Lessons

Lesson Info

Pre-Shoot with Q&A

I'm going to show you the four different clients that we're gonna be working with while we're here. Nicole is our first client today she's going to come with two boys she's got a four year old and a two and a half year old I'm so used to turning around, I'm not even looking at this thing in front me e I can see right here now um, two and four, four and two so that's going to be fun? We'll see some rowdy, I'm sure, but she sent me this room in her living room and obviously I've just placed the frames right over what she sent me here in the room that she photographed, you see that I've asked her to just take a piece of paper to the wall, which is the easiest, best first way to do this is just have her take a piece of paper, the wall, you take it into preview measure it and then you've got your exact sizing for your framing is that you're going to dio, and so I planned a package a for her, which is the three ten by tens. These three are all tend my tens, even though they look like differe...

nt sizes, they're just different size moldings, so we've got a six inch folding in the middle and a four inch molding on each side. The one that we have displayed here is that that's all a four inch molding so that that's going to look a little bit different, but I just thought for the size of the wall there she had enough room to do one a little bigger, another grouping that would work work really well here that I would suggest would be ah, one of the bigger frames with smaller frames underneath, because, again, she's got that depth and that that space for that so that's nicole what I'm the reason that I chose a grouping with three images is because I'm planning on putting the boys together in the middle and then one of each of them on the sides. If we did one of the bigger groupings, I would have the boys together and the big image and in the middle image on the bottom, and then two of each of them on the sides we wanted toa alta just tell a little story. Leone is our second client, and she also has two small ones. I think she's got a boy and a girl, but she sent me the stairway is the place that she wanted to decorate. And so again, you know what? It's throwing the stuff up there, you've got to use your imagination a little bit because we're not we're seeing that stairway in front of the the wall so we've got enough just frame right over it she's going to use for imagination to imagine those back on the wall and not in front of that stairway but I want to give her the idea of seeing this finished so that she can start envisioning what that's gonna look like once her kids get photographed and she's got great images over kids in there, so I planned package c for her, which is a sixteen by twenty and to ten by ten and then I added an additional ten by ten that would be super easy to just take off, but she can see it so that it's that option that's there for her and with that again, I would do the two kids in the bigger one, one of each of them and the smaller ones and then another one of both the kids if she chose to keep that grouping and like it wass I'd probably bring the one of the two kids over to the top left and have the single ones and the ones that's bottom left and the one that's top right just for you symmetry there so just want to think about the flow of things again they're not even taken this campus off the wall that's ok? We're just gonna frame right over the top of it and once we put those there kids in there at the end of this you know they're going to take that art piece down whatever it is and I've worked with people in chicago before that they'll sit and tell me how much is on their wall do you know what I paid for this? You know they're proud of it, but once you get their kids in those images right on top of it yeah, I can find another spot for that thing so you know, it's it's the power of being able to just show it done and then our last client they were in a photograph tomorrow morning this is her play room she again she's had a a canvas on the wall and so I designed this grouping based on the colors in that canvas because I'm going to suggest to her and I actually already have that she either hang this grouping as it is or she can keep the campus where it is hang the three small ones underneath and then moved the larger portrait to another part of the room it's still all going to tie together so we're still working within that grouping. Um lisa sent me three images any time they send me more than one I'm going to design every space they send me I'm just going to assume if you sent me three wells you want three walls designed right? So they're lisa and her husband are planning to adopt soon and so they've got the baby room ready for for the baby. And so I'm going to suggest to her that she hang a picture of big brother and sister in the baby room. You know, that's a great way to bring in the new baby into the new home. Obviously, she's can say no and that's okay, we want always make the suggestions to make that available to her. All right, so this, uh I was gonna tell you one more thing about one of these moms, I think it's lynn, eh? British might be nicole. Anyway, one of these mom, it is nicole, this is our first client is pregnant and she's, like, eight months pregnant. And so you're going to get to see me work with her and kind of work through that process of well, I'm just about to have another baby. Why would I wantto hang fortress of my kids right now? When there's another one coming? And I've already discussed some things with her, we'll discuss him again. When she's here for the sale, I'm sure, but some of the suggestion that I'm making to her would our things like, you know, this is this is the last time that it's going to be just these two all the sudden there's gonna be another baby in the house and this baby is going to take over. It is another boy, they're having a third boy, but we all know that when the next day becomes the little one's kind of feel like, what about me? You know? And there have been actual studies done that have shown what? How is self esteem of a child is built when there's portrait's in the home of the child and of the family? So I've talked to nicole about that and talk to her about, you know, this is going to be a great thing if we go ahead and do this, you get the images of the boys on the wall, they're going to have something to be excited about and show off when the family comes in and they want to hold the baby when friends come in and it's, they're bringing gifts for the baby. Now, this two year old, this four year old can say, yeah, but look at me, you know? So I'm walking her through some of those steps along the way too kind of, you know, moved through those objections before they even happen. So she's not ableto say to me, well, what about this so any objections that you guys get that you feel like yes, yeah I'm so glad that you touched on the campuses are existing on the walls because ernie and I were talking about that yesterday that that's the problem I face the most is that the house is already decorated and they have no space or let it or I was walking with a client around her house and you know, she's got these are pieces that they oh I'm into art and it's all over I'm like so what happens when they have no room now so typically I'm handling this on the phone but if I was in the home I would do with this exact same way but when a mom says to me, well, we've got all windows in our house you just have no place where you know for pictures or they