Lessons

Lesson Info

Posing a Mature Woman

Now I want to switch gears a bit and we're I'm going to show you that you know that not all of our subjects are you know, what, twenty two years old and little models, right? Sometimes we're working with women that are like my age and it takes a great deal of skill to photograph someone my age and do it effectively because we don't have I mean let's face it gravity kind of takes a hold of us and we're not you know, we don't have you know, our skin kind of starts going down and girls kind of sag a little bit and let's face it it's just not a good look anymore, but I want to show you there are some beautiful things that you can do my favorite woman type to work with I mean, I would rather work with mature women that are my age any day of the week, then the young ones because it doesn't it's easier to make t make that look good, then it just to make me look good because I'm just, you know, because I do have those flaws and, you know, that's the way it is, so I love love love working and e...

mpowering women I think that's one of my favorite things about photography in general, so we're going to be working with a net now come your precious oh, you look gorgeous. Oh, thank you. I told you I'm always trying to flash people. I'm not kidding, you know me, I'm such an exhibitionist. Okay, now the next question I have for you a net is are you a professional model? Okay? You're not and, you know, I totally understand that, you know, I think I'm going to get you to sit down, but what I want is hey, dad, can we just I want to get is the couch right here. Um and I think let's see, I think I'm going to start right here on the black wall just for fun. And I just want to use it for a sit on the edge of it. So she's not going to sit on the whole couch right about there. That's. Good. Just right about here, love. Let me see how this is gonna work for her. Okay? All right. Q t come right here, baby. And I'm going to start by just having her sit on the edge of the couch right here. You're going to park your dukes right between that thing right here. Now, why am I gonna have her down here and what is my camera angle going to be? Why is my camera angle going to be a higher camera angle? Why is it more flattering? That's right remember those camera guys you do not photograph me from under here ate a good look okay no higher camera angle is going to be a phenomenal way to photograph us so let's see we've got okay I don't think we need you to have the mike right now let's take that let me see how that looks for you. Excellent oh this oh, look atyou girlfriend you are so got it going on I love it already and oh my goodness do I like your jewelry? Holy cow I'm telling you if that just happens to get lost today you know it's not me okay let's do we got here? I'm gonna get upon my ladder oh she's looking great already and I'm going to show you a couple of different types of lighting patterns that we can work with with annette I love love love the soft light on her is really important why would I want to use a large light source on her and not a small white source? Why michael what was that just helps helps soften the light especially for if you have textures on the skin that you want to go remove right that's right you see on mature skin flat light is flattering flat, lightest flattering so it's not that we can't ever use well it's not that we don't want that we always want shadows on the face there are sometimes when we we are willing tio go they forego the shadows because we're the flat light is a little bit more flattering but on a net look at that beautiful shadow on that cheek now I'm going to show you a couple of different things and that turn your face a tiny bit this way missy right there and with your chin oh and your shoulder right here lean towards me beautiful chin up a little bit lovely darling what's your boyfriend's name I forget gorgeous bring your chin towards me a little bit beautiful all that oh is she hot or what? How's my exposure I need a lower my exposure just a little bit here perfect you know hanging on to change my iast because I don't need to have it this high I s oh here we go nice love it oh beautiful that's much better let's see how she's looking now oh yeah she looks great okay now what I want you to do is uncle john I want you to turn move that light around that way because I want you to see what happens as we move that light around her hang on stay right there and annette look at me right here cannot hang on right there stop right there, john okay, now come back this way just a little bit. Is this better or worse? It's not good right? Why because as that light moves around the side of her face what happens? It causes the light teo the light doesn't fill in on the cracks we have as we get older and those those crow's feet and that character lines so we want to bring that light back around this way but not all the way because we still want that bit of a shadow on the face but we want a nice soft light so come this way just a little bit more hunt beautiful beautiful a tad more love it oh she looked gorgeous annette turn your face is where a little bit us that way a little bit perfect ah that's gorgeous I'll tell you right now you are adorable this is going on your facebook page I can tell you right now awesome beautiful with your chest lean towards me love it darling see how we want to stretch that neck just a little bit you are one hot woman I'm loving this turn your feet that way a little bit more with your shoulders lovett awesome and not such a big smile nice tall with your back