Lessons

Lesson Info

Styled Shoot Prep Q&A

You communicate with these with everyone that you're collaborating with. Are there certain things that take necessity or priority before others like to make sure that you have this vendor to work with? Or is there one that's more important others as faras just category categorically I'm sorry. What was the question? Who is? Is there an order? Or in an order of importance of vendors that you collaborate with? No, no! If there's a baker who wants tio collaborate, worst possible situation is that we don't have anybody like nobody wants to cooperate with us. Fine, make me three or four dummy cakes and I will shoot the heck out of those cakes and I will stylized them. And who knows? Maybe I'll submit him cool forsaken phase no, cool. Yes, britney situation where you will pay a creative professional for your stylist. So our board way we are going to get into that when we get into that. Oh, um oh, tomorrow. Okay, we're going to get into that tomorrow we're gonna get into paying running into m...

y mistakes when he gets a lot of tomorrow are going down dirty so that happens tomorrow. I'll explain looking my voice started crack no, like all my mistakes and the stupid stuff that I did, but no it still to this day not still to this day from my experiences I pull this learned it's best for everybody to be a part of it and my afraid to help and there have been times and whatever I don't care I'll see if I care I say whatever's on my there was a point to a about a week we can have go as we're coming into the shoot I was having a conference call with chelsea and he just felt like something just I don't have to get into it but I felt at a distance and I felt like something wasn't right and I was like, listen, kelsi and I c c us less on it it doesn't matter to me if creative live gave you a budget and you're trying to work within that budget I'm trying to shape to the editorial if it doesn't look editorial, I will pay you the difference to have it make it look editorial because my name's on this shoot how can I come into the shoot and saying who would sew editorially get it's like won't want wait, we're going to do whatever we have to and I talked to jamie and he's like because you know, happy wife happy like he's like ok ok get thing is that's a lesson that oh well, we didn't want to make it feel like it wasn't so you just communicate so again open communication and what resulted as a byproduct of just a ceo? I'm gonna put in whatever I have to do. I think it works like that in every situation. No, but you know, if it was a big enough shoot or if you really, really, really felt like this is your idea of, like, oh, my goodness, and there was, like, a little tiny like, oh, this rental is going to cost one hundred dollars, and you're like, I know this rental is going to make a difference, and nobody wants a kitchen for it if you want to get it, but no, I don't really pay people, ok, so I was like a long answer saying, ok, michelle, shoot shot list. Is this also a shot list for weddings, for your brides and grooms? Or do you take some of these places out, depending on no, I mean, I would try, I would try to shoot, I mean, because I have so much more time on a style shoot. I can be so much more particular about focusing on the smallest of details. You know, sometimes I don't have time to go in and tuck thirty four linens underneath the thirty four tables that are in the room, I, you know, it's like this is a very extensive shot list and I tried to do at minimum at least seventy five percent of it you know, sometimes I'm not given the opportunity to shoot the paper goes on a wedding day because the bride didn't bring the imitation I email her in advance and I tell her or her wedding coordinator please bring the invitation if she doesn't bring that petition I don't shoot it so there are certain things that are out of my control and but yeah I tried to you know always too many cars always shoot the signature drink sign and stuff like that yeah I tried to yeah questions online question is go was about the locations from life by rebecca what about the location how do you shoot for the vendor of the location or do you um it depends it depends on the shoot itself so if we for instance what back to the idea yesterday we talked about in nineteen forties art deco shoot and lets him in los angeles and I find a really cool nineteen forties art deco home in like close police and I shoot there well the owner of that house of the owner of that rental property because by the mere fact that I'm shooting in his or her space they would probably want more or less not the details of the flatware but the wider photos that I'm getting for the designer so sometimes most of the time people will be having styled shoots in areas like a hotel and so the hotel is basically doing it more so for the idea of advertising for being attached to a group of vendors. So every time the photos are listed that you know hypothetically the ritz carlton we're going to get miguel was listed as the venue in which had happened it's not necessarily that they're really desire ing mohr photos because that particular venue has shot been shot ten thousand times over and that's another thing we were talking about to john during lunch tangent sorry, so sometimes brides or even photographers will get a wedding and because it's by fact that it's at a particular venue so bride will say, oh hypothetically hypothetically and if I don't think I have any but I don't know if I have a bright it ritz carlton when we're gonna get miguel this year, I'm not talking about you if a bright hypothetically has a wedding at the ritz carlton luna getting l and she says I believe that my wedding can be published that leads me to ask another question why? If a response is because I'm getting married at the ritz carlton lee and miguel, I would be putting of red flags and managing your expectations immediately because from a bloggers perspective, older established hotels as well as hotel hotel chains have been shot again and again and again and again and unless you're bringing in somebody to redesign the ballroom, that ball room has