Cantrell couture at where does this concept come from? And why am I standing before you today? Well, I have to tell you have known since I was five years old that I want to be a photographer. When I was a little girl on the middle child of three daughters, I was called jelly fingers. I was always in trouble. I want you to know I am. I am the proud holder of a two point eight g p a in high school did not go to college. Um, but I'm not dumb. I was at the top of the bottom of my class, just so you know, okay, but you know what? It wasn't because I was dumb. It was because I had a hard time learning the way that they taught in school. I mean, I'm extremely visual if I see it, I can do it just like that, but don't hand me a manual, it just isn't going to happen. And the really funny part this is I've written three books. No, thank goodness. I had a fabulous writer, skip cohen, who wrote the all three of my books, but if it hadn't been for that, I would have never got them done. And I would ...

have never learned photography if it hadn't been for the visual aspect, which is why this kind of a venue so powerful because many of you are just like me and that if we see something done, holy cow get out of our way, we can do it but don't hand us amanda, we're not going to read that photoshopped. Manu, are we guys know it's not gonna happen? Um, I got married in nineteen seventy five married my high school sweetheart right out of high school. Uh, something married almost thirty seven years, and I have to tell you, when I got married, we had a friend with a good camera take our wedding pictures, and I have to tell you it was at that moment when I saw my pictures for the first time that I realized one of the most important lessons that I will ever have learned, and that is that cameras don't take pictures people people do, and that you can hand on artists, somebody who really understands an f stop from a bus stop and who understands how the light an image effectively knows how to use room lights or use the light coming from a window or lights from overhead and knows how to sculpt the body with that, and they can use that little point shoot with their with their their iphone and get beautiful pictures and you can hand somebody who's got the greatest camera, the most expensive piece of equipment in the world, but they don't know anything more than were to press the shutter, and you're still not going to get a great image. And so, unless by the way, unless they do that spray and pray method where they just sprayed the room like a monkey might, and then maybe they get lucky and get a good picture and that's something we're going that's not what we're going to do this weekend. We're going to learn good photographic techniques so that when every one of you leave this room, you're going to leave this room, and for those of you on the internet, you're gonna be well qualified in on a on a path that has a very fine foundation laid for creating beautiful images with predictable results. So let's talk about a few of the aspects of photography the tools for capture I use good equipment. I used the cannon ius wendy mark four camera body I have a fifteen millimeter fish, twenty four millimeter, one two fifty millimeter, twenty four to seventy, eighty five one two one thirty five two and the seventy two, two hundred two eight I s I have a variety of different lens is the most important quality in these lenses are that they're all fast glass and that's important to me because I do like working in a fairly lower light situation um and I also like to selectively focus so that my subject their eyes are tax sharp and but I want everything else to go away I've been a judge and photographic competition for many years now and I will tell you there are two reasons why prince and images get judged down number one because we show too much information in other words, the magic of that moment is like right over here but it's so far away you can't see it you cannot see that beauty and then the other reason why images air judge adversities because people do not know when to back away from the computer and back away from photo shop and they over they might come up with all of their photo shop tricks. So watch out for those kinds of things so I do like a variety of lenses I use lexar six hundred time compact flash cards I prefer smaller compact flash cards versus bigger ones I don't want to put all of my eggs in one basket I wanna have this few of images that I can on one card I prefer to have a lot of cards of course I come from the film days when we could get twenty four exposures you know on a roll of film back in the old house of glad days in fact, when I first got started as a photographer the gentleman who trained me his name was don gerhard he's not even in photography anymore he used to hand me six rolls of one twenty film for an entire wedding six rules you realize I mean that that's not very many pictures and he would give me this little checklist of poses and it would say ok pose number one bride and groom gazing at one another bright picture bride with her dad and stuff like that, you know? And then he would say to me, of course I had to immediately go out and go buy another ten role because I couldn't shoot a wedding that way, right? But I'll tell you what that was really good for it really taught me the value of learning what the decisive moment looks like and learning to press that shutter at the right moment. So in my mind I still try to think like I only have twelve rolls of film to work with and that way I'm not snap happy and just captain just getting loosey goosey and just, you know, taking the same picture twenty five times learn not to do that learned to be thoughtful about when you press the shutter and then move on not only will that make you a much better photographer but it'll also it'll make you it means you have less work editing later on, so let's talk a little bit about the edit process and such after capture, I'm going to use it don't be like room for processing my role files. I use it course photo shop for working any images that I'm going to do, whether it be weddings, portrait of families or anything and I love photo shop actions. I'm inactions junkie and extremely proud of it. I don't use them full bleed. In other words, I'm not going to use a photo shop action at one hundred percent. I will use that action quite often at maybe five percent it's like salt and pepper when your career creating a fine meal, you don't don't the entire salt shaker on it use it just in a very sparing way you're avants actions I absolutely his film actions he's got one for infrared, black and white and red that is by far the very best mimic of black and white in front I've ever come across its phenomenal I love it. Um, I use markets bells actually has some beautiful black and white actions as well. Kevin, cambodia has some amazing actions and by the way, um your bombs tacticians and my own actions and kevin can voters we're going to have to give away so it could be really cool. Um nick software has also got some amazing amazing actions as well and so you might wonder well, baby, why do you have so many actions that you use? Well, it's kind of like a recipe you know how many do you have? One cookbook? No, no, we don't have one cookbook because today I might feel like a nut and I might want to southwestern flavor in my pot roast will tomorrow I might decide that I wanted to be, you know, kind of like the old world way or are like my grandma used to make it which is kind of a joke is anybody that knows me knows that I do not know how to boil water. So from there, once my images are captured and might creation has been done I will tell you whether it's a wedding or whether it's a portrait of a family, children or anything all of my artwork is done before a client ever sees a single picture for me they will never ever see on edited work ever you might wonder, well why? Why, lord, do you think I would have that adopt that kind of velocity? Thank you, your first impression when you saw when you, uh if you put your unedited work out there that's what they see is your business model basically and when you have it edited and perfect and everything's ready to go uh it looks better for you you are absolutely right you know honey, you are way smarter than you look can I just tell you right now you're just way smarter than you look showing you I think that they're gonna happen all day long that's exactly right you say I want them to see beautiful photography equals great photographer and you see if you wait and you do your retouching and any of the artwork and you wait so it will be you know they're not going to buy that picture or you know, I want to make sure and I don't want to do work on something that they're not going to purchase you see then beautiful photography equals great photo shopped tricks and I don't like that I don't want that kind of thing I don't want them even think about photo shop, so I really want them to see beautiful work and go holy cow, that gal is really good at what she does and I want them to think I am perfect and you see if you show them images that they're gonna you're gonna edit out later on that guess what? They see that maybe you're not all that perfect and I don't want that yes what they do, we like scary touching, which is if you have close up and it takes just quite amount of time to do accorded scandal such good question, what do you do if you do, you have to do about the re touching on the skin I retouch it it's that important to me? However, I'm really good at retouching and I'm really fast. It generally takes me about maybe a minute, a minute and a half to retouch and that's to retouch like a good to do a really good skin cleanup. Now let me let me make this really clear I don't what I don't make babies look like plastic dolls, I don't make them look like plastic dolls I don't make women that are my age that are in their fifties, I don't make them try to look like they're twenty five I want them, especially mature women like myself I want us to look rested, I want us to look beautiful, but I don't want us to look like twenty five so there's, you know, there's a fine line and making some he looked better it's like wearing makeup, you know, you know many women today wear makeup and that's kind of what I want to do is I want to just clean up the lines underneath the eyes, soften the skin towns a bit and then make them look better than they do. Great question can can we talk about that? How you do it in a minute? Because it makes me search you know what? I wish I had time right now, and if we have time during the three days, I'll be happy to run you through some of my quick photo shop techniques for cleaning up the skin because it really is important, especially like, especially for mature women, I can promise you that woman is never ever going to see herself unedited un retouched, you know, because it's so funny is that funny how we think we looked really cool don't I mean, I got up this morning, I'm going, yeah, you are looking for a thirty day I'm hot today, you know, on dh then when I see the footage, I'm going home now, who is that old chick? That's e I know it's so not me and yet, you know, because we don't see ourselves the way we really look, we see ourselves the way we think we looked and if we saw ourselves, we really look heck, no, we would so not be wearing spandex, ok, some have been look for women by eight and you're looking at, we're gonna go on to that, ok, excuse me I use pwd color lab in atlanta, georgia. They do a lot of my for those if you don't want to do your own retouching and your own color, work there a great lab to work with graphic authority for textures and backgrounds album sink their ethical line and also azura album companies for albums and then shoot you for getting my keeping my company well organized. So now let's, move on. Our first segment we're going to talk about this morning is about food, war photography and creating beautiful images. In that kind of a scenario, you will find that my style of photography is very clean. I don't use a lot of props, in fact are set this morning is very, very simple because I don't believe you need have lots of cha cha ki and lots of stuff to make a pretty image if you understand the way to light a photograph in a way that's going to be beautiful for your subject and you understand how to compose it properly and minimized background elements that are of a distraction, you can create beautiful, beautiful pictures literally anywhere, including the bathroom upstairs, which I'm hoping we're going to get a chance to go and photograph in at some point this weekend. So let's talk about the way that light falls across your subject and about the way that you compose the female form specifically to create a beautiful image and you know what? This young lady right here all she is is a bride not wearing a white dress do you see that you see concepts are concepts and posing concepts are absolutely universal for women there's a certain concert and so what she's where he has nothing to do with its not going to change the way we pose her to create a pretty image it's not all going to change that so let me give you a real quick demonstration that come here michael I need you for help her second okay now yeah, you knew this was gonna happen okay, michael, can I have you