though it's real important keep your back tall don't I feel like your mom nice you're doing great. Let me see what looks like a net for you to stand up for a second and I want you to turn your feet that oh you know what I want you to do here you go scooter pie I want you to sit with your feet up in the couch and turn this way with your feet you know and you're going to sit on the be careful no fallen down oh this is gonna work on like this already okay right about there and now annette I want you to bend this elbow in you're gonna lean into the couch right here we'll look at her hey uncle john lower that light for me and I want you to bring it around and bring it on the front of her face on the other side sammy can I ask a question yes so you were talking about not lighting from the side for a woman who is older than those young women who have perfect skin what about men I feel like with men sometimes those lines you know give character and that is that the rules don't apply to men you can't I mean there are a lot of men who are very fussy about their skin and still want that flatter light but men can get away with it more than us girls you know let's face it that's you know that's just the way it is I mean there is a double oh I love this let me see your face turn your face towards me a little bit darling excellent and when should tilt your head this way and roll your shoulder back this way just a little bit and now lean towards me with your chin turn your face more lean towards me with your chin good set of tall form and you know what? Why is this wrong what did I do wrong? Come on somebody identified because I mean if it's going to be if I want her to lean forward why can't she do that for me? Because I see her legs crossed on the other side you see that's exactly what we want to hear qd uncross your legs ok good bring this foot down your front foot down actually and I want you now to lean towards me right here see how easy now it's working better love it let's see how that looks for you showing up a little bit gorgeous and look right here at me excellent lovely I'm going to tell you you are adorable tilt your head that way nice nice nice! Nice! Nice gorgeous dynamite okay now hopes I'm so sorry you need that hit anyway you know what, uncle john? I want to set up the clamshell lighting on her now so let's get our clams shot itself shall set up and while you're doing that, I just want to look at her face right here turn your shoulders towards me a little bit this way at roll towards me right here on your bringing spread you're allowed a little oh in fact you know what hang on, john will go and set that up, but I want it while you're doing that. I'm going to do some more pictures of her on I'm gonna do a couple more full length shots of her, but I want to do them over here on the black wall. So let's, move this light back here. Here you go, cuties. Stand up a second, precious and that you're going to come over here, darling. Excellent. Oh, I love this already. Know I want a little higher can't oh, that's gonna be very, very pretty. Ok, so we have our beautiful light source all set. Let me see your jacket has pockets in your in your jacket and trains in your back in your pocket. Jack, your jacket pocket. There you go. Excellent. Oh, they will try both. I'm not sure where I'm going yet, so ok, now we definitely want those elbows away from the waist line on her. That is very, very pretty. Now we could do we could see how she's got her front. Now she's, she automatically knows howto model look at her. Oh, yeah, I love it all and look at you. You are so sassy, I'm telling you right now, but if I want her waistline toe look even smaller than it does right now I want that tire cameron will your camera guy get on a tire camera see how pretty that is from up there now with your chest only lean towards me just a little bit lean towards me right here beautiful bring this front foot towards me a little bit perfect you see the more that she leans forward what do I get here see how that really sculpts her shape it gives her this beautiful hourglass figure without a lot of work we can also turn your feet this way relax your shoulders for a second and turn your feet towards me right here big good job you are doing a little bit more good job now we're gonna have that main light cross her body this direction and let's have you bring this foot forward to me right here excellent right there and I want you to push your hip away from my hand right here toward I'm sorry not away close to towards my okay but I want I want to show them let's show them both ways ok push your hip towards me this way and take your hand out of your pants pocket right there. Okay, good or bad? Why? Yeah there's first of all yeah seat look at this you see when you do not have when we don't keep those arms away from the body all this is doing is making her look heavier hey, annette, turn your feet towards me. Straight this way. Love straight into the camera and let's. Just pull your jacket this way. Right here and bring your arms just flat to your side. Okay, look at how much of a disservice this does for her. You see, this is adding, you know, a good, you know, four inches to her shape and making her look bulky. It makes her look bulky because we're photographing straight up and down on her. And it's. Not a good look for any of us. And, you know, so I'm gonna have you let's. Have you not turn your feet towards me, right about here, um, and butt right there. And now this foot right here. Bring it towards me right here. Excellent. See how I gave her that point of reference and not