been seen again again again and again so I would think what she's challenge to me is that one she wants to be published, which I'm thinking ok, so now the bar has been raised because not only if I shot it that then you quite a few times I now need to find a different way from how I've shot it, but I also need to rethink how I could shoot that ball rooms that it doesn't look like the ballroom and unless she's changing out the carpet because every hotel has quite possibly the worst carpet you could ever possibly pick, I need to find a way to not shoot the ball room that reveals the carpet that I did by so intently all of these things I'm picking up in the back of my mind so always manage expectations because brides will come in thinking, well, I'm getting married at the hotel. Yes, but I wasn't the brides get married at the ace hotel, so if you're choosing your venue base because you think that you're going to get published, start cautioning them in advance and managing expectation because once you manager expectation you could exceed their expectations joe nesa richards has a question for real weddings do you send images toe all the vendors? Absolutely absolutely so I talked about that earlier today when we put out the gallery and email all the vendors from the day, but first asking the brights permission. Then I sent an email to all of the creative team because I try to stay away from calling them vendors or artists and evil all of them, and I let them know where they can have accessibility to the high res images that they could use for their use in print or online on the condition that the photo credit is. Listen, this jasmine death star dot com thank you for saying that again. So we have several folks asking and from j santana photo from flashes of inspiration questions about if you don't have a creative team again, have you personally ever done a stylized shoot by yourself? Um, and would you suggest doing this even if it's for blog's missions to say, a d I y blawg okay, so I'm going to talk about that tomorrow, but I ask my knee jerk reaction reaction is to say no, you can't be a one man show because I can't come in. Do you make up and hair and then make the bouquet and then stylized and shoot and then shoot the chute? And then and make it look like it all wasn't just like hodgepodge like I want to make myself become a professional. So what if, like I get to the blawg and it's like photo credit justice star standing credit, jetsons star making jasmine star here just starts like really what are you like? I only want to be a photographer. I will talk about doing a styled shoot on my own me being the impetus of it, me being responsible for it, we'll talk about the mistakes it and hear it we made because of that tomorrow. Great good question from bianca jade, do you submit the photos for publication? Personally or dude, outsource it or have it an assistant do that for you? I do it personally if there is going to be somebody representing my brand, especially in an online marketing capacity, I want it to be me I don't I knew that I know that there are photographers who worked with publicists and I it's fine either way, but from my perspective, unless that publicist was an exact carbon copy of me and that doesn't exist in the world, I even have a twin sister and I wouldn't want her representing my brand I mean let's now she's watching me like works, I'm just getting the okay, so I just feel like we're the best representations of her brand that's what I feel so if there's going to be somebody who is responding to an editor, I don't want it to be something on my behalf. I want to do it personally, so, yes, I handle, and I think to follow that the question was about do you actually edit your own images like photos? Oh, yes, we're gonna talk about the divers versus right. Ok, well, how about tomorrow? But what I will say is I do outsource the the entire edit so hypothetically tomorrow tomorrow yield gallery of three hundred fifty images let's just say three hundred fifty images of what the gallery is. Those images will have been edited by photographers edit, but the images that actually get submitted to an online blawg I will go through and edit them and photoshopped, but I do very little. I do minimal editing, we're gonna talk about how little ideal because if you have good light and you shoot it well in the can, when I'm basically doing is cleaning up and highlighting maybe dark spots in a photo or darkening edges. I kind of just like like a little like darker edges, but that's just like a personal preference it's keeping it light it's getting it's clean. Photos and editing the most are most probably going to be of the bride if I do a close up of her, I might be removing blemishes if that's the case or removing flyaway hairs but it's very minimal question from a t a r p eighty is a stylized shoot the same as a mock wedding um, it couldn't be I mean, it could be like if you're actually shooting it like you would a wedding, we're not shooting a wedding today, we're shooting a wedding reception today, so I guess in that terminology would be a mock reception dilation of the perception. So yeah, a detail question from life by rebecca regarding ice sculptures who does that go to on the creative team? Does it go to the consultant or the designer? It will go to whoever wants it they're even there might be even it would go to the cater it would go to the venue. It would go to the designer and if the floor's wanted it, I would say, go ahead, you know, in order to tell her story, the only thing I don't want to do is like you didn't create that no, you can't well, I didn't create the makeup, nor did I create the food, but I use it to tell my story so I don't want to impede my my creative team I don't want to keep my created by not allowing them to use other photos, and I know we've talked about this, um, but question again from cindy j for an amateur wanting tio, try a stylized shoot, how do you contact vendors without sounding like a starker? Especially if you don't have much photo proof? If you don't have much photo proof, I would focus on getting photo proof. It's a big investment for a lot of people