just turned towards the audits? First of all, can we just all agree this is going to make one seriously but ugly girl just it would something really, really ugly girl but that's all right, you're comfortable with that home. Okay? Now, if you'll just look at him in the interest rate on into the camera like from where you're sitting ok, would you see that say that he looks you know, he looks pretty bulky right it's making him look a little bit bigger and not only that but he's about the average size of many of our women today isn't that true the average size of the american woman is a size fourteen and I know from around the world there are many women that are not you know little tiny girls anymore many women are bigger but now watch what happens when I pose him in a specific way and tell me if it doesn't make him appear more slender than he did a minute ago okay so michael first of all by the way are you a professional model ok just want to clarify do we practice this okay yeah you somehow that so does not surprise me from I'm sorry look I know that you have to fight for bathroom time was like no no no I'm not doesn't surprise me at all ok so michael I want you to turn your feet towards me right here excellent now why did you do that correctly but it did more than just show him help over the years michael's turn your feet towards me here you see he did it again the same exactly why did he get it right? I stood where I want to give him a point of reference laurent this is exactly when you're posing people you give them a visual cue as to where you want them to go you will never ever hear me we're use words like left or right do you know why why why am I say turn left? Why would I not say to michael michael turn left who's left and who's, right? Am I talking about? Does that make sense to you? You see? And the more that you learn the art of communicating with very visual simple cues, especially for a wedding when logic does not reign as king that day anyway, right? Then the better equipped you're going to be to be able to compose yourself getting done really fast. So learn the art of visual cues. The next thing that's really important is you notice that I didn't do this lauren to do what I'm doing right here I mean michael, do this. Why would this not be correct? Why would I not want to do this? Why would I not want to stand like this and say do what I'm doing right here because you can't see what he's saying behind you thank you that's exactly right that's right, lloyd? Because you see, when you turn your back on your subject you can't see his eyes. I can't I have lost my connection with him. You do not turn to stone by looking people in the eyes it's okay, all they are is just people it's all right, so with michael, if I want him to do what I want, I need to make sure that he doesn't have that pulse a look in his eyes so I'm gonna take michael turn your feet towards me right here. Excellent. He did it exactly right? The next thing I want to do is I want to shift his weight to his back foot now with photographers if we say it in photography terms we say put your weight on your back foot but the problem is is that people and doing this thing they go like this because they're not photographers are clients are photographers there people so I learned that there's a sneaky way to get them to put their weight on their back foot and I learned it by going to hawaii and watching hula dancers you know what a hula dancer is dancing? What are they moving? They're shifting their him one way or the other and I learned and what? Hey, wait a minute if I say to my subject michael this right here is your hip can you just push it towards my hand? Guess what automatically his weight shifted to his back leg and I didn't have to do anything special and more importantly, you do not have to touch your subject to get them to do that that's important that you not have to touch the subject to get them to do that because especially, you know you have a broad a little bride or this whole galaxy interviewed in food war work and you're a man you may want to not have to touch her and may make her feel uncomfortable have you touching her so you want to be able to use gestures and say hey you see this shit right here just point to it said push it towards my hand and immediately their weight shifts to the back leg now for most women we want to shift that weight back away from the camera why why make us look thinner? That's right? Why would it make you look heavier to shift your hip forward? Why? Well it's it's more than gravity though michael it's more the gravity lloyd is it the the the magnification of the emancipation of the lens so if you're a fisherman you put the fish out far long armed technique and it looks really big back I'm sorry obama girl no, I'm sorry just want you to know just for the record I was my daddy's only son so I know how to fish in a really big because of the perspective of the well that's true it has to do with perspective but ladies it goes way farther than perspective I'm sorry, but my five does it look bigger with the weight on it or does it make thinner with the weight away from it? It looks thinner if I push the wait to see I don't have the weight on the five so whenever you put pressure on that, any kind of a body part right here and you push that element forward, you're putting weight on it, which is spreading out the muscle in your thigh and it's making you appear heavier, so, you know, it doesn't said I don't know any woman who wants to hear fatter and flatter than she is so that's what we want to do with michael wanna push that hip away from the camera? That's step number one the next thing that we want to do is we want to bend this front me a little bit because what we're trying to do is we want to create a nice diagonal line. You see how there's a nice line on my leg because I my front knees bent, so take this knee and ben journey and bring it over towards your other leg. Unifil looking teo, you are hot now. That's in loving it. Michael, look right here, right? Yeah. You are doing great. Point your toe towards me. This way. A little bit. Love it. Very, very good. That's. Excellent. Michael. Now, the other thing that we want to do is now I wantto I want to have impresses. Tell me a little bit towards my hand. Is the pressure coming towards me a little bit this way? You know, this is where men and women are so a lot of different. Okay, you ready for this? Okay, ladies, if I asked you to pressure, tell me towards my hand what is the first thing you're going to do? Suck in right way. So it's fuckin right? No, guys were, then you okay? They booth and they spoke about their summit. It is just so funny how men and women are different, but in it crazy how women is there a woman in this room that would go pull my finger way doing no plan? No, I think I think that, you know, we just don't there's some things that, like the unit. I'm sorry. So it's the universal code of women, hooded manhood and so the thing that we're trying to do if michael were a woman is we want to rock those shoulders back a little. You see what happens when I pull my pelvis forward a little bit, it rocks my shoulders back a little bit. You want to learn to become body parts specific. The next thing that I might do is I want to create a bit of a light trap in here I don't want his arms close to the body that's real important you see the closer his arms are to the body then I can't see this you see this light trap is what gives his waist or her waist context you see if the arms a real close to the shape the body right your guess what all we've done is added twenty pounds and made him look heavier or her made her look bigger than she wass ok are we on the same page all with me now? Okay so thank you precious she did a good job so now let's look at some slides and we're gonna look at some examples and using those opposing concepts in relation to the light source so let's talk for a moment about the kind of lighting that you need to have to create beautiful images like that where is the main light coming from in this picture would you agree it's coming from over in this direction right here right now you notice that she has her body turned towards the light source but where is the camera in relation to that? Where is the camera position that's the critical part now is the camera in the same direction as the light no camera is away from the light source why? Because we want that highlight and that shadow underneath her bus line we want that shadow on her cheek that's really important so let me show you the real high tech way that I captured this image ok? This is my one of my spaces in my studio and as you can tell I have I have you know, all the latest technology I do I have everything that these were just too simple windows in my studio twenty foot ceilings and so I have two windows on dh then we have this really amazing piece of insulation board that I got it and what is it called home depot for like two dollars, fifty nine cents one side has silver a duct tape on it on the other side is white I use it as a large reflector and this is what I use my tripod for I know I haven't used a tripod in one hundred years I just don't I don't I find it slows me down too much and I don't need a tripod I find that it's too confining um for me and I don't need it to if I'm photographing in a slower shutter speed I can hand hold my camera with a seventy two two hundred millimeter lens on it and a fourth of a second without getting movement I learned to play little games in your mind to learn new techniques folks if you do that guess what it means that you're never you're never at a loss and you always have in your mind a plan b so I always have little games that I play it keeps me busy and keeps me, you know, gives me just a little a little side game for myself, so one of the games that I play is if I'm shooting a wedding, I go how low can I go? And so I'll go ok, I'm going to try to go for a half a second, so sometime in the evening when there's dancing going on during the wedding, I will have my my clients and I'll be photographing they'll say I'm going to try to get a half a second exposure without getting movement so go let all the air out of my lungs I braced my arms across my chest and very slowly press the shutter and then I see what did I get it? Is there too much movement? And then it helps me to learn a new ah, a slower way to photographing and and because there's sometimes when you don't want to introduce flash because it's just a little bit too sharp and too too hard the other thing in this picture is this piece right here this is just a piece of of opaque plexi glass that actually fits up in these windows it's the same side as these windows, I just put it up in the window when I need it and when I need a white floor I just laid on the floor so that I can have my subjects sit on top of it on the floor and that way I have something very, very simple, so my main light is coming from the windows and then I'm going to fill in the face just a smidgen with my reflector. Now you don't want to fill it in all the way. I don't want that light to be equal on both sides of the face. I want dimensionality. In other words, highlights and shadows shadows are what give any image it's a dimensionality that's what gives it its its shape? And so we want people to have shape it's so, so important. So you want to think about whenever you're about to take a picture, say, well, where is the main light coming from? And we were how doe I pose my subject? And what direction do I pose? My subject in relation to that light source. Okay, does make sense questions way doing okay? Yes, michael, if you know you're just going to shoot from waste. Yeah, from torso out. Excellent question, michael. I'm no, I have. In fact, one of my favorite reflectors is the five and one reflector. It has five different reflectors and one it has a black side, a white side, a translucent a gold side and a silver side. And for portrait, you know, for if you're doing three quarter length or half length it's very, very easy. You can get beautiful, beautiful results so you don't have to buy this very specialized piece right here. This just stays in the studio. When I go on location, we take that reflected the other ones with us. They're much more portable and are able to use those on on location. This one just gives us a real nice, soft bit of film. Okay, yes. Is there a color that you used the most, like the white or the slover? Excellent question, linda, depending on the subject. If I'm working with someone who has a person of color like african american or a philippine or chinese, one has got darker hair that I might be inclined to use the silver side of the reflector because with darker skin tones, what gives that face it's dimensionality are not the shadow areas it's the highlights or the little speculators on the face that's what gives that skin it's dimension? What gives is caucasian skin like myself? Dimensionality are the shadow areas that here so on my skin I might choose to use the white side of the reflector excellent question anymore before we go on bambi the internet is loving this oh good I'm glad saying you're making everything so easy it is easy now it's actually really hard it's very difficult you never will get this let's just get it ok but now hang on a second wait a minute by the way just