pushing up towards my hand right here. Just a tiny, tiny bit. And now, let's, take this elbow and we're gonna put your hand in your pants pocket. Good job. Just relax your elbow. Good. I want that little bit of a light trap right there. That's what I'm looking for and now you know what I'd like to have you doing that I just want you to take your pelvis and the front just press it toward my hand just a little tiny bit perfect just a tiny bit the shoulder relax your shoulder yes I could tell she had a shoulder up and we don't want those shoulders up now the last thing I might want to do is I might want to have her just lean slightly towards me just a tiny tiny bit of movement let me have you turn your feet a tiny bit towards me right there good now with your chest lean towards me just a little bit perfect very nice now in looking at a net I like the other side I think the other side of her face is really is I think her best side and yet it's it's on the opposite side of the part so that isn't always a rule that you have to photograph on the same side of the part so we've got her here we could do it easily a photograph of her right here we could also not turn your feet this way towards me in that good job turn your feet a little bit more this way good job and now separate those feet for me and then push this hip away beautiful very nice and then just take this hand put it in your pocket right here beautiful and relax that elbow this way so we don't want that elbow out this way we want it this way and now look at how nice that looks for her and now with your chin I'm gonna have you lean towards me tiny tiny bit beautiful very nice relax your shoulders just a little bit much better with your chin lean towards me just a tad beautiful you see becoming body part specific you get people to do exactly what you want them to do so that looks very very nice and now we have that beautiful shape showing right here it's very very flattering on her okay so relax for a second case I know here we have two girls what are we going to do with two women us two girls I know neither one of you oppose us terry come here oppose us two years huh? Sisters just remember yet we're sisters just remember you just multiply by two the same concept imposing you would impose me straight in front of the camera for any more that you would annette right? Correct. So what are we going to do? We want to turn it at one way we would probably turned out this way so how are we going to use communicate that we're gonna face me like you are very nice and separate your feet children length perfect now want you to put your hips towards my hand they're just a little bit you don't need to give way don't want to get them see that she's not a model so we don't want to make her get all the vote posey thing we want we want just that we want just that nice soft, soft kind of look ok, so so we would go hey, you know what? Instead of having me in this picture hey, celeste, come over here missing who lets get you and your mom together? Mississippi, I think that's a new one. I know it isn't it's a new one. Okay, this is, by the way, is the less mom. So ok. So when we want celeste on that side or do we want her on this side, you are on this side. Okay, let me just take your mike. I'm gonna tuck it here and you're into your breast or something hiding very good. Good. Okay, so now where are we going to go with it? Let's start okay, I think you're probably facing so much that way turned towards me perfect. Separate your feet shoulder perfect, but this hit back just a hair. Very nice. Nice, beautiful terry, look at how beautiful she looks there I want you to take this foot and pointed towards me nice and bend your front me excellent you little man, don't you see? I think I want her blocking her. Just a hair. Maybe he wanted a tiny bit in front of her mom on beautiful voluntary actually turned towards me. There you go. Scoot this way toward your mama. Excellent. You get your feet shoulder apart. Here you go. Turn towards where? Just a little bit more. Hastert. There you go. Uh, put your front foot right here after they will bend your front. Me. Very nice let's. See hands. What do we do with hand? You know, I got to tell you, first of all, you have done an outstanding job. Beautiful, beautiful job. Like I will tell you right now if you took that right now. You've done already. You've done a nice service to her. So what do we do with the hands? Well, there's a couple of things you could do with the hands. So go ahead and finish up your post cause this is so nice for what you're doing so it's less is beautiful, I think let's, put your hand on her back shoulder. Beautiful. Very nice. Keep it back. We don't want to see the law hot dogs on the shoulder, correct, I tell that's offering actually, I kind of like your hand here but we don't want to show the back of the hand well right but it and you know what? Maybe the moms just maybe maybe her and her mom, can I just have you hold each other's hands right here but you don't want to just hold hands way out here roll your shoulders towards each other just a little bit actual mom with your chest lean towards your daughter more. Celeste, lean toward your mom a little bit right there. You see how nice that looks? Mom, lean towards me a little bit right here and now tilt your head towards your daughter. And now give your mom a hug with that cheek right in there, honey. See? Beautiful. See how nice that looks right there. And, you know, in fact, the only thing I would do to change it because I love love love what you did. You did a great job. Love it. You