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Check-In & Q&A with Scott Robert Lim

Here scott's website and that is scott robert l a dotcom scott robert l a dot com and you can find out what he's been up tio you also posted a discount code on the page scott can you talk about us what's that as it do you want to talk about that well actually the discount code was for us passing out these postcards at w p p ay okay good is still good till april six so it's all good so it's vegas s r l all no spaces and you can get it off all right that sounds good to basically there's a twenty percent off for what's the crazy stupid like coarse and uh think like take a while and I think like a tank a wedding photographer so you have a choice there and we have one of the students from the course krystal welsh and I'm going to bring up her website oh there wow and now you want to tell the world the folks watching a little bit about you and then we can get in sure so I wanted to say hi scott robert how are you crystal so cute stop it I must even vegas I didn't seo I was I want oh you were...

there for like two days it was awesome where you have the creative live thing with the you know I actually just went I made a beeline for the expo I wanted teo you know it takes a couple of days through that usually but but anyway so hello sorry I missed you and hi everybody watching my name's krista welsh and I live in seattle my website is love song photo dot com and you can find all my social media links through there but I guess you can ask if you want more information I just finished my third year of shooting weddings before that I was in a really corporate interior design job and um so kind of my goal has been to make at least a cz much as I did in the interior design world just to see if I could do it um and and we're on the way we're on the way so I took scott's class uh was it was that december yes too soon december so when it was awesome it was a lot of information and uh definitely one that's worth three watching there is a lot to go over do you think the classes help doing anyway like moving forward um you know yeah absolutely it actually kind of grounded me scott uh I feel like if you well for me since I work alone most of the time I don't really have anybody to kind of bounce ideas off of or really no you know I don't really have a guide except for some things that I read or just what I think other people are doing so that course was really good for me just tow have kind of a reality check uh yeah so and I definitely needed that um I learned I learned about feeding the beast it takes some time to build and that's maybe that that could be the most valuable thing that I got out of it um you know, just I have to be patient and you know, a lot of us start off thinking that we're goingto totally rocket you know, in the first year and that's just not the case you have to build slowly and build it you know, build your business in a smart way so I definitely got that from you. Yeah it's like you know what? You have to work really hard and it's going to take several years to and so I think people come in and a lot of times they only give themselves a year or you know, maybe they convinced their spouse or their partner to do this and usually you know you're really on a short leash and if you give yourself only one or two years basically might as well not even do it because that's not really fine enough time so that's great. So staying in the game breaking even staying in the game is a success I seriously seriously he's just gonna stay in the game and hang around and then eventually something's click and then boom you know you're often running looks like you have a great start I've seen your images before and uh and I've talked to you about it at the class and I think you've got, um a good basis to start with which is great thank you cool okay, I want to slap poppin just talked to a couple of days ago and he said it specifically about you it's not going to be that at least I don't think it's gonna be bad but can handle it you think you're strong that's one of one of the points was just having the confidence to charge mohr and that was something that comes up and so what do you have to say about that? Actually I think it was more and less maur and lis anyways tio I don't know if you remember that conversation do you remember that? Well if I'm thinking of the right one uh well something that keeps coming to my mind is that you were the first person I think in a figure of authority as faras the wedding business is concerned that said just do what you can to book this many weddings you know get that get that referral basis and you know, if you have to charge a little bit less in order to build that up then there's no shame in that like just get it done right? So that what kind of what you're referencing yeah, what people don't realize that frequency is everything in that you have to show a volume of work um so let's say, you know, you're a bride and your went to two sites and one post of wedding every four months, and then you went to this and they went to another site and they're posting ah, wedding, you know, once every three weeks at least, and if you can't tell which is the better photographer, you're going to go with the one that you know, is building momentum and that post regularly, and so you really need for, you know what I tell people it's like, hey, that baseline is twelve weddings in a year, you've got to do twelve weddings here because on average that's showing one every month and then people know that you're a serious player or not, because if you show one want, you know, to three weddings a year, you're really never going to gain any traction. So in the beginning of your career and you're like a paid intern, you're you know, we're at the bottom rung and we just gotta, like, prove ourselves and whatever we need to do to get those twelve weddings a year to build that mo mentum, we gotta do it, and then on top of that, once you get that twelve, so you gotta be committed to twelve because that you know what I did my first six for like nothing for free I just did it right but the thing you have to remember is that you have to get twice a cz good every year you have to go and analyze yourself and say hey, what do I need help in where can I grow and you gotta be committed to being at least twice is good why is that? Well, a lotta a lot of brides book about a year out, right or so yes, though they're booking you at a certain level okay, so when you get to their wedding six months twelve months later and you're twice as good when you provide that imagery there going to be blown away that you go oh my gosh e I mean so because it was good but this is ridiculous like okay and that's what really gets that rave is because you've just given them an added value and you need that rape you need people talking about you most of the, you know, best wedding photographers that I know they really don't do any advertising it's all by word of mouth and that's what you have to kind of generate and you think about always compare it to food and restaurants right the most average food you will see the the most advertisements for right what we watched tv, how many mcdonald's commercials do we see right when the food is average you've gotta constantly advertise and you have to constantly get your name out there. Why? Because your food the food is