for the record this is my son's little brother this is my dog on and the reason this slide is in here is that I want you to look at the quality of life besides the fact that I miss him terribly jesus accused they come I mean, come on that is the cutest dog in the universe. Look at the quality of light look at the light in his eyes this is in that same location so it doesn't matter whether you're photographing a person whether you're photographing a woman are any kind of a creature just watch the way the light falls across them you can tell the main light is coming from this side of his face would you agree with that and then notice how? Because I'm photographing on this side of him we're getting these little highlights and shadows there highlights in the firm but we're also getting those shadow areas in the fur which are would give cooper his dimensionality another paul powerful tool is the selective focus I shot this image with an eighty five millimeter one point to lend about two point oh, both of the eyes are tax short, but do you notice how the feet are not sharp it all and the background is not sharp? Why it's? Because you see those things I don't want to compete with the face I want your eye, your eye as the viewer to go right to that that those eyes if somebody is looking in the camera at us, we expect those eyes to be sharp we want them to be tax sharp so that's the rule you want to think about but think about after that do you need to have everything else to be sharp so you may want to use one of those fast lenses that can really blur out those insignificant things that are less important that you don't need to be sharp. Do you notice, by the way, how I'm filling up the frame with the subject that's one of the other techniques that's a really important thing for us to learn to do is if you're doing a closer fill the frame I'm not worried about whether I have to have it make an eight by ten print, I will do what I will make a print that is going to work for that picture this would make a great seven by ten but not an eight by ten because it would crop off his feet right so we're not going to do this is an eight by ten if I had a client who wanted this to be an eight by ten that I would put it on a mat of some sort that could be so in other words make the print seven by ten and put it in a larger matt so that that mad and could be eight by ten does that make sense okay because all of us are a couple questions from the internet if right that's all right a question from a monster was when do you use black reflectors that is a great question and you tell monster that is a really good question um let me tell you when you would use a black reflector hey q t come of your baby we're going to use you by the way laurent you're going to be my black reflector I want you to notice what happens with my face when laurent turn your I want to see your butt such around this way okay now stand at fault for everything now I want you to notice what happened when I move myself closer to him do you see how we're getting a shadow on this side of my face so you see black reflectors absorb light white reflectors and silver reflectors reflect light so if I'm working with somebody who is a larger person and I want to slim down that face I will use the black side of a reflector and then photograph from that same side does that make sense? Thank you, baby. That was really good of you appreciate that. So the moral of the story is the black side the reflector is is by the way is my second favorite side to use because when you can have when you have somebody who's got a round face and you want to make that face look a bit more narrow or you have cheekbones you want those cheekbones to pop out a little bit. Using the black side of the reflector is a phenomenal tool for sculpting that face a bit more and making that face appear more slender. It's a really good for any of the questions on that. Another question with regard to when you talked about your five and one reflector they were wondering what size you use that was a a shutterbug. Ok, great, I like the sixty inch reflector the sixty inch it's a nice big round one um good size, I don't like him too small and here's how you use a reflector. For instance, if you kids are my subject and we're going to talk a lot about this as the program goes on and I'll give you some demonstrations and slide format, I don't use the reflector like this I use the reflector like this so in other words that the sun is back there behind you and I want to give a little bit of snap to your face I'm going to use the edge of that reflector it'll come into my reflector and then I will whisk it across your face on the side not like this because we don't want to use the entire the center oh, great thank you forget I got mike sidekick john so I'm going to use a reflector like this not like like this okay make sense. Okay? Cool. All right, great. Thank you. Look ok, so now let's talk about about a bit more about opposing in doing good war work and the ways that you can create beautiful images I do not believe in telling people to smile telling them to look sexy telling them to do things I give them a reason to behave that way for example if I just said to you all if I said terry I want you to smile we get that fake smile that we all put on for people that we don't know. However, if I said to terry on my lord, honey, I don't know fucking photograph you are so seriously but ugly, you know, there you go see, I have given her a reason to smile because she knows I'm full of crap right? So give them a reason to have an expression and you get riel beautiful expressions you get absolute great expressions so when I'm photographing children this's exactly do linda give me five would you do that her okay that's exactly what I'm gonna do I'm gonna play with children my associate photographer michael van auken is absolutely brilliant he does magic tricks for the little kids when they came in and were photographing them so that and so that while they were photographing our children were not saying stupid stuff like smile you know it's just it's so not gonna happen you're not going to get really imagery you're not gonna get beautiful riel smiles or real expression so I give people a reason to behave a certain way and that when you get people a reason to do something then you get a natural expression yes, michael so when you do that, do you usually try toe do time it so you're getting it at a certain point of that reaction or do you just trying to get it at the peak of it? Excellent question. Michael yes what I do usually this is when I may take three frames the first one doesn't ever get that that's not the one that gets the expression my camera and by the way is always at my eye when I'm behaving like this so in other words if I'm going to find like something with terrify was making that crazy, stupid joke with her, you know, my cameras not going to be down here when I'm you know I'm going to miss the moment, so my cameras going to be appear and my finger is on the trigger so that when she starts getting that reaction bang, bang, bang, then I will get I can watch it happen. You know, one of the other things on the ways that you can train yourself to be able to capture the decisive moment for those of you that are the documentary style photographer who really likes to be the fly on the wall and create beautiful images, but you don't want to make people you want to get them to do things to do it, you want it to be natural here's how you do it, you take new york, roams with your brain and where's pictures with your brain that when your random moment you could be sitting in the restaurant could be sitting in starbucks. I'm having having your coffee in the morning and you look at the way the light is falling upon people spaces and you pay attention to what's going on with them and in your mind interpret their personal stories that's what I do all the time, I no matter where I could be walking through the grocery store and I'm taking your crimes with my brain and pictures of my brain thinking, ok, well, is it gonna happen or what's gonna happen next? I also think it's, extremely important to become a good listener learn to be an extremely careful listener, and then you can hear when something's gonna happen, you can feel it, you literally can feel it. And so I'm very, very much and a very good listener it's my one good qualities, and I'm a good listener, and then the second thing that I think is really, really critical is keeping your finger on the trigger don't wear your in your camera around your neck like a piece of jewelry. It's not a piece of jewelry, you ain't going to get it if it's down here and then you're going to the stupid thing and go, you can you do that again, and I'm gonna happen, so don't do it. Have your finger on the trigger, have your eye through the viewfinder thing if you have to look through the camera and that way, when that decisive moment happens, you know it and you nail it every single time and it's just so powerful for you, as it is just so rewarding, it's like going fishing with your dad and you know, when you really big one in it's in images feel so good you got it. Well, that's how it makes you feel when you see that decisive moment building and because you had the correct lens on your camera. And you had you thought these things out in your mind ahead of time when you didn't have a camera in your hand. You were prepared for that moment as it unfolded. Do you have any other questions? Perfect pixel would like to know what method you use when the model is simply not responding. Great question. Well, what do you do when the models not responding and has little energy? I fired them. No, no, no. I'm just kidding. This is exactly what I do. Okay, uh, do theron make it over here? Okay. Enemy enemy right onto me. Okay, to me. Ok. So let's say that autonomy it's my subject and this is kind of getting that little deadpan expression from her and it's not, you know, nothing's going on now, that would be very difficult for because the reason I picked all these people because they all had a personality, but just, you know, but for instance, if I would say there's two things that cause you're subject not to respond number one, you're boring as hell. But if you have the personality of a carpet you aren't going to get great pictures so learned to fake it and have a good personality you know there's I have known a number no human rights you got that part down no I don't think this is not me I'm really shy person but you know I really believe that it's important to have tio pretend to become an actress at that moment and just have some fun with people you know it's been my experience that people are very much a reflection of who you are and if you are having fun and you're animated with them they cannot help become animated and so this is but but there are some things that you can do to loosen him up okay, so on a mate I'm gonna get it right that time onto me ok economy ok, we should back up a bit okay? And this time what I want you to do on ammi is you're gonna walk towards me and I want to see some sass in that back side okay okay you ready saying that she can't even shake you need to keep a straight look at a race already. Okay, ready one two three go that was the worst job I have ever seen that was just so pathetic did you see that? I mean, look at that as so cheesy ok one more time already okay girlfriend come on oh yeah oh yeah she's got it going on band ok it's not about the act of having her walk that's not what this moment is about but you just see what happened with her face now you see how it kind of breaks it up you break it up and you just kind of it breaks that that that that moment of you know that those happening and so that's one reason that I always get people moving and if I feel like I'm kind of screwing it up if I just messed it up because I got him to come food posed then I'm gonna shake it out I'm going to say ok I want you to shake it out let's just start all over again and we're going to get and we'll start in a different way so that's how I would handle that thank you love ok any of the questions before we go on ok cool so with this young woman it's what gives her what's giving her body its language um let me let me demonstrate this chief what is my body language saying to you right now protected back off right I have an attitude going on now notice what happens if I do one thing now what am I saying to you and what did I do to change the perspective from you? What I do all I did was lean forward so you see body language, the attitude you can get from your subject that you can create in the way that you pose your subject is speaks volumes about the way whether they're leaning forward to the camera bit or leaning back aloof is back back off for men. If I'm photographing a man, I may want him to back to lean back because it will give him that more powerful look, if I'm photographing women of any kind any age, I want her engaged a little bit towards the camera men let me demonstrate one of their technique for you. I want all of you that are sitting here today. I want all of you, by the way, that air that are viewing I want you to give your by the way, you're going to need a mirror. At some point, you'll want to get you a little mirror for those of you out in the audience, and I want you to place