go, girl. You rock, come with me on this. Okay? Let me just have you do one thing scooted by turn your feet towards me this way. Keep turning a whole bunch more because I almost want to see over your shoulder. Beautiful. Now let me just have you take your hand and we're gonna put it on your mama's tummy right here, beautiful very nice. Right there. I love where you're going right there. And now, girls, both of you lean towards each other with your chest. And now lean towards me right here. Mom, lean your head. I want right touching your daughter. There you go. You got it. Let me just get a picture of this. They make sure that my lighting is working. Need to be hang on a second, john. Nice and close. Right there. Love it one more time. Let me see if I'm focused on me to make sure that this is correct. And I was like, let's. See how it looks? There we go. Oh. Oh, that's lovely. There you go. Awesome. Hey, celeste, turn your face this way a little bit, and I want you right there. All that tonight. Mom, lean towards me with your chin. Gore. Just love it. Hey, when is that girl going to give you some grandchildren? I mean, what? Can we talk about this place? I mean, what is the deal with her? You know, you've got two grand kiddies, right? One grand kitty I well, you she doesn't know about the other one yet, huh? Excellent right your kids and both of you it's less lean towards me a bunch of what both of you to lean towards me and coming close to your daughter right there with your cheek right there love it so let's come towards me but you're hiding back there not so less I mean mom annette come in and I want your cheek nice and close right there on right there girls awesome gorgeous and one more got it beautiful thank you ladies very very much perfect perfect perfect ok hang on before we finish up on here hang on a second scooter you're not for yet um I just basically want to show you just a couple of variations on that you guys are going to look adorable by the way if I were in normally if I have them in light clothes I would have on a light background but just for the sake of this demonstration we're just going to keep it here okay so let's come here missy mom back up just to hear hey here's a cute kitty turn your feet towards me so less this way excellent and now you're gonna push me up this way good and both stretch out this like this direction here excellent me just okay you're fine right there. Okay, now mom I'm gonna have you tuck yourself behind your daughter just a little bit right there back up just about a half a foot about six inches right there come this way just a little bit beautiful with your feet I want you and separate your feet and push your hip away from me beautiful and now with your chin I want this hand right here we're gonna put it right over her arm and I want you to lean over her shoulder and coming close to me right here come towards me more mom good tall with your back used to lean with your whole chest right there. Let me have you take this hand right here so leslie and into your mom with that shoulder right there good job tilt your head this my mom and turn your face a little bit with your shoulders. Turn that way just a tad and now this is how we would light it so let's bring your arms right in front looking how soft that is on them right there see how pretty that his kids can you guys see it already getting a picture champa little bit mom beautiful love it. Can you give your daughter a hug with your cheek on that side? Gorgeous. Ok, can we give a great big hand just celeste and her mom absolutely phenomenal okay, I think do we have time for questions? Oh, can we do that after lunch or how much time we're going to have times okay, great yeah let's do clamshell because we sort of did a little bit of clam shell there become your q t um this set up right here is more or less clam shell right here clams show lighting basically is when you have your main light up above and then you're going to fill underneath with a reflector the idea being looked at the soft light I'm almost wondering I'll have to look from the camera position to see if I need to bring that main light down a little bit this is just going to fill and this is going to produce a very flat light very very flat light so what does it look like? Did I look hot? Yeah there you go the snooze you lose foul right there so this is my favorite kind of light source for mature skin because as you can tell with my skin it is filling an arabic crack I've got I mean it just fills it in this is light is known as glamour light now if we want to get real fancy we can add some kicker lights in the background will highlight the hair and stuff or to light the background but for the sake of this demonstration we're just going to keep it simple this way so here you go precious come right over there I would want to let's see how we're doing here dad we see how that looks right there. Oh, that's. A lovely shot. I didn't take that one. Obviously. Ok, I think I might even bring this light down just a tad. Basically what? I'm trying to do it. I want to just I want just a whisper of room right through here to be able to get my picture right here. We'll see how that looks. See how, as I bring that light down, it becomes even softer on her face. Yeah. Now, the next thing I want to do is a net. I'm going to have you back up just a little bit with your feet. Be careful next and I want you to turn your feet this way towards me. Separate your feet. Push the city away from me. Pushing it that way. Beautiful. And now, with your chest, I want you to lean your chin. That's. What beautiful. See