not better than anybody else is it's just average right average price average everything and so therefore your marketing has to be much more intense when you have an average product but when you have a superior product that product does all the work for you and you khun get all the referrals right from that base and so that's what really wanted you to do is just a build that base up and get those volumes of weddings within that first year yeah and that's I mean that's my favorite way of getting new clients you know I like it when somebody tells their friend about me that's a huge compliment and then you know that client is usually you know, we were fast friends or whatever because we already have a mutual person and common and yes, so I prefer that anyway so that's what I'm working on yeah you're going to go in I find that when you when you book a wedding from a referral of real strong referral you're going to go into that wedding and that and that bride and the groom are going to think highly of you um and because I've done other weddings where they just found me through somehow booked me they didn't know anything about me and I felt that I got a lot more respect when I went in through a strong referral and and I like to those meetings a lot more because and those weddings I felt special and the other weddings that was just like just hired help right I could be I could be anyone yeah I could be the price was right or whatever and here I am like you know and I'll sew definitely I think that's the best way to grow the business I'm working on it yeah I know you are to get you to go forward okay I'm unit myself out there with a lot of background noise I'm calling him from uncreative life here in san francisco and I wanted teo just break in and say hi to a few people all we've got on the partners they were in the class I'm watching and they said hi from utah we've got a j patel from the bay area michael from atlanta bernadette from new zealand jennifer from washington we've got a few so I wanted to break in just to talk about the pictures that you sat here so do you want to talk about those air sherry and those ice nice um those robert this morning do you have any favorites that you want to get into I have to look at what I do I sent you guys honestly I was like I have to send them something here you go. Oh, so they're some of my some of my favorites I I don't know are there any that you care to talk about robert scott yeah, you know, I took a look at him and I think it's very solid um I think it's kind of reflective I think of where the price point you are because I remember a conversation we had during creative live and yeah, you know you have a good compositional your composition is very good. I like your use of color um your post parsons singh is a very clean style um and but I think there's room for improvement who as were I think, um I think if you kind of I know there's some pictures like this where you kind of, um what one person you know, you are an interior decorating, right? Yeah, interior design do your design. Okay, whatever. Uh, when you're when you're designing a room a lot of times you probably have a certain theme right? A certain sometimes a main emphasis. And I think when it comes to especially posing the bride and groom I think it would be great if you kind of on some of the shots focused on one person and brought the beauty out in that one person and then design everything and then lay out everything according to that one person on dso when you're opposing a brightly just like the last picture that we have and you're proposing a couple um kind of that very typical looking at each other look which is fine but what happens is your when the viewers looking at that it loses a bit of impact because the beauty you don't know who to concentrate on first right so basically you just kind of more if the couple together and then you concentrate on the composition now you have good composition and so it works for you there but where I would like to challenge you a bit is maybe bring out the beauty in one of the couple first I like I prefer the bride because usually when you feature the bride that makes you the most money quite frankly on so if you can kind of feature her a little bit more and then kind of bring the groom in to complement that person and then this scenery I think you'll have ah ah huge impact and I know he did that on a few pictures which I liked but if you can kind of continue to do that and developed that I think that will really push up your photography to the next level because your proposition and your color is very good and if you could just learn how to pose um a couple a little bit better then I think it will be good also that that's very clear to me so thank you yeah keep working on it yeah, and another thing too is I like how you're featuring here the bride alone shots and I think if you can continue to work on that and bring that beauty of the bride out I think you're gonna have a lot more to success and you're gonna put yourself at a different level because right now you're following into you know, just looking at your overall work I would say you're falling in that you know slightly above average category okay, so it's like yeah, you can earn a living with this but I want youto earn an extraordinary living with your photography and get to that you know? So you're making even mohr than you were making at your other job and I think if you continue to just bring that beauty out um and maximize the beauty a little bit more in with your subjects uh and if you work really hard this year on it, I think that will make a huge difference and you know, I I would look at the work like when I was first getting into this business, I would look at the people who had longevity and who were doing really well and one of my kind of mentors that I kind of have was wool mull to me was your font and he started a family with your body I am so yeah, I mean yeah, he like um I mean, his work just blew me away because he was the first person that I saw that really glamorized the bride, okay? And so he's been doing that throughout his career and he still has a great business and, you know, doing hundred weddings a year or something ridiculous like that and then also gerry g bonus right? Those two guys like are, you know, icons in the business and they can stay in business forever because they just accentuate that beauty of the bride. So I kind of followed in that in that kind of pattern and all all the people that I've mentored that have done well also have kind of fallen that pattern and they've done very well just using that formula where you're just glamorizing that bride and bringing her beauty out and that is a success formula that will work I guarantee it off well there's other people that to our that can be creative but their compositions are way crazy and interesting so you I think you have the ability to do that also looking at your work you could even be more aggressive with your compositions um and you might want to try that out too, but right now you're finding yourself and and so I want what I want to do is to take some chances with your work because your work is good and it can make you a living but I think I need to have these separate from the masses a bit and I need your own individual style and personality to come out and so I think if you just kind of let yourself go even mohr and