tell me we've got stuff everywhere we don't have any wall space, whatever the objection is I'm gonna tell her you know what? I love a challenge if you'll just walk to your house if there's even a place you consider hang your portrait if she's taking that picture she's considering it, okay, so I'm gonna tell her walk to your house and any place you'd even consider hanging your portrait I just want you to take that snapshot for me don't even worry about taking something off the wall if it's something that you would consider replacing go ahead and take that photo so I'm going to assume that since she took this photo she is willing to replace that campus and I'm gonna didn't design over it typically a mom who says I don't have any space I have all windows she's really proud of that window light and that's great so that's something that I want to talk about is you know I love houses like that when thoughts of natural light that's so awesome you know if you know I love a challenge just walk around anyplace he would even consider you know, maybe maybe not and then I'll tell them you know, I have people that hang stuff in bathrooms and mud rooms and kitchens and you know it's it's all good wherever you think there might be a spot that you would want to enjoy the kids every day enjoy kids everything I love and that is something to use when I am talking tio two moms for our regular sessions I not only want to know about their decor style in their colors and all that I want to know about their lifestyle too, so I'll ask them you know, do you like to entertain um do you you know, whatever just stuff about what they do and if they're entertaining it's it's a way to say, you know, great you're going to love having something to just show off what's most important to you and a lot of times if it's a mom who's entertaining that's going to be the mom that I'm going to ask is that mom who's got the white carpet and the room nobody goes in and it's you know, it's that profile of the mom and you already know that that's a question to ask you like to entertain you like to bring people in your house she's probably the working mom so once you tell her this is a way to show off what's most important to you I mean, I gotta have that I'm off working every day and busting off my kids I need to have this to let people know this is most important to me use a great line but love your language but the same thing with the mom who is to stay at home, mom and, you know, has got that home where the kids coming after school and have their cookies and jump on the couches and and all that that great stuff, same thing you know, I'm talking to her and she says, yeah, we have this wonderful room that is a great room. I make sure the kids all sit down for dinner at least three nights a week, we're all here and I'm going to tell her the same thing I'm going to say, you know what a great place to be able to enjoy this family session or enjoy these moments that we've captured in this place where you sit down all together once a week and enjoy each other you know it's just like you said using that language and that self esteem thing I'm so going to use that because that's one of the most important things to me when I'm photographing as I told you yesterday for me one of the reasons I photograph children is I used to be a youth worker and for me it is about making that child feel important and feel and it is amazing how excited they are when they're pictures on the walls I mean my kids when the pictures come kids, when new people come over they point to their pictures on the campus is on the wall and I'm just really going toe now focus on helping parents realize it's so important to her up and take that step get them on the walls because even like studies show this improves their self esteem and what you said about the second before the second before the baby's born what a brilliant idea laurie because yes, parents were all thinking about the new baby but that's just a great way to say yeah but this is about there's all these new photos were going to come in for the battle of new baby and the kids are going to sing all everybody cooing over the baby isn't this great to focus on them first, I love it, lori I'm so using that when I'll give you one more circumstance as well and I'm talking about high school seniors here but I know there's people out there who will be planning events around the high school seniors like we talked about yesterday, but with high school seniors there are a lot of objections come up when it comes to law portrait's and the objections are we've got little ones and I don't really want to make a shrine to the older one or I've had these two that have already graduated and, you know, we got to do the same thing and so I always want to turn it back to them and say, you know what? I'm gonna bet your kids are all really different and they're gonna say, yeah, because they all are and so, you know, why don't we do something really special today for, you know, for jasmine let's do something that's all about her and just for her? And then one of the reasons we offer a free family session for every single person that comes through is a high school senior we'll tell them, you know, when we do your family session in the fall, we'll go ahead and get it portrait's matched up of the other kids, whether it's younger, older, whatever so again, it's just, you know, going from those objections that you've had even once and figuring out how am I gonna answer this the next time? How am I gonna address it beforehand of possible but always having that very positive way to communicate to them? This is the best thing to do really? Just one quick question because there are a number of people that are asking it online and the k k is one as well as mountain girl for longtime customers who have bought your wall groupings do they keep buying after year after year or just change out the prince in existing groupings? And do you allow that? Yep and that's a great question and yes, when we are hanging something in somebody's, come back, you know, third year on the road let's let's say I'm either I'm always gonna tell them the most lived in area of your home is where you want the most current portrait's so let's hang something from today session in the most lived in there of your home if that's going to take the place if this is most living area, we're going to take the place of this grouping we can either choose to take this grouping to another area of the home we can split these images up, which is a great thing about a gallery we can add to the gallery so if we've got this grouping and we're going to add three more from this year, we could do it right in the same space if their space and so we'll talk about growing your gallery a lot because I want to always give them that option that they can add imagesit I also will if this these frames are perfect for this space, they want to keep him there absolutely will actually take the frames from them, re frame them with the new prince, and the old prince will be back behind them toe archive them so well, and we've done we've done all of those options, and then miley had a question earlier about how they get their portrait in the end and for me, I have a studio space, and so even for the events, I want them to come pick up their portrait because then they're seeing everything else that we do. However, we also have done events on location where I've delivered everything backto one spot I do an event in minneapolis ah, once a year at least once a year and it's about