can do one way is to create a story. A story creates emotion, and and some people do is they look at movies and they'll kind of remember a famous scene in a movie, and then they'll try to recreate that because that kind of creates some sort of emotion. And in this particular picture, I did this session in New York with this couple and I go, Well, what is the flavor of New York? Well, first of all, I think of taxis. And then I think of these awesome buildings with ladders on the side of them. And so you know, I go, you know what? Let's go get a taxi because that's so New York. That's the New York lifestyle. Let's get a tax. Evils just drive around to some street where it looks kind of with that kind of ladders and stuff like that. So we got a taxi. Um, we drove around for a little while and then we that stop right here. And so I had, uh I kind of created this scene for them. I said, You know what? Let's kind of pretend that Ah, your fiancee. She's going on a business trip and you know, you're seeing her off to the airport. And I could see her for three months and you're saying goodbye to her. And then in the beginning, we were doing this post, and in a taxi driver he was actually hiding, but I thought he that she was kind of the texture of the feel of the mood of that. So I said, No, no, no, no, no. Come out. Come out here towards the front. And then he started looking at me. No, no, no, Don't look at me. Just look over there. Uh and then that's how I created this this picture. But it was started from off a story in my mind. And you can do that with a lot of shots. Some people are really, really good at it. I'm like, OK at it. Every once in a while might be inspired, but it's not really my my thing. But some people are really, really good at that. Another way is to, and this is what I do. A lot is I describe a feeling. Okay, now look at this picture here I am on the Great Wall of China. And do you think you know, uh, an everyday person will walk along that wall of China and the cover up and close their eyes and look over happened to put their nose to the light. I think that happens by chance. No. What? We had to arrange that. What did I say to her to get her to do that? What do you think I did? Well, I said it is like Okay, but 10 your cold and look over their enclosure rised describe the feeling you can use the same polls for different emotions and you get unlimited poses. Actually, if you look at fashion magazines, a lot of times I have This is not my fashion posing workshop, but I broke down a lot of these poses to very basic poses and what makes him different? A lot of times, it's just the emotion. For example, the one when the one posed that I did learn was what I call the walk away pose, which is Ah, you know, let's say this is a light walk away from the light head towards the light and then bam pop that hip out. So this is the only pose I knew, right? But if I change like I could do this post, you know, we can at the camera. But if I change the emotion I said, Hey, why don't you act? Ah, aloof and regal. Okay, what would you do, Right? I said, why don't you act a little bit shy and coy, right? If I said be happy? Uh huh. Right. It's like the exact same pose, but it's just you put different emotions to it, and it takes on a new life of its own. Lick it. You can use some key phrases to evoke this emotion or for glamour. Posing one is the hug. Me or kiss me feel like Oh, uh, hey, can you pretend that you want to be hugged? How would you feel like if you know Oh, man, I just I'm feeling not good today. And I want to feel loved, Right? Oh, hugged me, kissed me. You say Kiss me. What? What would you do? Put your cheek out to somebody, right? You describe the feeling and automatically it kind of evolves into itself because certain feelings evolve certain types of physical actions. And then with your posing skills, you just tweak the arm a bit. You tell him to shift their weight a bit, change hand a bit. And then you just created a masterpiece. But you allowed your subject to express themselves in it. And it's the combination of both your work together. It's something special. How about this Ravage me if I said I want that ravage me photos. What would this is like from a good friend? Jennifer Hudson? Uh And okay, she took this photo. And if you want a like okay, ravage me, right? Oh, ravage me. Take me now. You can do that without lifting both arms up, right? You can't say ravage me. Take me now. But it has to be this. So the feeling will automatically allow a person to do something for you. Okay? It automatically suggests certain kind of body movements. Here's another one. This is actually a very difficult ah feeling to describe the look at me post. It's like you're a model. Why? Okay, now? Because she's kind of ah, Hong Kong celebrity. So it was easy for her to give me this post, because isn't this like the competence Post, right? Like camera. Uh, can we get camera here, but camera, Look at me. See that confidence? Your clients sometimes will not be able to get to that point until after the session. Okay, you have to build as photographers. It's our job to build that confidence into our subjects. So by the end, they can fully express themselves. And when they can fully express themselves and then you compose them and create a masterpiece out of it, you