don't be afraid to post that I knew it's so scary like ah I'm not sure about this but sure why what about live is look right go ahead do it it's okay you only get two likes like one of them I don't know what it likes ok it just try things I think that's that's for everybody just to go outside of your box and try some crazy stuff and it might not be very good in the beginning but I guarantee you will learn to evolve that and fit it into your style and you'll find that that will serve you well and get you above the masses that's the hardest part was kind of you know we're booking weddings and we're earning a living it's hard to change because you you're afraid if I changed too much then I'm going to lose what I have but then you're not going to gain anything either you know and so to gain something greater you have to let go of something familiar and that is the one lesson that I've learned in my life is that you always have to let go of something familiar security our old ways and then you can transcend above that but you have to kind of take chances with our art with our business with everything well, I just want to say thank you for that and that was really insightful everything that you've said I've totally thought about and I totally agree with you and sometimes it's just nice toe maybe hear somebody just say like I'm gonna push you a little bit and yeah ah so and some you know, it's it's kind of it's interesting I feel over the past couple of years you know, I learned something with every wedding and it's nice to have one thing to think about when I go into each wedding to maybe try to change it up a little bit or one thing to try so I think my next wedding it's next month I'm going I'm going to try to step it up tio you know what? This might surprise you? I mean, the biggest thing really that just took my photography over to the edge is when I went into each wedding I started saying hey, um I need twenty minutes alone with just you the bride okay? So whenever can we plan in our schedule twenty minutes with just you because I want to take some fantastic pictures of you? Of course you're only gonna get five but you want it for twenty you might get ten right and so and then I just got that twenty minutes alone with the bride and I I was able to take some great shots of depth bride, and that really helped my photography get to that next level because every bride, when they're looking at sites, they're putting themselves in that in those photographers photos, right? And so if you take beautiful pictures of brides, brides will put themselves in that you know it, especially if that bride kind of looks like them or has a similar type of body shape or something like that, then they can identify with that. And, um, that was the one thing that really just made a huge difference in my in my work, I mean, that literally took me to that, you know, from being average to being, like, five thousand dollars plus just focusing on that one thing, and it was just those twenty minutes, every wedding that I would go in and practice and try to take some beautiful pictures of her, and I suggest that because that really worked for me, I love that idea because right now I don't really do that. I mean, I have time with the bride, but usually it's kind of it's, it's quick, and there are a lot of people around, you know, like that, so that really appeals to me, I might I might try that I love that yeah it's just a simple little adjustment in the schedule but it will add if some really nice images to your work I love it I love it thank that thank you you got it okay I'm a muting myself hi great discussion let's see you actually brought in that second point it was having the confidence to change your surprises charge more charge less and also to get a volume of work and you you went straight from pricing into that so I don't need to bring that up what they're alright now though are a lot of questions really popped up and I'm going to play favorites here foreigner pick nice yeah well the w p p ay yeah so they have asked the question and I selected it so I don't know if you see it up there but if if you don't I'll read it out loud I see a lot of questions about charging low or free to start scott how do you feel about people who are still photographers but changing genres to weddings? How do they break into the business without losing a lot of income during the switch? Ah uh what was that? I don't see how they would be losing income to just be adding to their income right? Or I don't quite really understand they want to add they want to switch over to weddings from a different um all together is that what they want to do? Okay, well anything um I think that if you want to get started with this business um it's gonna be kind of an investment um and you've got to get that twelve weddings whatever that price is and so the market is really good at determining how good you are. Um so if you can't get twelve weddings in a year ah with the pricing that you're at um and you know, kind of contacting your friends and and getting the word out there then I think you've got to create something exciting you've got to create some sort of discount, some sort of major discount like, you know, maybe it's just one wedding, you know, the first wedding for every month you say, hey, I'm I'm going to discount my price is fifty percent or something like that I don't know you've got to create some sort of buzz around your business and if you can't do it with your work, I mean the only other thing that you can kind of do it with his pricing to prove yourself to get practicing so you really need those twelve weddings to get going and that might be being event you might not make any money at all ah in the beginning ah, but you khun bills from that so it's just like any other business you've got to be ableto risk something there's no way that you can start something new without any type of risk ah so that's where you know, if we could do business without risking anything we'd all be millionaires right now would you don't like name that's easy and so it's does who kind of learned how to risk and develop their abilities? Those are the people that are really going toe gain traction and move ahead so it's always about risking all the time and that's what's hard for us is that risking aspect yeah, I agree and that for me that's a great answer granite I'm working creative like maybe I'm a little biased I think you've got to take the risk now another question we got from sabrina ding and mine gosh oh my gosh you know her? Uh yeah, a little bit okay, you're her question is, can you talk about your creative process on how you come up with an idea and then how you execute that in a real life shoot from an idea? I've always been intrigued with your creative process, okay? You know what it's different when I'm shooting a wedding? Um I don't I come in as a blank slate actually, um and I kind of observed and I kind of see the bridal party kind of I see the environment and I take that in and maybe there's something it within that environment than and suppliers me may I see a red chair? I go wow, that looks cool let's do something about that let's do something with that or a lot of times with my wedding photography is I call it's called kind of hitting the re line bun I'll watch something transpire maybe it's like a tender moment that I see with the bride and the bridesmaids and