how that now we're getting that longshan for her it's? Absolutely beautiful. I might even. Hey, you know what scooter can have you take your shoes off. I know I go. I have a bunch of names for everybody. What can I say? Okay, good. You're gonna lean towards me right here in that that that is my girl children had that way, scooter lovely and you know turn your shoulders a little tiny bit why do I need to turn her shoulders a little bit keep turning and now turn your face back this way just a little bit beautiful now turn your face back towards me just a tiny bit gorgeous love that dog ok here's facebook picture here yeah love it match dot com here we come love turn your face this way a whole bunch will see lovett can't have you turn your feet the other way good job and now turn your shoulders back this way a little bit hang on a second john, can you hold on a second? Let me show you why I'm doing this and what we don't want to hang on a second precious if I turn her shoulders too much one way or the other and then have returned her face why is that not good to your lens? True, but what would change that? Ah well what you did rotated back out so it's not as close or drop it or drop it see by dropping the shoulder see you could have if you have the shoulder this way now it's closest to the lens but if I drop it now see how it's not no longer that it's not cultured in the face drop it like it's hot right as right drop it like it's hot so and that's not my quote for the day that's michael's okay now but but that's not why I turned her away it's because this court in the neck right here I don't want that corn sticking out I don't want to turn because when you turn the head too far you make that cord stick out of the head so relax for a second qd excellent and now with your chest just leaned toward this way just a little bit ideally, I'd love to have everything up a little higher and shoot into her this direction but this gives you just a general idea of what we're trying to do. Okay? Well, can we give him that big hand? That was just absolutely phenomenal and I love it it's great and you're coming back this afternoon, right? I don't know I can remember is she coming back later on today for us to do groups fabulous? She says she's going to come back this afternoon we're going to bridal shoes anyway, we will see you all in do have questions. Well, we have a couple of things to talk about before lunch you want to take a couple questions I'd love to ok let's say I have a question from aaron how do you decide when to have the subject's body facing the main line and when to face away great question it depends on which side of their face photographs better which side of their face seems to be their best side we all you know our faces are never exactly even most people don't have a face that's exactly even this is my better side and so we all have of one side of our face that's better than the other so the way that I determine which side is going to face the light source or two factors number one the face which side of the face I want to photograph you know whether it be this side of the other side that's number one factor the other factor that's going to go into it is how much of their shape do I want to show? And is the light source going to be able to cross that body so that I can make give them a more slender silhouette? Or is it going to make them look heavier? So those there's a couple of factors there's more than one factor that go into it and what I would recommend doing is you want to always turn your subjects one way or the other take pictures from both sides and that way you can kind of start determining which side will photograph better the best training I ever got the gentleman who hired me my one of my first jobs the first two years that I worked for this studio I shot, like five thousand senior portrait's high school seniors. Let me tell you, when you only have, like, ten min between each high school senior to photograph them, you learn very quickly about what side of the face photographs better. So, you know, sometimes we think in our career that we never want to do certain kinds of photography. I don't want to do this because that's not where I want to go, but I always look att every experience as being well, what can I learn from this? It may not be really what I want to do with my life. I mean, I may not want to ever have that as my mainstay, but, boy, I tell you what as much as I didn't like that style of photography, I am absolutely forever grateful that I had that kind of an experience because it taught me so much about quickly identifying the best features on people. Um, remembering if you are working with an older subject or you're working with a heavier subject, I'm having them lean towards the camera is a really good thing don't photograph people straight into the camera is a is really a good rule to kind of not a rule, but a concept to follow is, well, one of the question. Great. Yep. And you answered the question that I was going to ask about. How do you determine which side is best? Uh, do you ever ask people what their preferred side? No, I never asked them, because that that takes and the reason I don't ask those kinds of questions is it takes this emotional experience and pulls it into a logical scenario. I don't ask any kind of questions that are going to draw that are going to make that subject start thinking in logical terms because it kills the magic kills, that emotional response that I'm going to be looking for. And they have to think on the logical part of their brain. That's. Why I wouldn't do that.