to become involved with a style shoot, so if you're looking for photo proof and this is the thing, okay, so this is the thing I wanted to caution before you talk the course. I mean, I guess I didn't do that, so here we go as new ever talk over there are watching this, they may shift their attention to shooting a styled shoot when the attention should really be learned to shoot practice, had a shoot, shoot weddings, shoot weddings, and then we get so sick and tired of shooting weddings, shoot weddings, practice will on ly yield what your style is, and then by near act of doing what you're doing, that's, when you're gonna be meeting different vendors by going out and going to industry functions, that's, where you're going to be meeting people, the first style's shoot that I did was with people that I met at an industry function we had never done did a wedding together, but we all realized, hey, we're all newbies, so I wasn't going out to this established baker and being like, so can you get me down the cake? I was hitting up a girl who was at the same social climb as I wass so we're all just like, hey, there are other people who have so much more than we have what little that we have let's bound together to see if we could produce a shoot that we're proud of, and we did so that's, the advice I would be giving to the newbie is don't try to go out because you may sound desperate and you don't want to sound desperate, so get involved first with other people make friends with them proved to them that you care more about them than with the opportunities that they could provide for you and then cross that bridge when you're giving there, but that takes a lot of time that is great advice. Okay, great uh, question from rene ce brink, how do you come up with things that are fresh and original that aren't over? Done? My advice would be jd always says, I need to pause, but my question so that I look pensive before, so my answer is, um kneejerk read like more so consumed with photos so as photographers were in fotos fotos fotos fotos so it's hard to feel like you know you want to think of idea we already saw that we'll of course already thought because you're only submerging yourself in things that you find interesting, which is fine but diversify what your interests are because that's actually what responds a really cool I actually saw a style shoot okay, so in california there's a lot of mixers so apparently californians we love the party I mean literally there's an event everything a month that people can go to and so this one particular event they've diversified their event by having a competition so different creative teams could get together and stylized a shoot given a team, so the theme for this particular party was snapped crackle, pop and how did you interpret how did you interpret that? So there was like I think ten teams ten design we'll call him design firms because we're fancy up in these parts design teams came up and submitted their tables. So what did snap crackle pop look like for them? So one one designer did it where she used popcorn as the theme one designer did snap crackle pop with like a jack not jackson pollack who's who's, the guy that does the campbells cans and like the kind of pop art andy warhol so snap, crackle pop and it was like more like take on pop music pop colors you know that papa field snap crackle pop another creative team used a fireplace as a theme so closing up next to the fireplace because the snap crackle pop pop is what you hear from barbara I mean, these people really did it up the team I was kind of most impressed with is they did a snap crackle pop but they did it with a scientific so they used a beakers as little shot glasses and they used like test tubes a drink shakers I mean, yeah, come on now, right? So to me what it shows is there so much creativity if we as photographers stop limiting ourselves to simply looking at what's already been produced so I would say read more I would say surf I know it sounds terrible but surf like pop culture things I just feel like it's really cool to be reading the book center present watching the movies that are present as well as looking to old school, you know, things like reading giant ire and creating a whole shoot around that without doing like the traditional vintage look that we've all seen a thousand times before would be really cool like what about doing a modern spin on jane ira jane mayer would be written today what would that look like? That is something that you could do that would be really appealing to attract a very specific kind of a bright also look to magazines I just love that I love seeing what fashion magazines are doing I think they're kind of like the for the four runners to what's going out there I go to a conference every year called fault and it primarily focuses to fashion bloggers and I go there feeling like the dopey isthe girl ever like I was the first you're going and I texted jd the minute I arrived and I was just like, oh my god, I seriously look like I'm wearing burlap like these girls are so stylish and everybody there was wearing neon cans and guess what you thought when the minute I got home meal in pain because I had to be cool I had you know either way what I think it taught me there is that what they're doing is they're setting the trends that kind of hit the bridal scene about a year and a half later what can we do to intercept that around the six month part mark and become the leaders in our industry for setting those those standards and norms? Yes, britney had a question because you you touched on industry mixers and stuff yesterday too and we actually talked about this a dinner was how do you find those things like obviously where you lived there you said everyday occurrences like going to the grocery store, but it is number and everything california's like why might not you know, it's really probably see. So what magazines do is let the larger cities, perhaps on like a three month basis. So the not magazine, I guess it has perks to live in, to live in the metropolitan area. It does so. Los angeles, dallas, new york might anne even seattle, but these magazines will