they'll do something together that's cute or whatever and I'll see it and hello wow that's great let's hate I want to do that again but then I'll do it again I'll hit the rewind button, but I'll make it even better so I'll say, hey let's, do it again but can you come over here by this window and, oh, wait let's add your mom in here and so what? What it does is the wedding day feeds me, um clues of that person and what that day is like, and then I take those clues or those hands and I try to make it better. And so that way the wedding does isn't something that is just like a cookie cutter like I do these, you know, set opposes all the time, but I'm kind of working with the wedding day and that person and so what really inspires me is just that the day what's transpiring on that day and how I'm getting to know the personality of that client and what they like and and um you know what kind of makes them tick and I kind of read into that and kind of shoot around that and then if nothing is there I think for me I might go to is I know what my strengths are right and I try to be extremely positive and affirming and somebody that I want to be like I don't want to be a detriment to the wedding I want to be like wow scott's really fun to be around and when I feel like people are having fun with me then those emotions come out then I can make them come alive and they're kind of interacting with me and then I can get the shots that that I I feel that I really um like worse it's that emotion um and it's it's kind of their personality coming out and my personality coming out at the same time but I think from an artistic point of view ah lot of the times ah how I will be inspired is by looking at the environment you know um so probably one of the worst places for me to shoot would be probably like well a lot of people like this but I think it's okay but like for me shooting at a beach right would be terrible for me because I've got a couple options I've got you know, I've got the the ocean, the sand and you know, the sun ok and that's about it right there's nothing for me to use my creativity whereas if you bring me in an urban area like inside somewhere and maybe there's mears, there are some tables there or there's an interesting structure I can work around that's when I find that I get going but if you give me like a place like a big grass field with nothing around it like I'm the worst at that I mean I'll just do some basic stuff my go to stuff but I won't really feel inspired, so what really inspires me a lot is the architecture er you know, textures and things like that light shadow things of that nature that really answered a question e I learned a little bit thin people like you're not a photographer move yeah s o next question we've got a couple of good ones actually from victoria harding joaquin on dh she's still actually and to select it perhaps you could talk about how to get your self published start smaller you're working don't give up oh good question yeah, you know what we'll actually you've got to ask the question why you want to get published first of all right and so for me personally um I was always looking to be that you know, ever since the beginning I wanted to be that ten k plus photographer so I just wanted to cover all my bases I wanted to win some awards I wanted to be published in magazines I wanted uh kind of off I needed to build up my what'd you call it my uh um drawn a blank what is it when you have your when you go to a job your resume e I haven't even applied for a job it's a love uh yeah, I like your resume right? So I wanted all that stuff. Um so what I did well, like I group my you know, I wrote a little bit about myself and I seriously I went on the online and I just emailed like everybody online everybody like magazines um you know websites and I think I spent like a few days on this and I must have emailed about two hundred people just like to get published in I found this one site and she like um so great wow, I like your stuff I want to publish I want a plum bliss you online and we got to be talking through um e mails and it so happened she only lived like five miles away from me so you know we said, hey let's, get together you can interview me and we're five my miles from each other let's uh sit down and have a talk about it and let's have some coffee so we sat down and I forgot the name of the site it was on online site that she was working with and we got to be talking about you know later on after the interview kind of like some of my aspirations and some of my dreams and I said you know one of my dreams is like one day I want to be in range finder magazine does everybody know what range finder magazine is it's like uh w p p I and she goes oh really that's interesting because I also write for range finder magazine mmm that's so that got me into range finder rag thing that's the moral of the story is you don't know where one lead is going to take you and I you know what I must have like spent two days or a week just emailing people one person responded and through that one person I got that online article and then eventually because of her I got onto into range finder magazine also um and so that was a huge um kind of ah leap for me because what I was able to do after getting published in magazines this is a good little trick that I used was I made copies of them for I had extra magazines that I was in and when I met with a client oh yeah, winning awards is cool too because they would give you this press I don't know w p p ay doesn't now but every time you win award they would like do a press release for you right? So I would copy those out so I would have you know, some of the I can't remember I I won my first award and I made a copy of that press release I had that in there I had a couple articles that I was in I had the actual magazine that I was also in and then I would hand that over to the bride during our consultation I go, you know, hear cem cem information about me and and so I would give them the map here some magazines that I was in so it was much as the brag about myself without really kind of bragging about myself it was just giving them something that's good. So that was a good technique that I used you just got to get out there and just get your name out there and, you know, just start submitting to magazines and if you could get me back, that would be even better okay e god, I have a choice between another question how chrissie and one about light so let's do the pricing first pricing okay that question is from mapple and grassi I think natalie and I are not that I'm that I'm watching your name but when he it's like the question and topping up doesn't charging low to build your portfolio trap you people will want the low charge I'm doing weddings but I'm also building my part polio by using models ought well sometimes that's the way you have to start off I don't think you should always have to do that I think you should mix it in you should do support fully with models but then maybe you should just do some free weddings or do ah like may I just I started off with weddings from my friends that were getting america's nobody else will hire me but and have some real live events mixed in with that too because the person that's gonna gonna book you as a wedding photographer they're going to want to see that if you could do the entire wedding so you know those photos