it up in front by the by you computer monitors, you're going to need to see this at some point in the next three days. I want you to see what happens when you feel it. Ok, so the first thing I want all of y'all to do is I want you to take a picture with your brain of the way that you're all seated in this room okay, I want you to see how you're seated you know how your little time he's kind of hanging forward a little bit? We're going to just hanging back. Okay? Now the next thing I want you to do is I want all of you lean forward just lean forward, ok? Do you notice how your shoulders air kind of rounded rounded this way? Right? And by the way, for us girls that's not all that good looking. Is it that's? Not a good thing because it's gonna make us look like we have a little bit of a belly and it's it's gonna make the girls kind of hang a little bit and that ain't good and so we don't want to do that now what? You also sit back, but this time when you lean forward I want you to lean forward to me with your chest lean towards me with your chest. Okay, what's the difference say more upright, which is stretching out your torso and exactly and you wouldn't idea what did I ask you to do? I said with your chest lean forward a bit so you see it straighten your back up automatically you see how that works so you want to learn to become very body part specific? So with this young woman I said to her I said I want you to lead forward to me with your shoulder see with your shoulder or with her chest and then I want you to roll that shoulder forward a bit because it would give her a bit of grace and give her a little bit more of a glamorous almost like like huh and went with her lips I just said could you I just want to repeat the words, huh? What does that mean? You know, kind of like you were just like you didn't quite understand um and then notice it all has to start with the feet always with her feet even if you cannot see the feet it must they must be there. You must have the post and correct on the foot. So if my knee has been like a showed you with michael a little earlier, then all I'm gonna do is now say with your chest lean forward a little bit, see how that leaning forward with the chest and then here's one other thing that's really important is that you want to have your subject when they're lean forward for you men especially this is really critical you never ever, ever use the front of your hand ever why? Because you do imagine thing lean towards me with your chest. Oh, that is so not going to happen, right? Because it's invasive your hand this way is invasive and it's it's grabbing it kind of feels nasty doesn't but notice what happens if I say lean towards me now with your chest, you see how the back of the hand becomes harmless? It's a harmless entity, and so these kinds of things that the language that you want to use learned to become extremely specific on what you want people to do, and they'll do it just like that. It makes it very, very fast questions. Hey, we're doing okay, all right, good let's, go forward, okay, having people seated or laying down can be a really, really floundering thing for them to do, and especially by the way, if you're photographing someone who is a bit heavier, if you want to minimize the both or you want, there are two ways that you can do it number one, crop it out if it's bigger and you want to get rid of it, crop it or hide it also, by the way, let's say that you are doing good war work, and you want that the shape of that young woman's body, her bus line to look a bit more curve, a cious having her lay on her tummy of it is going to give her a bit more cleavage. It's going to make her look a bit more it's, a much more flattering way to do it on. And then again notice where is the light source in relation to the camera? Main light is actually coming in from almost behind her it's room lighting or here we have a little highlight right here and these little bits of highlights on the cheek. But the camera position is about forty five degrees from there. You see that? So you see, you don't want to be photographing flat into the light, and otherwise I would not move my camera position in the same direction as that light source. I would want it on the shadow side of the face. That's called short lighting folks when you like from the shadow side of the face or not like when you photograph from the shadows side of the face that's called short light. Hey, got any questions for me? There's a question. How far away from her? Where you when you took this shot. How far away was I? Probably from maybe me too, the coffee table right here, what I do images this is very much my comfort zone, I love intimate images. On close up pictures of people I find that if they can see when they if they're much more impacting and impact us everything in the mind of the client they don't understand you know the rembrandt triangle on the cheek they know one thing impact do I look great or do I look bad that's it that's all a client understands photographers understand all that other technical stuff so what I generally like to do is I like I'm very comfortable taking lots of beautiful close ups yes, I will do some beautiful full length shots especially beautiful beautiful gown on or she has pretty legs and will show off those legs but as a general rule a lot of my imagery is more tight and more intimate and so the seventy two two hundred millimeter lens is my favorite tool I mean I use that the most of any lens I have I use the seventy two two hundred millimeter lens and I will you notice that I'm down low on the ground with her because not only do I want to see her face but I also want to see the fact that she has a backside back here so I want that to continue just a little bit but I wanted to be out of focus I don't want any of this to be as focused as the face because it starts competing with face it starts competing another question sure, we might be getting to this later, but are there any tips for getting male subjects grooms engaged and any male specific posed tips other than what you've already talked about for grooms it's absolutely in fact, I need a guy for this let's see who could I use? Um okay come your kitty oh yeah ok great question about photographing men there are men you can photograph them in a variety of things that you can't get women to do men can push their hip towards the camera a bit but it's not about this they don't push their hip this way or this way like women we don't use the same kind of terminology because if we do then he starts looking a bit more feminine what we do do is if I just said yes see, it just doesn't it looks a little bit too feminine for him for him but what I want to do is I want to get again I want that weight to shift to the backlight that's where I wanted to go. So the first thing I'm gonna dio is I find my light source and then again I want him about forty five degrees opposed in relation to the light source of the first one to say, laurent, I want you to lift this front foot off the ground for a second just lifted off ground and not just set it down just gently, like you're going to step on a butterfly and you don't want to squish it. Ok? So when he lifted his front foot off the ground, where did the weight shift too the only place that's got left to go the back leg it's a real sneaky way of getting people to do exactly what you want to do. Yeah, well, there you go. Yeah, well, maybe maybe not somebody who's drunk, but what can I say then? I'll just give something hang onto here, hold on to be precious for a second. So okay. So notice how immediately it kind of shifts that weight backwards. The other thing that I will do for men is I might say to him with this shoulder and this hip, I want you lean towards me a little bit here, you see how when he leans towards me with the shoulder and with the hip this whole side of his body, it shifts the weight that way and that can be very, very flattering. When we get to photographing our couple today this afternoon, you'll see exactly what I'm talking about. The other thing that men can do is we also want them to hang of it. We want those shoulders, they can round their shoulders like this you can have them a little bit rounded so the next thing I want you to do is I'm gonna have you just kind of like hang towards me just a little bit love it right there good job excellent okay but not I mean I don't want your little belly hanging out but just kind of leaned towards me now if your shoulders a little bit love it and then turn your face this way a little bit oh baby you are hot right there, pal that is really good looking good thank you by the way we do not I don't do something where the guy has his thumb sticking out of pocket I think there is not anything in the universe that is cheesier than that I mean, that is just says I am a photographer you know real people in the universe real guys don't ever walk around with our thumb hanging out of the box we don't care with their hand is doing in that pocket it's not our business okay. Thank you. Thank you so much. Okay, we doing okay? Uh oh sammy there were a couple questions about hands casually for men how would you post place so for hands for guys I want I'm not going tio I want his hands is to be comfortable relaxed I wanted to put the whole hand in his pocket I want a bit of a bend and that elbow so if I were a guy that I'm gonna do this with his hand and I want a bit of an elbow in that hand that arm right here or I'll bring him down I don't have a problem with guys put their hands and front you know, some people call that the fig leaf post, but a lot of guys like naturally do that they do that naturally so I try to make it really is is that I try to stay away from anything that is you know, that is photography terms because it seems it's just too posey and it doesn't feel real and that's why I don't do that thing with the thumb hanging out of the pocket because on by the way, if you're judged and photographic competition have that well hot dog hanging on the pocket okay have that foam hanging on the block it because if you don't there it is so seriously doc, you points ok, so but in the real world of photographing normal people like you and I, I just want their hand or if you repair genes I'll just have him tuck us thumb through his pocket and maybe make a fist with his hand or keep it loose just relaxed and casual he may check through his belt or you know, in his jacket um his hand might be hanging out with this some hanging for his pocket any of the questions we'll just to follow up on that eric ashley had asked, disband, be specifically pose hands and fingers, or does she let the model place them naturally? So for example, in great and other types of depending on the scenario, I do pose the hands very specifically when I'm working with women. Okay, come your terry um especially this is this is really important for women because you want to be able to have those hands looking very, very grateful. So if I'm closing the hands and this is what I want, notice how my thumb I'm taking my film, I'm putting it in the middle of her palm of her hand because when you do that, it automatically makes the hand lay very nicely. I might if I finding her, did you get a real actually and I go like this if they need to relax the hand and if if it's below the waist that I want to have been the risks up, if it's above the way they convention up like this, we would have a lot of choices what they could do with their hands. The one thing that you want to stay away from one posing as we don't want to see the back of the hand, why would I not want to see the back of the hand? Why no well maybe it could be but but more important than that why else what I did not want to see the back of the hand because it's almost as big as the face and you see this if I'm photographing her right here and this hand is right here then guess what it's closer to the lens of the camera that her face is and it's going to appear larger so I want to make sure so I want to see the side of the hand the other thing is when you see this side of the hand you see the side of the arm and not the back of the arm which is a bigger part of our body that we don't want to see thank you precious good questions ok so let's move on so let's talk a little bit about about filling the camera a bit and notice again where the lights coming from you see that the catch light in her eye by the way this is my daughter in law tell me and I can have great good looking rankings or what yeah yeah yeah this is my daughter in law lead yeah she's just beautiful um by the way lee's yeah I hope you I got out of the hospital today in a good way and you're healthy again she was in mexico and got food forcing really really bad was in hospital all day yesterday okay notice how that highlight right there isn't about the two o'clock position in the eye notice how because it is in that position the light skims across the eye and highlights or illuminates the iris that's what gives that iris its glow and its dimensionality? So I'm always looking if you want to think about where the light is coming in on the eye so the first thing I do whenever I'm photographing any subject is I'm looking at them and I said, where is the light coming in on their eyes? Were my getting that catch like, is that a large a light source or a small light source and that's