comment host parties, and so that is a certain extent, and then there's just sometimes asserts. Sometimes bloggers will have get togethers like, well, like so green wedding shoes paired up with the deejay in los angeles, and they had an event and they invited people, sometimes different venues. So a venue in los angeles entitled up, entitled with called more room on um, redesigned their venue. So they reached up to the community and they just put up a link anybody would ever done anything at mar vermont got an invite s o when they redesigned that they just wanted to have a large party and all of the industry people will kind of go to that on dh. Sometimes like for that in the event that I was talking about was done by utterly engaged, and so they have a party twice a year and that was done just independent so that happens in a lot of different it happens in a lot of different ways and sometimes it's just you hear about the parties and sometimes it's play to pay so sometimes you'll have tio paid to give to an industry party but in the beginning who cares like just go in make friends and be people and the tickets aren't expected jordan and they're probably fifteen to twenty five dollars depending but then you get drinks and you know you get to meet people it's an invested for the business and follow the people you want like create an aspiration model so if there's a you're from portland correct so if you are following, say a designer here in seattle that you really really like or a designer in portland be sure to follow them and social media because if they say oh I'm going to the top hatters event google topped headers event can I buy a ticket to top headers event like remember like the hustle like don't sit on the bench and being like where the parties get on the court and find the parties and this is coming from a girl who party's here is think I act like I get in there and like oh party I got a party when I hang up with a friend friend station that's how I roll but either way I really try to get out and meet at least two people, because I've come from the school of belief that dale carnegie has said, and I say this again and again and again, dale carnegie says he will go farther, being generally interested in two other people than trying to get two hundred people genuinely interested in you don't go to the mixer and pass on your business card like this. What can you waken you defeat this yet? Uh, go find people who are like minded don't look to the big gunners in the field because boldly hanging around, people who want to things from them hang up, the people who are marginalized hang out with people who nobody talking to because those are the people who are going to want to ally with you to create things what's wrong with me. I act like I'm about to cry, it's a throw it's a throat thing it's really drives like collaboration brings me to tears, friendship, love, unicorns basically, you're gonna want to find people who are in your current station because they're going to be just as invested in that shoot not you know, everyone. I work with some of these, I'm doing you a favor because I've been there, so we'll talk about that smart to yes, that extent like we're in a position to where we started ourselves like there's, a group in dallas specifically that gets together and they do thursday therapy and it's from everyone all over across the board and yes, the knot has come to dallas and it was fun seeing everyone there, but you'll be surprised who wants to join in wait are like don't have some bleeding or god help us, we will do a couple more questions, like maybe a few a couple laura lima from spain does it a style I shoot? Is that the same as an editorial shoot for a magazine? And is there any way to do a style issue and then sell it to a magazine? Ok, there's this fixation on selling our images people you will not get paid at all for print, you just won't. You will get paid to shoot the cover of a magazine uh ninety percent of the time, but they're paying a commercial photographer. There are magazines like destination I do that will pick a man, pick a photo from one of their submissions to feature on the magazine and you still don't get paid for that you get noticed you get the notoriety of having shot the cover of destination I do that in and of itself is a huge honor and exposure that you would have never got in otherwise so most of the time the features that are being featured with in the magazine's editorial spreads are not shot by wedding photographers there shot by commercial photographers so inside weddings and martha stewart and brides hire a commercial photographer to come shoot their table escapes maybe it needs to maybe we need to raise the bar within our community so that we can be the ones asked for that and paid for it but it's not there now the on ly time that they're taking submissions from photographers are for riel weddings and occasionally styled shoots but that is so so so so so far in view in between styled shoots are primarily a vehicle for online online bloggers that's become like a huge point of differentiation yes ashleigh or people I know we have real people today question and then if you have an idea like the story in mind would you be looking for models that are for real people that are going to fit that where you're going to rely more on the dress and the hair and makeup team to kind of make them look like ok that's going on that's a great question or those are great questions I think you asked three so I want to make sure that it gets all three I'm gonna go to the last one first I'm not depending on the models to define the look depending on the look to define the models um another one was how do we procure the models models will always be the bane of a photographer's existence, they are the hardest thing to come across. And even celeste, as the producer of the show, has a hard time finding models. Because when you could, uh, ok, it's two pronged when it what comes with working professional models, you can work with a new model who's trying to build her book, but the modeling agency doesn't really want bright, aware they may want one shoot to kind of show