start becoming world class. At that point, people start raving about you. People started thinking you're the best photographer there is. Why? Because you made them beautiful like they've never seen before. You broke those barriers down and you showed them the beauty that was hidden in them. As I get paid big bucks, that's the rewarding aspect of photography. And that's why I love portraiture. Because if I could see a person and I could see there, I can see a certain beauty in them that they can't. And if I could bring that out in them and show them and make them feel so good about themselves, it's like, Wow, I don't even need any money for this, but I will ask for money, but I don't need it, because that's my reward. And that is the point where we start to become world class photographers. So when we can do that All right. Okay. How do you create a, uh, emotion? This is a very, very, very important point. Your subject will mirror and reflect your positive energy. So this is where you're gonna have to have some social skills. And I've seen, you know, some photographers do this. And how would you like to be? Stand over there. Okay, Now look sexy for May. How would you feel? You know, uh, come on over here. Okay. Uh, that looks OK. Can you look a little bit cuter? That's not going to get you anywhere. Come on now. Right. But if you're positive, if you're reflecting this positive energy, this loving and encouraging energy, your clients will mere or that. Now, you know, I used to do wedding photography. And as a good wedding photographer, you're supposed to understand why people hire you. So a lot of times I would consult with the client and then they would back get back to me later, and then they say. You know what, Scott? We were thinking about it and, yes, your racer a lot higher, but we want to hire you because, you know, we just think you're gonna do an outstanding job. And then I would at that point, I would always ask all my clients. Well, what was it that you liked about my work or me? That why you're hiring me? I was just curious, right? And I would do, ah, lot of Asian weddings. That was kind of my niche. And I did a lot of Asian weddings and they would come back to me and say, You know what? Whenever I look at your wedding photos, it looks like everybody is having a great time. And for that for Asian, that's kind of important, because we just tend to be a little bit reserve and not really share our motion that much sometimes, except for me, but And so that was important to them. And I go, Wow, that's interesting that you thought I would have never thought about that. And then I thought about it a little bit more and I go You know what? That is? Me. When I come to the event. I'm always high energy. Let's have some fun. Ah, let's do this together and bam that reflects in my clients. And then I take the photo. And so who you are and what you are will show up into your work. And I see this all the time again when I review portfolios and I look at their work. Ah, lot of times I am actually looking at their personality. I could see it right in their work. It freaks out some people, but you can see it. It's there. If you have a problem showing emotion, creating positive energy, the outcome of your pictures will be emotion less okay, So now if we come to photography because we like all the technical aspects of it and we like, you know, using the seven lights and whatever. And we like the gear and we like everything, all the technical things to it. That's great. It will get you to the certain point, but it's not going to get you to a world class imagery. It's that extra emotional content that you've got to put into your photos. It's got to be your emotional content. What you are because that's going to give you your signature style. If you are not reflected in your work, your signature style is not gonna come out. Okay, So what's review? When makes strong subject matter one beauty. We maximize beauty with the art of portraiture. Emotion create emotion by telling a and described a feeling right. Remember, the subject will mirror you. All right. Great. This was an interesting photo here because, like can create drum and tension. And I was at this wedding, and I don't know what happened, but this song played and this mom gathered her kids, pulled them together, and she just started crying. I had no idea what was going through her mind, but I thought it was interesting. And so I raised my camera really high, and I took the photo. Now I had off camera flash going here off camera lighting. Now, can you imagine this photo? If I had my on camera flash and I just blasted them with my flash on their or like, I took a point and shoot camera, and I just boob took it. It would totally lose the feeling, you know, used to go see the deer drop in her eyes and the light just happened to hit the brightest point there. The light. I had the light across the room and it was going across people's bodies and structures. And that's what gave her these shadow feeling here. And it's solely set the mood of that photo. If I would have let it differently. We wouldn't even been looking at this photo because it would look stupid. But light can create drama and tension and mood. So what is good light? We'll talk a little bit busy for there's the main ah, main light. And I always like