three and a half, four hours for me, which isn't a huge amount of distance, but it's too far to for everybody to come pick up their porch. So we take everything all at one time, or I send it with one of my clients all at one time, and then everybody goes back to the event house to pick it up so you could do it any way you could ship there, there's lots of different ways to do it. Any frame company that you purchase from these guys, a creative, live knowhow out survey came package, which was with lots of packaging and just save your boxes. We always have labels that we can stick right over the labels that they came on our rip the labels offense to new ones on and just keep those packaging and the frame corners and literally, no matter what frame company or you're getting things from your good, they're going to come with frame corners, bubble wrap, they're going to be very well package that you could just ship them if you need teo, and then you're gonna want to charge for shipping if that's the option that they choose. But if your if your local and you're doing an event and you don't want to have them come to you, just take everything all to the host mom, and that could be part of the responsibility that she has, all right? Could I what if your don't know preview does that work with wild sorbet like they have the okay so my question is is I'm the wheels are turning in my head about about working with local companies and how I can partner with people um aaron brothers is a local framing company here and um I'm thinking well what can I do to work with them I mean and would there be a way to show what they provide within preview I don't know um there are both levin frame company and uh handcrafted framing are the two traditional frame companies that are in preview any frame ercan have their stuff in there that would just need to contact them they have to provide pictures of everything so it's mork but you also can photograph and put in your favorite frames okay and they can help you do that but the ones that are there if you get down and nuts and bolts almost all of the major frame companies have the same moldings and so you can show your client basically the right thing even with wild sir bay I have to play around on the colors and that's why we have the color sticks because there they don't look exactly the same I've got to get it right for the client to view and then I've got a really pick the colors you know, eh? So it's going to be that same way with traditional framing choose a couple of great moldings when you when you first start, get for me with a shooting black and white. I'd want a really great black molding in a couple different widths and maybe a like this, like a brown town. More of a c p a tone and just make your selection easy, especially for events. You want to make it very easy for the client to buy, so don't show him one hundred fifty two molding, you know, even if you're even if you bring him in to preview know what your favorites are so you can quickly pull them and have them pre pulled so that you can make suggestions based on the images as well as their decor. You could, but you can put the images into the picture and preview yes, okay, that's, what I was wondering so we can show them that with the ap their photo on their wall yet in the frame that you just exactly so enough already we're actually gonna do that next. They just quick question about seniors you just mentioned with seniors than you offer family sessions as well. Is that a freebie that you you do all of our high school seniors there they get a free family session with every senior session. And I do that I started doing that literally because of the objections that we would get and I knew that I needed teo I need to figure out how to match up so they've concentrated on this senior and so we do it all the time um they what has happened now as a result of that is those air some of our highest average is in our business because they've already been through the process, you know? So it's their great clients I love high school seniors more and more all the time oh, that's fine. All right, so this is preview and we're gonna go here, I've built our clients that we've got coming in. We just think this so hopefully it'll all happen. Lisa is the one with the three different groups things I'm just gonna work with her since we've got a couple things to work with. So we're going click on this session that she's got the collections at that I just went into that's where you're going to list your sessions for your client so you you might have more than one collection if you've got more than one session if they come in for a family session than a child session than a birthday sessions so you're going to just name so I would name him with their last name and then b day for birthday session r k for real kids and then I always put the year on it. Typically they're not going to do the same type of session in a year during the first year is going to stay and be for newborn two thousand twelve, four months, two thousand twelve, eight months to house twelve so it's all there so we can get right to their images. Uh, this little light bulb is the light trade. We're going to go out to that and that's going to bring in. I have no images for this client yet because we have a photographed her yet if we did, we would see oliver images here and you'll see me put those in this afternoon, we can build projects here for the client, which is just putting different frame groupings together, and then we can load in her home view, and I'm going to go back out and actually load. Oh, I can't this isn't my computer. Um, say I'm gonna load a home you for you, but I think I might be able to show you anyway. Let's, see, and march ago, okay. And home views when I click on one of these images it's going to take me into this room I can label the room I've named labelled this playroom and it's going to give me this ruler to work with I had already put it on this piece of paper because that's you know what it normally when I open this up the first time it's gonna be horizontal ruler and it's probably gonna be a little bigger than the bigger you can get them to measure the better um what I found is is that by telling them it's a piece of paper it makes it something that everybody has laying around that makes it easy and they don't have to get out of measuring tape they would rather find a piece of paper and a piece of tape than a measuring tape so that's where that came from now we have this tool that they could do skill and stick but it also always if you can get him to measure something bigger it's better the peel of sick just makes it easy for them so I'm gonna put it here and I know this paper is eleven inches so I'm gonna go over here and type in my eleven inches and then it's actually going to size this room for me so it knows exactly how big this area is something click save and now when we go out into the light trey I can click on this room this is the one we had and I'm here in now in the kid's room and I've already built this but if I had it built it yet I could go into these projects and just pull this framing on the wall this ice eyes this frame to eight by twelve which you can see over here and so now when it comes on this wall this is exactly what an eight by twelve four inch molding is going to look like that may even be a six inch holding I'm not sure but I'm gonna delete that with this grouping that we chose this is a sixteen my twenty four and three eight by eight now felisa gets here and she says oh