maybe what she's doing, but the odds of getting that are slim to none. And then you have to pay those models. And then if you decide to get those feature, you have to pay them a higher rate. Because it's technically acting as publicity for your company. So they're more dependable, but it's also so much harder and more expensive. So I yet to work with models for an agency to you could work with models from model mayhem. I did this, and I felt like it was a mistake because they were the most unreliable people. I had them flake out on the date of the shoot. Somebody had flaked out. I had to bring somebody in. I had to bring two and then okay, I was supposed to have three couples. Three guys and three girls and on the last day two of the guys didn't even show up and the third girl who was supposed to show up flaked and then one of the models like I have a friend who can come who's a model okay you just have to know that the shoot is doomed right there okay that's tomorrow's big story so I was working with three girls and one guy so then the story had to entirely changing the theme had to entirely change and it wasn't even having authorities story and it wasn't having a theme at that time anyway so now what I've just decided to do was hopefully rely on the team to find the models the best network to procure a couple is your own where is that the network that you have between your baker designer and things of that nature either a past client who wants to come back and be styled a different way because you know that you can depend on them and you could always pitch that hey you can get more wedding photos an entirely different cassidy or if you have a cousin in college who has a boyfriend or if you have a roommate or either way find dependable people in this particular situation so lest in the team we're trying to find couples here in seattle and it's hard because celeste has been trying to find models for every single class and so I really don't like to dive into my network because I don't want people to feel like I'm abusing them like I hate like tweeting I need this I need that it's just like a personal thing with me and nothing against those who do but I always feel bad if I'm like I need a model I need a model it just makes me feel bad so we got a cot we got caught under the gun and slices like jasmine, we need models and I was like, ok, so I put it on twitter and I was like, oh my gosh, I hope people don't hate me and then we got great models, we had a great great response and it was wonderful and it feels so lucky with the malls that were working with today. So as faras models go go to your network save time like model professional models are a dream to work with, you have to tell him anything because they're like, you know, I'd be like, ok, I just daniel and shoot and then with real people you have to coach up it is a better experience working with and when you pitch it to a blogger, the idea is to have a blogger posted makes it approachable for the average bride if you're looking at a girl who's like six foot seven and like one hundred pounds you like I'll never be that you know, so I like working with real girls with real curves with real blemishes and flies and you know, like that's the real girl so I prefer that okay, a question from sids for the stylized shoot where do you find the wedding dress? Do you reach out to a bridal store? Should the model already have address for the bride already? I think it works in different capacities I do think, though, when a bride brings her own dress it's not going to give the appeal because brides have already gotten married and so they're dressed but by the time they purchase their dress there wearing the dress in the again it's already technically a season old because of dividing year in advance and then by the time they actually want to bring out their dress again, it's already a season and a half old and so and sometimes their taste isn't your taste so it's always better to people if you could be in front of it by choosing what the dress is. And so if you reach out to bridal stores, they have samples they have samples may be kept in the back that have holes in the bottom or something which is not afraid to let her talk for his use or reaching out to new designers or reaching out to your designer or creative team maybe they have connections with a designer or ah bridal store or something like that, right? Thank you. And also t j maxx marshall's because you don't need to find a dress that is like, you know, big boo fontes like sometimes you want to show you just a simple white dresses like a troop neck and I would love love I love to shoot a bride who has just a simple speaking he strapped was like a cal mack and a drooped back and maybe just two simple lines silk all the way down a line and have, like, callaloo it not kelly's lewis of the valley die that's a style I would kill for because brides, you know, brides like a line I'd like to prove and that's fine, but editorial it's, like the cleaning curve, is doing something different is just so beautiful, but neither here nor there this will be the last question. Rg peter fourteen is wondering what advice would you give to teens who want tio start into the wedding photography, business and style I shoots. You know, it was an inspiration to break in uh fourteen like for like I give her photographer under protective yeah, um I think I think if you find people and your professional and you solicit trust, you'll be fine and I think that, like, britney is young and she's twenty two. But I feel like she's in a great position, because she could reach out immediately to her network and find the target, the target, target brides age and use that her friends as models. So it could be advantageous versus a photographer who might be seasoned, you know, be thirty eight, like where you gonna find, you know, like a young, blushing bride, you're not really gonna go to like your friend circle. They're probably already married, so it could be advantageous. Thie key is to act professional, and the key is to always, regardless of age, being more concerned with the person than what they could do for your business.