to get the main light off camera because it looks more natural that way. Ah, and there's separation or rim light. And then there's the background matching highlights global available. We're gonna talk about this for 1/2 an hour, so we're gonna move forward. Okay. Uh, good light and beauty create impact, baby. And I think that's really what you see on my website. You see a lot of beautiful people there, and the light is ah, try to perfect my lighting. It's all these photos already. See, that's my one post my walk away posts. But I shot it tighter that way, and it looks completely different. That's basically the same post, too. But she's leaning on something. Right? So you look at my you got offside. I'm even sorry that I even brought up that one post cause you now you got to go back and look at my imagery ago. Scott doesn't do anything different. That dude is a complete fraud. Okay, Like and care carry an image by itself. If you have good lighting, it can just by itself, it can carry an image. It could get set moods. Okay. Location in composition, location and composition, as they say when buying property. What location? Location? Location. Okay, this photo was taken in Times Square. Okay? Now, actually, Times Square as a little bit differently, and you can't even take this photo there because it's complete. It looks completely different now. This was taken a few years ago, but this photo, uh, it went an award, but I'm particularly proud of this photo because this is one of the first times I imagined a photo three months before I took it. So I knew I was going to be doing this workshop in New York and I thought about New York and I go, What is the I? Some of the icons in New York? Oh, Times Square. Okay, now I'm gonna take a manage that I've seen a lot of people take images at in New York. What could be different? What happens if I had the lot that the bride lying on the ground in the middle of Times Square that that could be interesting. So I had that image already my head. So when we went to Times Square to photograph this this is 10 o'clock at night. And if you've ever been to Times Square, there are thousands at thousands and thousands of people walking around at all times. This was no different. But sometimes when you have the vision in your head and you have an idea, the world works with you. And for a very, very brief moment, there was nobody around. And I said, This is it. Get down on the ground now. I I knew what I wanted to do. I figured it all out. I had one light over here. I took about four shots and then the world came crushing walking by. What happens if I didn't have that vision in my mind before I took the photo. It would have been there. Okay, so that's how important vision is. And this is what you're gonna find out. You're gonna find out the photos that you had a vision for. Those are the ones that you're gonna love. They might not necessarily be the best photos, but those are the photos that you're gonna fall in love with because that best represents your signature style. Who you are as a person. Okay, Okay. So location, location, location. Find the unique qualities of your location. Okay. Finally, you need qualities of wherever you are. What do you think this is? Venice. Italy, Right. When you save Dennis Italy, you think Oh, gondolas and whatever. So Ah, this This This couple contacted me and they wanted to do this session in Italy, and I started thinking about it. I go. You know, what if we're going to Italy to take photos were getting in a gondola, that's for sure. And so this was in my mind before I took it. But I wanted to do that, and I wanted to show the unique aspects of where I Waas, Where is this Hawaii? Right, The same thing. This photo was in my mind before I took it. Because I said, You know what? I'm going to Hawaii, and I want to kind of do something different. Oh, yeah? What happens if I, you know, get in the water and get the model in there too? And so my original idea was without this little red little reef there. But I was walking around Longs Drugs, and I saw these lays and go, Oh, man, Yeah, This is perfect. We could wrap this around her head and that will do it, but because I already had this photo in my mind, I can complete the vision by just adding that little. When I saw it, I knew it was for the photo. Great Wall of China. The good location could even mean an elevator. It doesn't matter. It doesn't have to be some stupendous place, but it must be unique. So let's review what four elements create a good photo view, subject matter, the beauty of it. Life off camera. LOL, we'll talk about that next hour composition. You gotta focus. Ah, What? You gotta create a singular focus a main idea and then all the elements around that need to support it. And then you need to show a variety of different things in your photo during that session and location. What are the unique quality is of that location? And what is the wow factor? It could even be an elevator. Right? But you have to see it. You have to tune your eyes to see it. Train your eyes constantly. Look around. Examine your virus constantly looking at light. You have to be absorbed in this sucker, man. If you want to be world class, you want to take it to the next level. It has to be your passion. You have to 24 7 live this because that's what is going to take.