I really love that but I hate those dots on that frame take those dots off no problem we just click on it it's going to take us into the project builder and I'm gonna go into my frame collection and here is where my shabby dots are and I'm just gonna get rid of him so no trouble she says see, I like that morning I wanted a different color I could just pull up all these all these colors and typically for me this comes up in a kind of by colors I would rather see it alphabetically because I confined him more quickly more quickly that word good programmer uh but alphabetically here if you hold your mouse over him you can get all the colors so she wants this to be bronze so there it is again I like him in the color sticks there even the catalogue before you get color sticks even the catalog you confined certain color so if she flips through here and says I gotta have this grouping I can look over here and it's going to tell me exactly what colors are on this molding so I can go in here alphabetically and find the colors and it makes it very easy tio customize on option for her for real kids I take in three color kind of packets and there's there's brights there's pastels and there's neutrals and typically I can plug somebody in there and they can actually see the actual colors so the discount that wild survey has right now is that okay for me to mention um they have actually put together each one of these packages and if you want to buy the rial kids one of the packages um and I don't make any money after this you guys this is not me trying to be a sales person but just what I use if you want to jump into this but you can get the package along with the two tabletop frames that come with the package and your choice in the the stick collections the color collections and she's got a great discount on those if you want to get something so you have something to show right away so and then what this is doing here on the bottom is it showing me everything that I've just built so I've got a formal broad bronze in the background I chose to delete my pattern my dots I've got rosy cheeks on the trim let's say we want to change arch for him we just go over here and I like this one better so I'm just gonna pull that over and choose my color again so it's makes it really easy to just you know, custom design when I click on this again I must induce a project and I'm gonna save for the wall and now it see how it changed it there and I've got the new color so it makes it really easy if I want to start this from scratch thes I actually have built here I've got the real kids packages a bcd so let's just take these off this wall and get rid of this frame grouping I've got the option of just pulling in a new package this is package, you see and I've got to go get my studio room client wall room's client and now I can pull in her wall and move these around on the new wall if she says I love that grouping but I don't like it in that room I'll pull in a different room so we can you know do it that way that makes sense so it makes it really easy to play with there if I don't want to choose one of those templates, you can also start from scratch you could make your own templates you can and by template, I mean the packages that I've created but or you can come in and you can start just by building a custom project so we can go out let's just go to projects I'm gonna click here on walter bay so you can come in normally, I would have all my image sorted in here we won't have those until after we photographed the clients, but I can still build a project for her. I can choose a striped frame, a regular plane, shabby chic frame or the dots frame. I can choose the parisians a gallery rap frame, which is kind of sets out on the wall box frame multiple image frame, textured frame, all that's built in right in here for you what it also does, um, let's say we're going to build a strike frame that's a striped ten by ten and this is going to give me a six inch molding automatically in this builder with the stripes, so we'll choose our molding color will choose our strike color, you can choose a pinstripe color and then your trim will throw a trim on there from color whoops don't go white so now we've got that that's not a good trim let's go back with that dark blue um and this is is the trim says talking of turquoise nautical sailboat blew. Okay, so this is what I was telling you guys about the colors are not perfect. This is actually the same color is this it doesn't look exactly the same. So you have to kind of walk that through with your client that I'll make sure that this is gonna, you know, bring me that that pillowcase and I'm gonna match it, you know, um and it helps the thing but we can now say save project and then when we go into back into this home view this is going to be in our project so we can now pull this onto a blank wall we conclude pull it onto the client wall in place it that piece of paper's there's what's gonna be the exact right size or we can go before you ever do in event if you want to start showing room groupings there's a room's global here that just has rooms for you has got solid color walls and you can customize it, make it any color you want or you can go in here and you can pull a room, do this, hang your grouping and you go back into her own projects and pulling another frame you can move them around you can size them once we get images in here this afternoon you'll see that we can pull our images in we can actually just click and expand the image that they can see what it's gonna look like cropped there's all kinds of options that you can do in here very quickly to actually play interior designer with your client this is such a different experience for them that there is they can't compare the dollar's at all they're not going to say well x y z photographer only charges this much this is a completely different experience so um someone was saying to me yesterday I won't look atyou or say your name but still with the idea that in my town this isn't gonna work I can't look over there because I don't wanna look at the person but you know there is somebody in my town that says the same thing you guys um it's you know it's winter said I was fifty, five hundred people in the middle of cornfields and there was someone in was a winner said I was saying I could never sell what she sells I do not take better pictures than than anybody else it's all about this entire experience and putting this whole plan and system into place following through planning with the client every step of the way that gets them to that final buying decision and it's not ever I'm pulling it out of them I mean they're they're excited by the time they sit down I've I've sent them I wouldn't send them this view we're not going to say that but you know if I'm talking teo mom we're talking about this she's already seen this I've already discussed with her and it's not even just sending over this picture hey here's what I put together for you it's what a wonderful place to have a portrait of the kids that are waiting for this new baby to come and fill this script you know it's I mean it's a whole different thing when we're talking about really what it's all about and really what it's all about is not just the session not just the images the pictures it's all about creating those memories not just through the images but through the experience that we give them the whole entire experience from start to finish all right, any questions there we did it we did have a quick question a little bit ago