that you have ah that you shot with the models that may get you in the door but what's going to close the deal is they want to see in complete wedding so you're going to eventually have to have that too so it's great it opens up the door but you have to have an entire wedding to show people that you can do it in order for you to be hired not unless you're doing it for free. That's why you're doing for free so you can get in that way. That's a very good question. People think that well, you're goingto if you charge too low, then you're gonna have to stay at that price forever. No, you don't that's like the biggest, like you don't have to worry about that. There's this thing in economics that we learn and it's called supply and demand. Okay, so we know that if the demand increase is what else increases your price, and so my whole thing is all you got to do is increase your demand, and then you can increase your price. But if you can't compress your demand your you're going, toby stuck, you might shoot yourself in the foot if you raise your rates without demand, so you have to have the demand first and literally. I've just been mentoring people, you know, mentor people all over the world and you know, this is these photographers, uh, that have a lot of demand, and they but they haven't been raising the rates because they're afraid that they won't get x amount of weddings every year. Ah, and so they're turning tonnes away and go well, you know, I kind of feel like, well, you should be you can't accept everybody, you should be turning some people away because you want a filter. Well, once you build that demand up, you can raise your rates because people are going to pay um, you maur, if the demand is high, okay, but if the demand isn't high, a person is not going to pay you more than what you're worth. So once you get that demand up, there's going to be people that are going to be attracted to your work that will pay you more, you will also yes, you will. You know, when you raise your rates a lot, let's say you raise your rates two thousand dollars above what you're charging now, yes, there's a chance that you're going to be losing that client based, willing to pay at that level, that is that's true, but because you have a high high demand, you're also increasing more people and attracting higher and clients to your site. And so you're grabbing those fish, so you're just kind of switching pond's, if, if, if there's a fishing analogy it's like, ok, I've been fishing in this pond for awhile. This pond is only going to get me a twelve inch fish, but if I go to this other pond here, I'm going to get there's a chance that I could get larger fish and I'm going to go over there and so that's kind of what you're doing but you have to have that demand and you won't never worry about losing money the only time we're gonna lose money is if you don't have the demand all right, that sounds like an excellent answer I understand I have something yes crystal I just wanted teo I just wanted to mention one thing that I took massive amounts of notes on during the class that you said back in december which was dead and offer um do you remember something about that spot not to close the deal yeah, you know so I think you know, a lot of us might think of this this person's budget it's so low but I don't know I'm not sure I've actually tried it out I've asked people who are having a pretty cool wedding you know, but maybe not the price point I want I've asked them tio you know, give me an offer and it's worked out you know, I've got yeah, I mean, I've gotten to a point where I'm comfortable shooting that wedding and it's a it's a cool what you know it's going to be a really cool couple really cool wedding probably great for the portfolio so ah hearing permission from you to maybe just get an offer you know that was helpful yeah so how you close a deal every time after your consultation if they don't book you you have to get an offer from them you can see you have to leave the ball in their court okay? So let's say you know they don't there I don't know what they're thinking but there just hasn't seemed to book and so I would ask him at the end of that say hey listen is there anything that I can do because I think you're great couple blob of law I want to book you right now what could I do to book you right now? Of course you have to say it in your own style everybody has to develop their own pitch so if that's not comfortable to you because you're not me then you have to think of your own way to say it but everybody has to kind of internalize their own kind of pitch but you have to ask you have to ask what will it take to hire me and so you know and get them to think about it right? And so if this is the key if they don't come back with anything like they say well, I don't know like even if you were to throw in an album cut your price down or whatever and they still don't respond that means let's face it they're not into you you're not going to book them no matter what um, they just don't they're just they're just not into your studio or whatever, so forget it, right? And if enough people keep doing that and not responding with an offer back to you, that means that you're way off base, your perception of who you are and what your studio is is completely different than how other people are seeing you, and you need to change something either lawyer price and get better or whatever, so we always need that feedback to know where we are, and so they're going to give us a feedback. Sometimes they'll say, well, you know, we love this package b, but can you throw an engagement session in that? And then we'll be good to go. So now guess what? I'm in full control, I either khun say, negotiate some or or I could just say yes and take it, but at least I know where I am I'm fairly close, I'm giving them sort of the deal and working with them and communicating with them and knowing what they want. And I turned that I feel that if, once I do that and I can book more jobs because I've developed my negotiating skills and that's what a photographer has to kind of work on it because we're artists and we're not used to negotiating, but you really have to, um work on your negotiating skills and that's just like what krista says simply asking at the end what's this going to take on then negotiate from there okay thiss husband good now you also written we did a calm way chucked in with each other is not your talked about an app where you want to tell people yeah if you're especially if you're in the u s if you're in the u s you can download my free app all you have to do is text scott robert one word scott robert two two four five eight seven so that scott robert two two four five eight seven and then that'll give you it's like a sticky album it's like a nap and then you just it gives you a link and then you can download my app right on your phone and that gives access to my workshops I have ah ah free pdf e book on lighting that you can sign up for andi just imagery there's wedding imagery on there there's a link to just ah some of my, uh wedding so you could get ideas of how I shot a wedding the entire thing from beginning the and um and and so you could just keep updated on what's going on with me and if you're out of the country you can always just email me and I can send you that lake which is scott at stock robert gallery dot com okay, I was just about