really important? Because the larger the light source and this is a pretty good sized light source it's a fairly good side light source in her eye, the softer that the light will be we can tell that this is a soft, light source because of the shadow see how soft the edge is of that shadow and again, do you notice how I'm photographing her on the right side of her face? You're on the shadow side shadow side now there's one type of face that you want to flat light or photograph on the bright side of the face you know what's not what kind of face that is, what kind of face might we want to make look bigger how about a long skinny face? So if your subject has a really long, narrow face, then that's the one person that you may say you know what I think I'm gonna like come on, I'm gonna photograph them from the side that the light is on however there's one caveat to that you know what that is it's what is their body big? You see if they're a bigger person than maybe I'm going to a mate air on the side of photographing on the shadow side because the majority of their body is going to be in shadow, which means they're gonna look slimmer does that make sense? They we're all on the same page so pay attention to where the light source is falling now by the way, can you tell where I took this picture give any indication of what the background wass any indication whatsoever? You see that's the beauty of just looking for pure light learned to do this in newark crumbs and those pictures with your brain and then you are absolutely never have lost you are always on q and you will notice a you know what? Ok here's my location, my light there's my light source and then everything else can go away and especially if you fill the frame with the subject's face and guess what, we don't care if there's brick back there because we won't see it learned to crop it in the camera used shallow depth of field cropping in the camera. Shallow depth of field coupled with beautiful soft light are your photography is your best friend as a photographer? It's absolutely going to save you when you're in that first church of ugly ville, and we have all photographed in that place before, right? Yeah, we'll have where? You know what? They had all the kids, pictures on the wall and all the handprints and all these colorful, you know, trips in mexico and all this, this all this colorful stuff? Well, you can literally photographed absolutely anywhere if you pay attention to the light source and filling the frame with your subject's face and then you shallow depth of field. Yes, love if the crop in the camera is and equivalent of eight by twelve or four by six um and you don't know what size is the client's gonna want? How do you crop in camera without excellent question? I crop always for the benefit of picture it's always about the picture because and I don't pay attention to what it's an eight by ten or not because the way that I look at it it's going to be about the integrity of the piece of the image itself then what I'll do is I'll say you know what? Look if if this were mike a client picture and they wanted an eight by ten picture it's okay well this is going to probably be we can either put this in an eight by ten on a canvas that's an eight by ten and make the image more like a six by you know, nine on an eight by ten canvas you mean you know what I mean by that that's the way I would personally do it or I would say you know what this print is not going to be good is an eight by ten this would be an amazing print that's a custom piece we want to make this a custom piece because not every picture should be eight by ten and I really believe that one of the things that separates you and I from all the realm of photographers or people out there that just have a good camera is that we're not thinking in eight by ten five by seven or four by six cropper four by five cross we're thinking about you know sometimes that pictures of five by ten minutes a long skinny picture and that's what gives it its beauty can you imagine propping a five by ten beautiful? You know, horizontal cool print and making in an eight by ten it would kill it so way sit with people of the clients when they are ordering pictures and we let them know right away you know, this is an image that's going to be that's a showpiece that you should make, you know, as a five by ten and the way that I want a client to see that picture the way that I want them to purchase it is the way that I show it. So in other words, if I have an image, whenever they see my pictures period in any kind of scenario, they see it the way that I envisioned them to see it, they'll see it if I wanted, if I if I know the magic of that picture is a five by ten horizontal, they're going to see it on my screen as a five by ten print they're not going to see it as a way it was shot, they're going to see it the way that I envision them too. I want that picture and then I will communicate to them that this is a piece that you want as a long, skinny picture don't don't crop it and then the way that we are any enlargement, any print that anyone buys from me, whether it be a four by six print or a kn eight by ten we mount all of our images before a client ever sees them, we melt are when they purchased a picture we mount them on double our excuse me eight ply eleven by fourteen that's that's a way for like if a person buys a picture from me just a single image if they bought a four by six picture but it's going to come on eleven by fourteen eight climb out why? Why would I do that? Because I was going to say because you're a professional and you're distinguishing your product from something that they can get at cbs exactly see a four by six picture you know at cbs or a costco is what you know, eighty nine cents or forty nine cents or whatever you see I'm going to charge a lot more than that and I want them to see my work is different and if you just give them a four by six picture than I'm sorry guess what people they're going to see that as this's a four by six am could goto wherever cvs you know how come you're charging so much for your prints? Well, my, my prints are art pieces when they get them so that it validates it's all part of the mystique and I charged the same amount that I do it for an eight by ten or seven by ten as I do a four by six is all the same price why because it takes me just as much work to print before my six and to do the artwork on that piece is it does on eight by ten image or whatever the case is. Does that make sense? Okay, so let's go forward. I know we're getting our time starting to get close where we're gonna start doing some real photography soon. I just want to let you know the internet is loving happy everybody's having so much I'm so relieved on they love you and your personality but your bladder can we get who are scheduled? Break is in about twenty minutes. Okay, good. All right. Great. Okay. Yes. Terrorist. One quick question about your proofing. Do you do proofing online? Do you do proof books like that? Sorry. I have to go to water. Um, excellent question for weddings. For weddings only. I do. Four by six proof prince that again, all my retouching is done before they ever see a picture. I generally take on a wedding somewhere between oh, around a thousand images for a whole like, twelve hour day. And then I will have a very heavy editor I edit down to about the best six or seven hundred images that a client will actually get. Those are our printed by p deputy color lab in atlanta, georgia their and their four by six prints and and I don't like those dumb proof, but magazines because I don't know of a single woman my age that I can see a picture that's that bag, they can't say it, and you know what? If they can't see it, they can't buy it, they can't get emotionally attached to it, so I want a big proof. So I do for my six prints, I want them to touch those pictures and hold them and pass them around. I want every aunt martha and their relatives, they have those pictures and to share them, and I want them to be screaming off the page and by george, I want those pictures screaming in my behalf that way, I'm not only going to photograph this event, but guess what every other family friend that they've got, they're going to have to come see me because they've seen my work and they're not seeing some stupid little proof magazine where the pictures were, you know, an inch and a half, two inches big that they got a great african microscope out to look at, I just hate that. Can you tell? I get a passion about that? I'm sorry, but I just don't like him, but and then we also do for weddings, we do an online service. As well so that they can view pictures online you know so that family and friends that are out of the country that they can that they can purchase images I will tell you for weddings I'm extremely well paid to get my butt out of bed so I am not there I don't care if they buy a single eight by ten after the fact I have made a very, very nice profit to show up that's important to me because I don't want to be printing of stupid christmas cards it's like you know how much money is in that and you gotta go hunt of the pictures it's just a waste of time so I prefer I want them I'll give them I give them all of their digital files and yes, the digital files that they get to keep are the high resolution retouched digital files I would be mortified I'm certainly not going to give them on image that was not that's not what I want them to see but again for weddings that because I'm extremely well paid to show up so my profit is built into my wedding coverage in that way they get whatever they want for portrait work. I do not do online proofing for portrait's, nor do I do proofs but here's why if you're doing a if you're trying to sell a portrait client ah wall portrait how big is there monitor are you think you're going? They're going to say, well, I want a big picture, vandy, how about eight by ten? You see, they can't see if they're if they're viewing online portrait work. I'm not going to sell the sixty inch wall portrait because they can't visualize how big that is, and something by a little tiny picture could say, oh, I want a big picture eight by ten because their monitors small and so for all her portrait clients, they come into the studio, we have an entire slide presentation that we show, we use triple scoop music, which is fabulous, copy free music so that they can purchase slide shows and we can actually with a good conscience, we can use that music without plagiarizing upon, you know, artists, I mean, I wouldn't want people copying my work illegal, why in the world that I, you know, be disrespectful to all these musicians out there and use their music without getting permission? So used triple scoop, music's, amazing, amazing music, it's it's a really great way to purchase songs, and then I will show them their beautiful images in a slide show format for boudoir. Specifically, we're doing albums, and in fact, I will tell you for our portrait clients, we're finding that they're really enjoying albums as well. So for your portrait clients don't minimize don't think you could only sell them a wall portrait many of today's families I really believe in and selling them your books this year and you're the life of your family this year in the life of your child because that child will grow and the other cool thing about doing year albums that once a year for a client not only to have a client for life but you also you're documenting their beautiful family history year after year you know how many pictures you can put in the first is home of their little kids trust me, I know because I have a number of clients who have a shrine in their house to their to their children but I mean you could only sell them so many wall prints and then you gotta start thinking, ok, well, what else could I do? Albums are an absolute phenomenal answer to that because you could do you know, ten or twenty images in a beautiful book for good war it's an absolute perfect entity because you can put this beautiful collection of boudoir images in an album that's very discreet so if you are showing some nutrients some of my images I do some tasteful nudes I don't d'oh a playboy style, so we're not showing you know anything that is we're not sure what any of that stuff you know it's very, very, very, very tastefully done in a very, very dignified way, but it's images that you may not want to hang on your wall. Yes, so when you are actually shooting kadar, is everything covered, like our shooting or just groping? Well, is sometimes it's crop it, but especially I'm very conscious of showing anything in the lower region. I don't you know, I'm going to cover that if it's breast will use that we cover with arms if she has a very pretty breasts, if she's got very pretty breast, we may show I may occasionally show some breast, but I'm not going. I don't show anything that's, if it's something of the bottom, if we're gonna do some nudes, then I'm going to use her body to cover herself in a very dignified way. She might take her hand and cover her bottom, you know, with her hand in this area bending that me, by the way, is a great way to hide parts that we don't necessarily want to show. Does that make sense? Maybe later I can ask it's more about like you are a female photograph and shooting female subject? Yes, and then as