about this particular set of frames above the baby's crib do they have glass in them they do not have glasses so I was just thinking that like earthquake friendly I don't know yeah and and they don't have glass in them none of these have glass and them typically your most people don't glass there art and so if you communicate it in that way then it makes sense and we're texting everything everything's got a luster coating on it so it's all very protected we tell people just to feather dust there there portrait's in their frames that way nothing's ever getting sprayed on them or the only time that it ever becomes an issues if somebody's putting something in their bathroom and at that point we might offer plexi glass and I also work with the local framer uh he does a lot for me and even sometimes when we get in some of our bigger frames I'll take him over to tom because it's just easier for us to not have toe manually do a lot of it the bigger, bigger pieces we just had somebody who did a storyboard and inside it was three images framed a high school senior boy and the storyboard and there he had a eleven by sixteen three images and so by the time you frame three of those together this was a big piece and it wasn't something that my framer inhouse framer felt comfortable handling and you know, so she just took it over to tom and it's great to have somebody local like that you can have and especially when you're we've got glass involved but we will we will we will glass stuff for people I don't ever get glass on my framers we just get it from our local framer who's right around the corner so he he loves us and we love him start to think if there is anything just in here that I wanted to show you guys but probably not until we get images in so we'll go back to the keynote here we do have some more questions okay wonderful we have about uh twenty minutes so great. Okay, okay caroline stern wants to know do moms and to mom's and you ever get overwhelmed by the amount of choices while sober offer do you pre select color choices ahead of time I do and that's one of the benefits of having the room view is because when mom sends me this room but this one in this was one that I pre designed last night in the mill the night but she sent me this room I she's obviously got blue she's got browns and so I'm gonna go ahead and select that colors she can definitely tell me you know, I wantto bring in a little all of green in there and I can just click on it again and take groups maybe sticking I'm normally working with a pen tablet okay but I can click on that come back in here go to my frame collections molding color and I'll select it for her I'm not going to let her sit and go through you know some might say great you you want an olive green you can see it so I put that there how do you know? Do you like that? Yes, let's just save it and when we go back, it's changed for her and she can see it done. So I'm usually when I'm in here, I'm also I'm not on my computer, so I'm not going to do it. I'll show you how it's done I go ahead and just first of all, you can save your home view so we can do this and now she can actually, you know what? We're gonna have it over here, but I also want to just take a snapshot of it and I'll save it is olive green option and then we've got that to pull up and we can compare the two that's also, the way you've got it right here, you can save it however you want that's what we'll email to the client and so I typically do not email them this view without images in it until I've talked to them. So I'm going to tell him I'm going to get him excited about first I'm going to say I put something together from for you, I'm super excited for you to see it. What I see here is the kid's both in the middle frame and one of each of them on the sides and you know, I'm super excited photograph for that I want to walk them through that process because I want them to believe that this and it is, but I want them to know that this whole process is a process, the reason that I'm I'm photographing, you're having the photograph, the walls, I'm putting the framing on the walls, I'm talking about it, walking them through it is because I'm going to shoot for what it is we're going to be ending up with. I'm going to shoot for the final product, and so we're walking through all those things I almost always even know if they're going to buy a book and so that's something that we've communicated, you know, I love the books we, you know, I saw such and such is or I'm telling them what we have to offer. I tell him about the image boxes, but the image box you can. You've got ten images in it with ease. One of the things I love about the a c I boxes it is actually a box it's wooden, a lot of the other places that you get image boxes from, in fact, I don't know of any other that doesn't wooden box most of them are cardboard, and so over time they start wearing down and um, he's, you could actually, I mean, if it got put on your kids for at home and they stood on it it's not going to den in its true, so in the image boxes, they get ten mounted prints. Um, so this is a good way for you to see, you know what amounted textured print looks like with with lustre coating on it, so they're all very protected, they they feel good, they know when they see these with texture and coating that you know, that it's a good, solid print, so we off we'd tell them if they buy an image box, what most people do is they get a little easel to go along with it, you can put the prince out of me so you could put one out on easily. You can switch him out when you want to, or you can use them as gifts, so they've got a lot of different verse italic e with that, we do have people that end up with image boxes that do give them all away or use them in different areas of the house, and they use them for just little like trinket boxes on the kid's counters, so we'll give them that idea as well that's a really great thing for newborns. To do at one of the bigger image boxes and this is actually a flatter one but we do a lot of the ten by ten and it's thicker image boxes that they can keep all of their their birth certificate in their first little hair and you know the the hospital bracelets all those things that are special that can throw on the image box on top of the counter and are the dresser and it makes it a really nice little keepsake. What a great idea. Multipurpose way have a question in the audience. Yeah, I was curious about the software. How many lives is it comes with when you buy the softer than I have and how many it is one license, but you can use it on all the computers in your studio so anywhere, you know, if we're working on something downstairs and our retouching area where stacy work she's gonna do all her thing she's gonna load the finished images into preview she's going to sink it and and then it's gonna be upstairs in the order room so all of your computers are all going to talk to each other. We even in my studio I have pc and mac, our office computer and our order room computer rpc everything else is mac it all talks, so that makes it really great too. I don't know you know, a lot of the other programs that are able to do that, so we've got the, you know, the client management, the scheduling and the room views the sails, all that all in one spot that's all improve you out yet on it? Does it have just preview have the slide shows and, like, when you're going through choosing images, or is it just for the previews for the walls or doesn't have the viewing keep of the viewing