the best thing doing what? You just did it okay, um see, I think we're going to wrap it up here. Uh thank you know ok, what do you want the question about like well, yeah, I'll do it not a little bit late, right yeah, we did. We did we did okay, david well, not unless you got to go. No, I don't have to go anywhere I want to go in christy, you got to go anywhere I'm comfy I could hang because I just want to give them their money's worth waken keep this party rolling let's go david wilson has a question about writing so here we go. How do you focus when you want to overpower the sun or ambient light and you cannot see your subject? I don't want to turn the so all the way because the image will become grainy I used the ninety nine and multiple manual flashes. Okay, is this a bright light situation? Can you read that question over again? Yeah, let me start again. How do you focus when you wantto overpower the sun are ambient light and you cannot see your subject. Oh, I know. Okay see he's using a sony a ninety nine and he has it on live you so what's happening is seeing all other cameras aren't like this and so when live you you see exactly the exposure that you're shooting at and so he's turning his risotto one hundred and his f stop to sixteen and it's really dark at that point so all he needs to do is turn his live you off when he's outside and then he will be able to see it ah you know see the subject um and so that's that's his situation there so it's all he did was just that then he can he can see it perfectly so just turn your body turn your live you off in that situation especially if you're in a really dark ah if you're kind of creating that black box I don't know if you saw creative live and crazy stupid light where I created a black box well if you're going to create a black box then you can't see anything through your viewfinder ifyou're in live you so turn it off and then you can see everything that answers question lighting clearly you are a lighting expert wade and I had that happen to me that's ok you're like I know how that's happening all right I'm going to go for another one we've got a question from david enough and he was responding to you saying twice as good each year that's magical how do you suggest keeping your skills improving and how do you get past hitting a plateau? Oh that's very good um I think you really one way that helped me was actually submitting into competitions um and I could and then you can get scores, you can get feed that and you, khun, generally see progress made from that point. Um, I think what really was a marker for me is that I feel good about my work, I can see myself improving, I like where I'm going, you know? And if you don't have that feeling of I like where I'm going with my work on, um then you're kind of like at that plateau and what I I I strongly recommend this is thatyou if you're at that plateau, the best way to get out of that plateau is strictly to get a mentor um, it's like, you know, like this one I like, you know, can someone be a concert violinist by watching youtube videos no it's impossible like, if you want let's say you want to win a gold medal and ice skating, what you going to do? You're gonna have to go out and get a coach right at the highest levels? Ah, of achievement are usually through a coach that's why you see all the professional sports teams, what do they do, but they just go out there and play know they have a coach, everybody needs to to get to that next level a lot of times we need a coach but we never think of that we just think of well maybe I'll take this class or I'll take that class or do this and you and it's basically kind of trying to find a needle in a haystack because you can't get out of yourself to see where you're going wrong you need somebody from the outside looking in whose very experienced who is at a level that you want to get to that khun khun see your whole body of work and who you aren't analyzed your business who you are as a person and all that kind of stuff help put it together for you and create a program to get you to that next level and because we don't have a very good formalised system of learning it's not like you're an engineer you want to become an engineer, you go through the or doctor, you go through this program and then you get certified and bam you're a doctor we don't have anything like that photography so what I suggest is finding a person who's highly successful, very skilled and get mentored by them somebody that kind of fits your style um and that will get you over that home for sure okay great I am going to you um talk about andrew's comment first andrew made a comment about your hair that's haircut nice so you gotta compliment coming in and also andr has a question uh let's see here we selected so it'll go up there it isthe if you inspired me so much I went and booked my first wedding super excited then I spoke with another photographer who says you need insurance insurance you need a legit contract you need this that everything else many ends it with now I'm in panic mode okay, how you doing that wedding for, you know, like you've been doing the wedding for a couple hundred bucks I really wouldn't worry about it, you know now if it was for a few thousand dollars yes, eventually you need all that stuff but you know, I'm going to tell you for your first wedding ah words let it too much you can get in I mean, you are liable um for some things but you can get a one day liability insurance if you're too freaked out about it, but I wouldn't worry about it too much, not less. You know that this is going to be a regular business. Ah. And um, you know, I had a business before I did this and I would do literally jobs in the thousands of dollars thousands tens of thousands of dollars simply on a handshake because that's, the way the business was, you know, that's how we did operated business and what what I find is that that ninety nine point nine percent of the people out there are very, very reasonable and as long as you are good and fair and sincere with what you want to do and if you sincerely don't want to rip people off, then you're always going to be able to just negotiate um something and I always tell the story about one time I had ah to harvard law harvard law graduates go after me and try to sue me but I think I would you like that okay? They're family were all lawyers too on top of that. Okay, so how would you like that situation? And but you know what? We just worked it out it was a misunderstanding and everything was fine and ah, you know, I have people skills I sincerely wanted teo give them ah provide a great service for them so I had nothing to hide and they were they just they were unreasonable either, and it was just a misunderstanding and we worked everything out. And so I think we get hung up with all these contracts and stuff like that, but it really comes down I mean guess they're important, but really it comes down to how you're treating people and setting expectation levels and to begin with and that's the important thing and so once you set those expectation levels off what they what you're going to provide and what they want then you're going to be flying and I wouldn't worry too much about it until you start booking weddings regularly and this becomes a business, then I think you should look into it further on but it's not that expensive if you join people a you're