a male, we try to, like, keep them covered, and so they feel comfortable, like for the time grab well, you know, I really understand that I know that being a woman in the good war world especially is a plus for me it is absolutely a plus however it's been my experience for many of you women to have a male doctor avail gynecologist I mean, I'm sorry, but after they've seen a few it's not that big a deal anymore, so just the way I look at it is when your camera is up at your eye you become invisible, you become invisible and if you handle somebody with dignity and you are with your camera is up to your eye and you are covering them discreetly or you are communicating your outstanding really close to them, you'd be surprised how much more comfortable people feel in front of you as an individual and maybe create some beautiful images that may be where they don't have a top on or something of that nature but it's because you're not you're not in their personal space, so I can't I'm not saying that you shouldn't do that or you can't do it, but whatever you do, you need to speak to that person in a very dignified, very, very classy way and use, you know, use appropriate languages that said, I use gestures allies to push your hip this way using the back of your hand to gesture is a great way to get someone to be more comfortable because you're not using the palm of your hand and that's more invasive does that help? Okay, yes, I just would like to step back just a little bit when you say the albums or break now, yes, do you mean an actual physical album where you put the pictures to slide him in or do photo books actually excellent question? They're always physical, real books. So in other words, they're not like an online book because why? Because women are tactile creatures we want to touch and hold stuff, you know, there's, not a pregnant woman that can walk in a room that we're not migrating and want to touch your belly. It just happens. We just immediately isn't that true? We just automatically just migrated like a little beacon, you know, we just immediately assume that it's ok for us to put our hands on some lady stomach, you know, just what we do, so they're really books. However, I like albums that are designed to, like we can do our designs and photoshopped lay them out so they don't have to be a mad and book, they could be one of those beautiful books that are done, like, you know, a zoe mentioned that as your does for me or that africa albums does where they are they're a digital album in other words, they're going to be the files are going to be sent to the lab they're going to be printed and then bound in a beautiful album that way as well. So but a variety of different ways I don't I don't have only one way to do my book sometimes I use mattered books the way that might my services air handled it depends on the client and when it comes to posing your subject, whoever your subject is I don't have a set way that I posed people or that I communicate with them and it's because I don't know who you are yet you see, I really believe that that my style of photography is based upon the individual that I'm photographing I and this is how I determine who are working with I look at what they're wearing because fashion in my opinion rules the world it absolutely rules the world that's why we have coach seats and alexis and that's why I believe that you know that's what we use certain tones in our home color schemes like in nineteen seventy five or in the seventies there was avocado green appliances in your kitchen is just what this started with the fashion world, so the first thing I do when someone walks in my studio is I watched I look where they wearing does their handbag match their shoes now what in the heck could I possibly learn by somebody's hand bag matching her shoes what's that mean what's that to do with anything linda what does have to do with anything? Well, they may have soil but it goes way farther than that come on, terry what does that mean if her handbag yeah, which tells me what they're into details right? What if their manner huh? That's true they could be very conservative so these things it tells me a lot about who I'm working with so that I don't have to ask them that stupid question of the universe which is what kind of photography do you want then I'm sorry it's a stupid question that has ever been you know what don't question you know why it's a stupid question because people don't know what they want it's like going shopping I go into the north from yesterday and this little lady comes up to me says can I help you and I go no thank you I'm just looking when five seconds later something calls me why? Because I felt it I saw it and at that moment then I realized what I really wanted and so it goes back to photography from a standpoint that many of us don't know what we want but we know what we want we see it so the unspoken is what they're wearing that tells me volumes about who I'm working with it tells me whether they're real private whether they are very conservative it tells me if there were a big flashy hearings and a big bill you know that he's tells me there a little bit more like for sochi they like sparkly things that tells me volumes about that girl that tells me she wants to be noticed it's like look at me so those kinds of things you're going to tell me a lot about the clients so I left their visual style dictate the way that I posed them in the way that I the way that I engage with my subject any of the questions we'll move on I want to say we have about ten minutes till brake so hard okay, so and just getting to the just to the lighting again notice the light is coming from over here this shoulder being raised up right here is important for her this leg right here the fact that her leg is bent that is really important what would happen if I had that let that need down in front? Yeah, all I've done is and twenty pounds her thighs so the forward thigh forward leg is the one that I want bed because it's going to take any pressure off of them here I need a cherokee to come or your chair for seven baby okay notice what happens with my thighs now and by the way this is a rare sight get to see this fatter side of the mt but I'll do anything for a cause ok notice what happens with my father okay bob sitting here and this is so embarrassing I'm going to hate this but you know you got to do what you gotta do but if I just have my father just sitting down in this chair this has come on like by the way would you not agree this is the potty pose I mean, we don't have the right way to do that but that's what this is called the body post so okay, but notice how it just makes that fi just it's like hello bacon big fire, right? But now notice what happens if I first of all move forward in the chair and I eliminate so it's not flattening out already I'm making that five look thinner so now if I looked it up and then I cross it over it's making the thighs look smaller in here because I'm not flattening it out and I'm not creating that that that more pancake area down here in the fox it's much more flattering for your subject questions you doing okay? All right so let's move forward um one other thing before I go on next week highlight and then shadow and then another highlight on her face and then more shadow areas. This is really important because the main light is crossing her body here. Do you see how small the highlight is on her arm that's really important? Because in this photograph, which is closer, her shoulder, her face that's, right? So if that because that shoulder is closer to the lens of the camera, if I were illuminating that arm if I had the light on this arm, guess what? That arm is going to be showing up and is going to be bigger than the face and it's gonna make the arms of heavier. Ok, so, really think about where you're positioning your subject in relation to that light source. I love lots of negative space. In fact, we talked about this a moment ago. This is a great example of an image I would absolutely not. Crop is an eight by ten. It would just look ridiculous. It needs a breathing room. It needs to have room for your eye to travel. We read from left to right. So the power point that right hand, a third of the picture is a very powerful, powerful spot. Um the lightest coming in again from this direction right here to get a nice highlight on her face, and in her case, she's one of those people who can actually have the flat of her arms she can she can cross her body and she can squeeze yourself and we could see the back of her arms. It's ok, the back of her hands. But why it's? Because again, most of that armisen shadow on lee the edge of the arm is illuminated so that's why it will work so in in her case with this additional four of those young women, by the way, she has a long, thin face. Do you notice that she got a very long, long face, so having so having that light be a bit softer and also measures have photographing her straight into her face that's why she's got that? What they've got a longer skinny face which needs to be perked out a limit on the size doesn't make sense ok, good we're doing okay, all right, so notice again again, this is another image. It would be ridiculous to crop it is an eight by ten because it would crop her hand off. It was just ridiculous, but notice how she is posing again the lightest coming from that the left hand side but notice what's going on again? It starts with the feet this forward foot like right here notice it's bent forward like this in this case her weight is on her back foot, but now she's leaning forward a bit you see on creating that energy flowing this way and but she's leaning forward with her chest. You see, when you have somebody leaned forward with chest, you arch that back, and then I killed her face back towards the light source. So in other words, if this were my life source, I'm gonna have her bring her front foot forward just a little bit lean forward with the chest and then turned her face back towards a light source so that the light skins across her shape across her body. Ok, any questions for everyone? Way have so many questions. I know, I know. Okay, so, you know, I'm from a time for maybe one more. Okay, well, photo nature wanted to know how much time you spend with the client before the shoot. Oh, excellent question. Um, ok, how much time do I spend with them? Well, it depends on the kind of photo shoot that it is. If it's a boudoir session, I generally before I start shooting maybe ten minutes. I'll sit down with him on my couch. Um, we have either spoken on the telephone and I've encouraged him to bring a variety of different things in I do not have in my studio lingerie for people aware, I think it's kind of icky and creepy I mean, who wouldn't were closed? Other people had on, so not do that so but what I do that's, why I use fabrics a lot because they're just much more harmless and I can and I can recover whatever I need to with fabrics and create a variety of different looks that way. So the first thing I do when I sit down with a person is I talked to them about their concerns and about the things that they like, I want to find out about their personal style, is this that I'm the first thing I'm doing? I'm looking at what they're where are there wearing closed toe shoes? Are they wearing cute sandals that are sparkly? Are they wearing heels? Those kinds of things tell me a lot about who the subject is, and then I asked them view point questions, viewpoint questions are important because how do you feel about such and such requires that they give me what it requires that they give me more than a yes and no answer, right? It means that they have to tell me how they feel about something, and that tells me volumes. It tells me what to avoid, you know, I don't like, you know, I'm really scared about having my picture taken, I hate having my picture taken well, why? Well, you know, I just you know, I never liked the way I look, and I feel stupid. Well, what is it that could make you feel stupid about about having your picture taken? He asked them viewpoint questions and you start fishing, and they tell you exactly what to avoid easily. It tells you what to avoid. Now, if it's for a wedding, I do an engagement session for every client that I photographed. And in fact, when I do, when I the first time I meet with the bride when I am her initial interview with me, um, the first thing I do when she sits in my room before I show her a single album, the first thing I do, I sit down with her. I'm going to find a spot that is lower than her. So if I if one of you girls was my bride, I'm gonna be sitting right here on the coffee table. Why? Because I want to be lower than you. Why? Because that makes you feel like you're in a position of power and I will lean forward a bit so that I could become very engaged. This is really who I am. I want them to feel comfortable and relaxed, the next thing I'm gonna do is I'm going to ask them. Tell me a little bit about your wedding first of all tell me about your dress I want to know all about that dress why do I want to know about her down why do I want to know about her dress because it's going to tell me volumes about her tell me well she says oh well we're in this big group people again and we're tr on my head and and and then I get this little sweetheart neckline well