capabilities? Thank you, yeah, yeah, yeah, I was talking about this right now, so I just wanted it also does, right? Yes, you will see that after we photograph our session. Okay, I'm gonna download the images right away and we'll show them right in preview also don't you can click and do a slide show, which will probably do because we've extended these sessions just a little bit longer so we can talk a little bit more through them. Um, typically with the events, I don't actually show a slide show, I just tell him we're gonna flip through the first time so that you can see everything. The reason is is because I'm a click and no if I don't want to see it again. So we're gonna flip through I'm real quick so that you can see everything, and then we'll go through each image one by one, and even as we go through, you'll see this afternoon that we're gonna go through and I'm gonna make suggestions and it's never going to be oh, I don't like that one or that one's not as good, but I'm gonna say, oh, I love her smile in this one so that it's it's making the job easier for mom if I have anything similar and we all know as we said, are at our computers and you're going, oh, but she'll like this one. And this, I mean, and her head's barely turn or she's, you know, just barely a different smile and, you know, what's mom gonna like better. Well, for doing that. What is she going to dio? We're ruining the order experience for her because all of a sudden now, it's hard work. So make all those decisions before your client season that's why, with these events, you have to be a little bit more careful with your shooting. They gotta edit in camera, which is okay, because mom's not watching over your back, um not one of the things I also do and I didn't even bring it here, but one of the things that I do in events a lot of times I have a cannon grip that is an electronic transfer to my ipad and I'll even hand them on the ipad while I'm shooting and nothing is gone for riel but I'll tell her you can start editing now and so she's got like a job to do during the session and I can just sit there and she's going to see him all as soon as I shoot him anyway but that kind of gives her a little bit of that power to go oh yeah she blinked her eyes oh yeah you know I love this and she's already kind of starting to formulate ideas before we sit down um it's a great it's it's whatever. I think nikon has one too but it's just it's through cannon is just a cannon's the wireless that's a wireless transfer yeah, I love it it's great with this high school seniors to kind of give us mom something to do does it have battery power like to the camera like does it? It is it fits on just like your your camera grip, right? But it's got one can one battery in there and then you actually have one still in your camera so you're providing extra power to your camera as well? Yes, yeah, it's just like a great uh huh. Do you you know, she sends in her picture for you, do you then show her the pictures like you have right here on the screen and she picks colors? Or do you wait until you've had this session with the kids and then revealing my actually choose the colors for her? So just like I did here, which I wouldn't choose this olive green mom told me she wanted this, so I changed it, but she hasn't seen any of this news. Wait, teo, the pictures she does, I'm going, I'm going to design something for her, and then I'm going to send it over to her. And I like to do that before the consultation even happens because what I'm going to do is I'm going to tell her I'm going toe I'm gonna suggest clothing. I'm going to suggest props and you know anything else based on your decor. So and so in her mind, it's so important to get me those pictures because I can't even suggest what the session's going to look like until I have those pictures, and so then when I do the consultation call I'm gonna call I'm gonna suggest clothing I'm gonna talk to her more about her kids and all those things asked lots of questions and then I'm gonna tell her I've gone ahead and design something for you I'm going to send it over to you so that you can see what it's gonna look like what I'm envisioning is having both of the kids in the middle of the image that I'm going to send you and each of the kids on the sides and I'll write that in the e mail again when I send it you know, here's what I love about this we can feature both of the kids individually and together blah, blah blah and I'll and I'll ask to even then you know, how do you feel about the colors that I've chosen and then she can come back to me and say, well, we're about to paint the room and I would like it to be green or I'm adding green pillows on the chair, you know? I mean, we can't we've got that opportunity it can be done in it, you'll see it today because I'm telling them to just throw me curveballs that the girls that are coming in but typically it's handled before we sit down we have already talked about a lot of these things so we don't change a lot of stuff right in front of them but it's you know I've shown you how easy it is once you have the base of it built and even if you did it I'll just go out of this lift go saving blank so that's done let's say we had a mom who did not get me her walls which would not make me happy but we're going to we're going to come in here and we're going to say um well you know what color are your walls well let's just pull up this color palette and we'll say there what do you want grey grey so I can choose a custom color wall you can also in here if you actually know you khun type in the the adobe letters for it the color layer are they doby I just made that up um working so there is there wall and now I can go in here and choose which package they've decided on the side they chosen package d I could just pull that on the wall well she says that those air absolutely not the right colors for me no problem let's just take this into the project builder and we will go and change that color. What color would you like? You like pink okay, um let's choose a pink that's just choose one until we like it and it's that quick so it's you know the decisions are all planned so that the more you prepare your client the easier it is for them to sit down with you and say I can't believe you did that that looks great you know? And for a long, long time we've been making suggestions in the studio with our clients but this is so much more personalized and customized and it's easy it's easy and it's fun and they really feel like there have all this additional service being given to them and it's you know it's simple anybody can do this and that's why I've even had some mom some host moms that have said I want I want to do this well they can learn to do this part a preview in five minutes and so I'll have it all set up for them I'll build the client I'll bet that filled the client collection which is the session that they're doing all they have to do is go in and click on that session bring him in whether they have our room view or not they can come in, they can pull their images in or I can have something already built if they want the color changed mom can click on it, change the colors very easily so it makes it very, very easy when you have a system in place bringing in that team member bringing that sales person is so simple because all you're doing is saying here's how it goes okay okay we actually have a couple of clarification questions okay so men are see sl hunter and murdock are a little confused about the prince without glass I guess