covered through people's three hundred bucks you got all your equipment covered and then you have liability insurance too if somebody sues you, they have people for you to go to bat for you so if anything, just go to peep a enjoying people for three hundred bucks and you got that covered how's that sounds good to me and I don't know that I'm not andrew way do have a request to repeat the information to get the app on dh that's tracy andi, I'll also just so everyone out there who's watching you know I'm going to type this stuff in on the page for people who may be miss it or come in and they don't see it lives you think they pad on the event page you can do that too, but for people who are anxious to get it now, how did they get there? Uh okay, so how to get the app ok, what you got to do is text scott robert one word no space to two, four, five, eight, seven so type in so you're going to two, four, five, eight, seven, two, four, five, eight, seven and then just text in the keyword scott robert then it's going to send a link back to you and then you should be all good and that's for people in the us yeah just emailed me and say, hey, semi, you're linked the app because it's uh you know it's it's a weird html link so I don't have memorized so just emailed me and I'll get it to you maybe we yeah, we could put that in um yeah, I'll definitely explain that I'm talking about on the page right now. I'll do it right now I'll be the link and the code are going up right now disgusted in that on the page and I'm going to get you right. You want some more questions? How you feeling? Yeah, let's, go. Okay. All right. I'm gonna there's one that's really? Sure. Johnny harris, we're going with you, ok? Leading question. How would you suggest finding a mentor? How would you wow that's a good one. First of all, you have to, um, let's see, you try to find I can't even see myself. Now, what did I do? Oh, here we go, okay, um, first you gotta find a photographer that what finding a mentor I say you know what? You gotta go for the goal you gotta go for the best that's available out there because if you get a mentor that's just um a little bit above you you're learning is not going to be is great if you can find somebody at a world class level that's all the best right? So what you got to do is find somebody style that kind of fits yours first of all and um and usually a lot of these top photographers they give workshops go to those workshops or they provide learning materials whatever it is get it right and understand kind of where they're coming from and then email them or ask them if they have some sort of mentoring program um and maybe they don't have on one that's an official one but if you ask them that's like thing yeah, I'll mentor you if you're going to go for somebody um at a very high level expected pay a price for it because these people are so busy ah in order for them to justify like for me I wish I could mentor everybody but I would have so many requests then I wouldn't know who yes no right and would take up so much of my time that my wife would kill me because I'm not providing for the family right? Eso is expect to pay ah is some sort of money, but I guarantee you if you find that right mentor, that is the best investment, I don't care how much you're paying for it. It's the best investment you'll ever make and there's two reasons why, like, for example, for myself, I've done work on on certain techniques that has literally taken five or some business techniques that I've been working on for, like, ten years, okay? And so then let's say, ah, you know, I'm going to my men, torri, and I tell them what to do and that little piece of advice it took me ten years to figure out that little piece of advice that I'm giving that mentoring that they can do immediately, you know, for lighting, for example, like I've working on some lighting things for five years and then bam, here I show you how to do it take you fifteen minutes to do it that just well gives you that exponential growth and that's what we're needing a way we can get on you not all of you have a supportive wife and an angel like I had, who let me suffer for twelve I mean, she supported me for twelve years I don't know if there's any other woman in the world that would actually do that for anybody. But somebody supported me for twelve years until I finally got my act together, okay? We usually don't have that much time that's why I was able to figure out a lot of things by myself you need to get it going within three years if you don't get it going within three years I guarantee your spouse your partner is going to say ah what's going on here we've been working in this wild, you know, like where we're going, right? So you need the fast track plan and that's what a mentor is going to give you also also watch this let's say you have a mentor who's there fairly influential in the business or in the industry, right? If you get good enough and if this mentor fills that your skill is high enough he's going to let you into the a list group everybody he knows the influential people, the people who you know decide on who's speaking at peep a or w p p I or whatever he's gonna open you up to all this other aspect that mole tremendously influence your career, which would take you years and years to establish just to get an interview or just to get your business card to this person that person is going to be able to do it just like that for you so that that's the too important I think reasons one is the learning is exponential and just that person's that mentors network is huge and you can't put a price on that. Okay, great. All right, we actually have a few more questions. I think what I can do though is copy those maybe it would be an option to email them teo and then I can put them on the page or how would you like to do it or should we just keep going? I just yeah, I could just get going. All right, yeah, who's there I don't have anything else but nobody else but you guys all right when I say that because one time I didn't hang out with the class I got a kid and then hang out went black for a while so I am just that that might happen, so I'm just looking after you yeah, what did hit room became my fingers crossed and we will power through this power through you know what? That's a real store? Yeah without taking kids because once I get kicked its over and goes black for a while let's do it all right but I'm going to select another question of this one is for roy from roided mok and he's asking about postproduction so how many hours do you spend on your post production of each wedding? What makes you work faster okay that's good that's a great question I spent way too long a post processing because I love it I like it and so I had to account for that in my pricing eventually so I figure you know, for me to go through a wedding and post process it and and call and all that kind of stuff it would take me probably about three or four days to do it so I would have to account for that in my pricing I was lucky that I have a stash my career that I could charge two thousand dollars I would know okay suit is gonna cost take me a week to do this I gotta count two thousand dollars into my price teo teo account for this pricing for this service because it would take me that long now if you can't do that I suggest this is what you suggest you should job about the main pork part of