blah blah right what does that tell me princess ok am I going to be showing her some sassy sexy bride who's on the beach wearing a slinky gowns? No because if I do she's going to do that she's gonna flip flip flip shut that book in the mumbai it's gonna be over she's been saying nice knowing you bam but it is going to be over the e r so I want to know what who I'm talking to so that the first album that I show her is exactly what she wants to see and it's because I have respect for who you are not who I want you to be I do not have a a philosophy of well it's my way or hit the highway I don't believe in that because photography is my profession it's not my religion it's my profession I do this yes I love it I have a ball doing it and I guess but I am paid really well to do my craft, and so I believe that I'm a photographer of humanity, which means I'm gonna photograph you the way you want to be photographed, and I'm gonna find out who you are so that I could photograph you in the best way that makes each of you feel comfortable. And that way, when you look at your pictures, you say, hey, ban you but my smile that you are really am and there are some points that I photographed that are very, you know, beautiful and sexy, like this young lady, you know, when you have this amazing love, you are very much were a lot of sparkly jewelry and stuff. I immediately put on sparkly mode. Bambi, this is part of learning vamp unease, and I do are going to sparkly bambi mode, and I'm going to do all this crazy, you know, you know, get real wild and crazy, and then if I have this gal who's, very private and quiet and guess what, I'm going to back off, and I'm going to become a bit more private and quiet and move nice and swiftly use softer tones in my voice and validating her in every step of the way, but in a way that's going to dignify that particular individual. That's exactly what I'm gonna handle it so the moral of the story is find out who you're working with and then that tells you a lot about how to photograph them. You know, we talked a little bit earlier about placement of pants, so when you hansel early look at this photograph of this young lady um even when she's laying down the position of her shape is really important, you notice that her legs are not laying one on top of one another that's important and we're gonna demonstrate that when we come back on dwi do supposing it a little bit also notice how this back arm is tucked underneath the waste? Why? Because we don't want the waist to look thicker we want the waist look curve a cious and notice how there's less light on the arm than there is on the waistline sorry and I'm not such a texas for but notice how that because there's more light on her waist you see that shape of her waistline and then notice the fingers notice how they're very soft generally when people if I need somebody to hold a garment, a garment by a woman is going to be held not by these two fingers, not by those two but by these two fingers why? Why? Because look what it does to my friend and see how it lays my hand nicely she could still hold her dress for her, her fabric, her skirt or her wedding gown but with these two fingers it makes all the difference in the world that it gives us beautiful, elegant soft look that's very, very pretty so with her, I just said, I want you to basically touch your thigh and then just lift it and then drop it back down, just lift your finger and then drop it back down and it lays the fingers in a very, very pretty way you know, we haven't talked a lot about exposure let me tell you about how I meet her. I use the light meter in the camera in the cannon system I used on lee the nine, the smallest amount of meat oring that you can, I don't believe I don't like the forty five the matrix of the forty five degrees, you know where you can, you can meet her for everything in the entire universe. I don't like that because I know exactly what I want to be exposed properly and that is her skin. I want that to be exposed properly, so I use the center focusing point and that's the evaluative meeting, which is a little circle with the dot in the middle because I want the center of that picture to be where my focus and more my media ring is taken from and then I will halfway hold down the trigger halfway so I can lock the exposure and locked the focus. And then I will recompose I don't use the wheel on the back. I use this finger only on lee because I just want to concentrate on one thing. I got to give me one finger. I can handle that. Ok? I just find you the wheel. One more thing to have for me by my little poor brain to have to think about. So I want one finger. I don't use the focusing mechanism on the back. Give me that. Just was shattered just like any, you know, you know, just just one finger work that's all have to do so that way I can have my focusing done in a proper way. I use manual meet oring, um, on lee. And the reason is, is because I get a much more accurate exposure. You see, when you look at exposing your subject, you have to think about what color are their skin tones on, whether the african american, darker skin tones or whether be somebody was really, really light skinned. You have to consider those when you're talking about exposing because in your camera, the light meter in your camera, any light meter on lee understands one thing. Because there's a black point, a white point and eighteen percent gray in the middle and your camera exposes for eighteen percent grey. What does that mean? Well, if you're photographing my skin that's about accurate cause, my skin is approximately eighteen percent, right? But what about somebody? Who's african american is their skin eighteen percent right? No it's probably at least a stopped two stops under. So to get a proper exposure on darker skin tones, I have to actually fool the light meter in the camera and under exposed so that's really important that's why I use the manual meter, because then I can expose for the individual that I'm working for and get a proper exposure on them, which gives you an overall, you know, gives you a better foundation. You see, the less work that I have to do with those files afterwards, the better I want to be able to get as much done in the camera as humanly possible so that I don't have to spend hours retouching I don't spend hours composing and I don't just spend hours doing other things. I can concentrate on great expressions and know that I'm going to get in the ballpark, I do shoot in raw mode. So that if I happen to be off by half stuff I'm okay as long you have four stops of exposure compensation when you're using raw in the cannon system to over and two under so as long as I'm you know not within you know over that then I'm gonna be just fine in my exposures but generally I try to fall in to getting it getting it right in the camera which is why I like to meet her manually and we have I know we're about out of time for this segment right during the last question oh sure I mean we have tons of questions we can go a little bit over our producer says if like so depending on what you'd like to do before the break let's give me one more question from the audience like here yes when you when you showed your lenses that you like to use all of them a lot of them almost all of them are really fast lenses when you're when you're meeting on a subject and then holding the to turn you down halfway and then re composing when you're at one point two or one point four two point oh even um how do you deal with the what's clear and what's not absolutely excellent question I'm not going you seriously are way smarter than you look you are you're smart guy okay what you have to think about is I pay attention to the eyes, are they when I'm moving? Am I going to move when I recomposed is that I still going to be sharps? In other words, I'd want to make sure that that forward I the one closest to the camera, is going to be tax sharp. So as long as I locked down the exposure, if I just move it horizontally, that eye is still going to be in shortly and focus the other element that goes into that that you have to think about in my case, is that the can system that I use the mark four system has the smaller chip in it, you know, has the smaller chips, so it has a bit of amplification factor. What that basically means is a one point three amplification factor. In other words, my seventy two, two hundred is more like a one hundred to three hundred millimeter lens, but one of the other things about that is that you have inherently greater depth of field for the given s stop. So one point two isn't like what it would look like on like the five d. The five d camera has the full chip regulates the same size one point two is exactly one point two. But on my camera because I have a smaller chip on it has the amplification factor you have greater depth of field for the given s stop, so I actually have a little bit more like I'd say more like two point oh is the way it actually visually looks great question okay let's move on just a little bit I've got a few more things to cover with you you could do beautiful, beautiful portrait of just about anyone noticed with this young lady that I've got her arms pressed against her shape you see, there are there are all of the come on steps that I'm teaching you are conceptual their concepts they're not absolute because there are exceptions to any rule and in her case because number one we're not seeing that arm on the left hand side or on the right hand side and we're only seeing this one armed by bringing those arms underneath the bus line I can push the bus together and give her a bit of amplification in her chest so there are exceptions to every rule. So in other words, if you can't see it does, it isn't really there so sometimes like with the arms, especially if I want to enhance the bell sign this is especially a powerful technique for mature women if you're doing boudoir for an older woman and you want to give her a little bit more cleavage and give her just ah prettier bust bring those arms underneath the bust and then have her squeeze slightly and it's gonna give her a pretty shape but you've got to make sure that you crop those arms crop it out the arms out so that it doesn't add both does that make sense? Okay again no notice where the light is coming from notice to catch light in her eye and out skims across the iris it's a very soft light source in this case the light is coming from the right hand side and it's just eliminates a nice big spread out light which is very, very flattering for just about any subject. By the way, this is marcus spells black and white actions just gorgeous action um but there are also times we talked a little bit about exposure a minute ago. There are times when I want to overexpose because of what the subject is in this case I could properly I could take a proper exposure and then on boost it later on in photo shop but I like getting it right in the camera so I chose to overexpose this image by about stock why? Because I don't want the skin toe look like skin I wanted to go white I want after that then I'm going to increase the contrast of it because what was really powerful in this experience with this subject was those incredible blue eyes this this massive, this beautiful piece of a fabric on her face and the color atonality again, the concept and the the photographic experience has to fit in the context of the picture itself. So in other words, I'm not going to try to make her look all soft and prissy because it doesn't work with that subject, so I want to I want to have a bit of high contrast to make those eyes pop the other thing that will happen when you add contrast to that face and blow the skin out hey, guess what if you've got somebody with really bad skin, guess what football those all of those imperfections in the skin or a lot of them go away and you're not going to see them so it's a really, really good thing to do in this case with this young woman exactly the same kind of experience the scenario shooted the treatment, the sooner the treatment. So I chose to over it's those a bit using bright sun. This is in the bright sun, I'm photographing her in a bright, sunny day how do I look at the tiny, how small her pupils are in her eyes? You could see again the light source and this is a shark this is actually a small light source, how do I know look at the shadow on her nose, see how it's got a sharp edge to it, it's a fairly sharp edge that you can't see it as much because I over exposed the image of it to make it blow out a little bit more, but only because I really wanted just those eyes to pop and those lips to pop and I really wanted them to show up on, by the way, is the sun in the sky a large light source or a small one? That's exactly right? It is a small light source except on a day like today, when we have clouds or diffusion are or that kind of thing, then we're going to have when you have diffusion of any congress, be clouds or fog, then it becomes a large light source because it spreads that light out. But generally the sun is a small light source on lee, because it's so very far away. Well, on that note, we're going to take a short break, and when we come back, we're going to actually get to working with our real life model. So I hope you guys will join us in a few minutes, okay, let's, get busy, we're going.