there really they want to know about the treatment that's on him I was actually and then also same kind of questions see brock photo wants to know about the texture so okay great that's a good question when I order from a cia color lab but I'm pretty sure that most of the professional print lab's have texture mounting and coding options and so with a c I I order a amounted print if it's eight by ten and smaller I'm typically ordering just matte board however bigger than that I'm ordering styrene and that's what I do the image box images on there a little bit maur expensive not a lot but the sirens a little bit more expensive but they're also it's a hard I can't bend this with the with the regular mounting the matte board mounting you could bend that in half not that it's gonna happen every day but this is just a little bit more you know if it gets dropped on a corner or something it's not quite so easily damaged if it's just gonna be framed matte board is fine just stick it in there and frame it I am going to take one of these off the wall because I'm going to see how tana typically we're backing these. I'm gonna bet she backed him for me. He did. So what this is is you know, with this is a matte board print, then it can go in here it's protected with another piece of cardboard or we just get black foam core is what we get put it in there, put it in with your staple gun framing gun and then back it and you can back it with black paper craft baker wrapping paper it can be anything you could even, you know, make him stylized to your studio colors. Do something special on there you could put the you could put a print of often authenticity certificate on the back of the frame if you like. We do put a this frame custom framed by lord or some studio. I like to have that on there because we do tell our clients that anything that it's trained by us is guaranteed, and I like that that's another level of service that we can offer them. So but then the regular prince even you know, these inside these air mounted on that board, those air styrene but they're all linen texture is the one that I used that someone I like they they have a canvas texture, a linen texture and something else I like the linen texture and it then their luster coated so any time you have something that's going to be out an image box or unframed on the wall, you want to do that final protection of the leicester coating and it's not very expensive, but you just work all that into your into your pricing. Lori, while you're there, somebody had asked earlier about whether using previa was just for wall hanging frames or ones that might be standing up as well. So, like the ones behind you, they're typically they there were not going to show them the frame the desktop frames in preview, but they, you know, these all are just very easy to grab one or two to take along with you, and they're cute sitting out, they come in all the different colors you can do, lots of different options. The thing with the table top frames with wild survey is you have to order a certain number of them and that's why they weren't great for the events is because you're going to be ordering more than one otherwise for your regular studio sessions, they're not as practical because you're having to stock them. So, yeah, I think you have to order maybe twenty at a time or actually it's, not a number it's a two hundred at a time, maybe two hundred dollars, not frames but but I could be wrong about that maybe if tana is listening or somebody that knows hannah could tell her to type in the jack room I'm not sure but for the events what tana has done is when you order a package when you order a wall grouping you can order to frame pieces with it so she's done that for these events so that you don't have to order so many at one time that makes sense but but you could go in here and just pick a five by seven frame and we probably wouldn't want the parisian so it's just to a shabby one so let's go shabby and let's say those air for inch moldings so you could still show them what they're five by seven print is gonna look like in here you could still decorate it give it the we'll give it the dots like that one say we want shabby dots of I don't know a different shade of green sure so and then throw that print in there so you can show them the actual finish piece what it's gonna look like even if you're not showing it on a desktop does that make sense so let's just go ahead and save this as a project and we'll go out poopsie know that isthe we can go into our home view and then we'll go to our projects and we'll pull that five by seven out and just set it on the desk kariya massing a quick question yes, so for for me I don't shoot all black and white, I shoot all different, I do it all different kinds of treatments, so for me, I guess it would be more difficult to choose frames had a time because I would I won't know exactly what the colors of the things will be so ondo also so I could just do this in the viewing once I've got my fare favorite photos after and then maybe put some into the albums without work better when you were dealing with color prints like the black and whites, I find it's easier because, you know, it's going to black and white, it'll go with, well, what do we do that you're going to base your molding color on the room? Ok, ok, I guess so and so and and that is well, I mean, it makes even more sense for you as another shooter that way, if you're shooting in this room, you're going to say I would love to see cem epsom earth tone texture, you know, gets him a sweater that's got that baby cream in it and you know it perfectly right around the room and make the suggestion and then shoot for that room, that room, and I'm going to tell you for regular sessions in the studio that's when we're changing clothes and they're doing multiple things I will tell them which outfit they are being photographed and for which room so they're changing were going to say I'm going to even call it this is a living room outfit this is her bedroom out because I really want them to be that solidified in their mind that this is why we're changing clothes and this is why we're changing background or location and you so pre sold the whole situation there's no doubt that it was not like oh I'm what they've already bought it because I dressed for it yet exactly exactly right so um I'm gonna take this back out to the project builder s so you can see traditional framing here and you know janice I would suggest even if you don't want to do you know multiple colored frames or you don't want to you know I would suggest choosing your moldings based on yours you're shooting style and the decor so you're only offering them you know if you like if you take in a basket taken six moldings because I'm not it's funny because I'm kind of vibrant personality but I'm not vibrant frames like I wouldn't that's not my taste in actually a little bit more classic for those so I guess I just I get overwhelmed by all the choices well in that two says he's back let's say uh excuse me I don't think I picked my size this may I may not be able to build this without an image so we won't do that right now but all the handcraft framing isn't here as well and the eleven framing you've also got your katori jewellery in here and so you can go through here and you can say I'm gonna build this key chain and you can show them exactly like the cropping on the on the key chain here are the brass cufflinks so you can just pull those images in and show them right away what it's