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Bambi Cantrell

Bambi Cantrell has been photographing in the San Francisco Bay Area for over 25 years. Her passion for capturing the decisive moment and her subsequent creative style have made her a household name in the photographic industry.Among her many accomplishments,

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Portrait Photography Lighting

Ratings and Reviews

a Creativelive Student

I'm very grateful to have the opportunity to lean from this course. This is such a fantastic value. Thank you, Bambi, for your time and talent. Thanks to Creative Live for making this resource available to us. I'm very, very thankful.

a Creativelive Student

I discovered CreativeLIVE this weekend. I am so glad that I did. This workshop was fabulous! I watched as much of the live broadcasts as I could. Then I kept my computer on throught the night so I could watch the rebroadcasts. I was compelled by all that I learned to purchase the course. Bambi is an incredible, down to earth, informative and funny woman. Her insights will have already helped me shape my future as a professional photographer. Thanks for a fine, influential weekend.

user-dae64a

WOW BAMBI!!! Thanks so much for your generosity and love in the abundant information you gave us during this posing and lighting course. I have had dozens of aha moments throughout the course and your practical tips have changed my photography forever. I see the direction of light and know exactly where to place myself and my subject confidently and swiftly. I still have a ton of practicing to do but this class gave me a great start . I plan on re-watching the classes and give myself some mini exercises to practice what you taught....Oh...and i wish I can remarry my husband of 15 and a half years so you can be my wedding photographer :)

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Posing and Lighting Overview

Posing and Lighting Overview

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1. Posing and Lighting Overview

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