gonna look like so that's nice to know you got those specialty product lines built and that they can actually kind of envision what it's gonna look like finished um you know this not bright colors you know this from the neutral line and you may only want to offer that but I mean the kid's rooms it's fabulous to go color for those I mean I'm not saying all of those I love all of them forgets friends there are fabulous but it's such a that's very helpful concepto think before I shoot liketo have that more in my head I've never approached it that way because I'm kind of a spontaneous person any form of planning is out of my normal realm so but it totally changes the bottom line and that's what makes the difference makes it worried me very much all right, we have time for a couple more questions, right? It's alright, one from michael p is how do you counter the argument from mom's that say, oh, I'll just get it framed myself you don't worry about it. Uh, well, what we do is we tell them that we're going to custom design this for them so that we're going to take away the need to go and get it on themselves so I always wanted to make it look like it's a benefit for them, which it is, but and I think part of that that is just the hand holding and telling them using that line again, what we specialize in is this and so when it all comes back down to I'm the specialist it's really hard for them to go, you know, they chose you for a reason, so and if you're telling them what that reason is it's hard for them to argue with that. So I just I think it's funny because I did this myself, but we always kind of make up all these objections. Every single person is going to have a zit every single person is going to want to frame them themselves, right and that's just not the case and so that its very normal I hear things a lot of times from photographers that I'm working with that will say you know, I mean, this just happened, and so this is the crisis of my life and, you know, you don't change your business based on one person you run your business like you do business. Yes, there's gonna be a hiccup here and there, but you have to do business based on you on your business and what's best for your business, for your family, and then that person that comes along, you make adjustments and everything's a case by case basis, it really is. But when you know you're structure and had that system now, and you always have that to go back to that's really, the underlying theme here is that that's the basis doesn't mean that it's always gonna be that way hundred percent of the time. But we're going to know our answers one hundred percent of the time because we've got a system in place because, you know, you're no, we specialize in right anything else again? Okay, jen h would like now says you said you narrow down, um in camera for real kids. What is the process from narrowing down images and studio that a couple people vast. Okay, yeah, and I will edit down as I'm shooting if I know something, if I just don't want to see it again but but typically not nearly as much I try to get it narrowed down in real kids because we're showing them the images immediately following so I'm not gonna have that process of going through light room saying yes no yes no I have a question that for people who might just be joining us again can you tell us why you call your system real kids again for because of the real life expect and do you guys want to hear a story? Sure. My stories um I actually started this whole thing as simply kids and it may be somebody who knows that that asked this question in my one of my key words ah one of my key words is simple and that's when describing that personality that's one of my five words is simple and everything that we do in the studio I always try to make it as simple as possible for us for life, for the client and so simply kids just made sense and in fact yesterday we were talking about building that product line for marathon press and that was my product line was called simple whatever it was um the simple collection and so simply kids made sense we started that I started the whole copyright process and draining trademarking all that process and was working alongside with the trademark attorney and in the middle of it all everything fell through the cracks and I got sued so once then what's the trademark processes started you are legally able to use that trademark symbol and so I just followed along with the attorney I was doing everything I thought I was supposed to be doing and started using it and it was out there I was speaking in teaching and the simply kids brand was out there and there was a photography studio called simply kids and she sued me and so now it's real kids so that's the story but but in the end it's you know I mean it's one of those things that you know I could have fought it my attorney in the begining wanted me to fucking fight and yes I think you know this industry is my life it's not worth it to me over and name people aren't coming because of the name that fits better any way with the changes well and our senior product line is called riel seniors but and and really life has been my tagline from day one when I started in nineteen ninety five and so it all made sense and it really does you know just flow with what I do so it'll work but but that's why do you wish you would have asked you know I think it's good there's some learning and that is I mean it's great teo it was, you know, who's good learning experience and I'm thankful that I went through the process and wasn't it wasn't worth it to meet a fight back, just not great. Listen, you were saying that you add it in your camera, so how many images typically do you take per session in the event sessions and the real kids? Russians, I probably shoot fifty, sixty images, and then I'm I wantto in camera get him down to showing thirty to forty, which is still a lot that's a lot of images to show however I want them tio at least have ten left in there. Yes, is that we can put into a book because I want them to add on a book and lots and lots of people do, and the reason is is because what we've designed this grouping for them, I've got three or four images in a grouping to tabletop images. What? How do I have the rest? You know so well and we want to do these albums so and you guys, you know, you can look through these there they all have way more than ten images in them, but ten is the minimum if we did one per page, so I'm still showing a lot with regular sessions, high school seniors, I try not to show more than eighty but I've shown one hundred twenty, and it just you know it all works out. We do albums for all about her high school seniors as well, for included what that included and they are, including our top package. We have our top senior packages twenty, five hundred and includes an album. But everything else we do a build a collection which I'm gonna show you a real kids build a collection product many tomorrow, which is gonna confuse everybody. Um, but it's, the builder collection system works so well that for people who are wanting to change their pricing, it it's the best way to start and really walk clients through that process of doing something different. So I'm gonna show you guys how all that works tomorrow, but and the build your own is what we do with our high school seniors. And the album is the fourth step of building your own own collection. So everybody does it because we're just telling him, this is step one, two, three and four and they had it. They do it.