it right? And then let's because there's all these services now for one hundred fifty bucks or whatever you can just get your wedding called and lightly edited and bam go for it right it's it's all over the place didn't have that back in the day so go ahead and do that if you like to post process then I love the post process so I would take the top you know say ten to twenty images that I've just loved and I would post process those because that was part of my enjoyment to I like to post processing and so I would do those and I can take my time on those but I would job about the bulk of it to somebody else and the night would only work on the images that I loved the top ten or twenty and then I would add those with everything at the end and so that's how I handled my post processing can I just add something really quickly to that sure after your class scott that was the first time I actually sat down and wrote out how long it took me two d'oh in one wedding I was surprised how much time I spent but I'm definitely recommend for other people to do that I was like you're spending that much time oh my god but it's liable to know that yes you need to know that's another key to good businesses is knowing how much time it takes you do everything that you offer because you have to price it according to that or eliminate that service if the money that you make for that particular service doesn't match up then just get rid of that service and don't offer it s so anyways okay my answer and the events okay, I've got another one from veronika lee and she says in the case when the bride and groom wants my allies portrait ce on the wedding day incorporating their bridal party how do you deal with huge parties each eve twenty huge parties are very very difficult what you do before your consultation if they want something stylized you've got to say well, how big's your viral party well, we have seven on each side okay, well you're not going to get anything stylized sorry it's him it's nearly I mean you can but okay, well yeah, we could do something but it's gonna take me an hour half a knauer just to set up one shot with that many people you know? So I think it's about managing the expectations the larger the bridal party, the less artistic it is I'm sorry because there comes a point it's like doing a group of thirty people how artistic can you get with that? You know, you can't really not in the form out of a wedding day so the larger the party, the less artistic it's going to be and you have to tell them up front and say, hey, I'm sorry, you know, I might be able to get a couple of shots off and creatively arrange us but it's going to take a huge amount of time and then I got no more time for you the bride and groom together so yeah, I could do it but I just realized, you know, the time factor is gonna be huge okay, that was pretty much to the point. And thanks for the question. Veronica and we've got one from michael jones and he's a scot what's a good starting price to get started into weddings to get those twelve weddings the first year. I think it depends on your experience. If you can start around a thousand bucks, that would be great, but if you can't, you know hey, I did my first six for free, okay? I could even get anything I could get any money for what? You know, no one will hire me, so I did it for free in the beginning. So it's, whatever. Whatever you can get, you know, like maybe you come in and say, hey, I could give you four hours for seven hundred bucks and start from there and then you can always if they and then you get it, then you get a response and go, well, I like your price point, but you know, can you go six hours? Yeah, you could negotiate or you could say, you know what? Okay, seven bucks, six bucks hey, I'll take it you're making did you realize if you're charging seven hundred dollars and you're working six hours and you're doing like a burn and shoot, which I recommend you're making over one hundred dollars an hour if you made seven hundred dollars a week and and and worked for six hours you'd be making thirty five thousand dollars a year working six hours a week that is amazing income amazing so don't I say everybody should have a bern and shoot package in there um in their package because it is the most effective way to make money I love it like so like people asked me to do weddings I'll say hey, I'll shoot all day for you you know, a ten hours whatever and my base price is thirty five hundred dollars and literally that's just me showing up shooting in handing over the files and that's it ah and so I start off with that price me myself here we go, okay? And I've got one more question coming up that I'm going to pick its from mandy haberman and she's asking oh, you are too yeah yeah right mandy's asking what needs or principles do you think a wedding photographer needs to have the at committed to memory? Sonny sixteen rule flash denies exit I think really you've got a kind of I think for most people I think you've got a house imposing go twos that's what really will make because a guy and lighting is easier for me I mean, quite frankly when I do a wedding I'm living in natural light a lot and using video, light and natural light, I'm living by that if I'm, um rarely if I do outdoors yeah, I guess you khun have some flash techniques there that's cool, but in general, um I think it's more important to one be able to find great natural light like you have to learn how to do that and then too polls learn how to pose learn how to pose one person first. Okay, so this is what I find happens that people don't really know howto pulls one person first, so when they try to post two, three, four people, it looks all helter skelter because they can't close one person first. So once you compose that one person which is usually the bride, then you just throw the dude in and then like it's magic, right? Or you could do opposite so you could pose the guy first and then throw the girl in and it to compliment him and then bam! So if you can do you compose one person, then it all starts from there and it makes it really, really easy nose to the light, right? Find the next the light source put the nose to the light, but bam then you're good and that's kind of just some simple things managing a wedding day ah, that I kind of would always in the back of my mind when all health or skelter breaks loose, right? Okay, fine. Where's the great national light, but the nose towards the light and then the body away from the light and then pop the hip. Damn, there it is. Throw the dude in then you're good. Wow! Okay, some really, really great. And I mean, I'm learning something that can I d o nose to the light. There we go, there's the way we've got a great compliment in here from humbly bowls. Scott, you're so energizing, I love you and your laugh so some great feedback. So I want to thank yourself for coming, and with us, you can find a spot at www love song gotto dot com, and from there you can follow her on twitter like her on facebook for scott, you've got scott, robert l a dot com and also you can get the app if you send a text message. If you're in the states at two or five, eight, seven and also there's a discount code for your class on the side. Yeah, there we got a biggest sorrel is the coupon code for twenty percent off also, I have a facebook group, scott, robert lim and creative life do you conjoined that to s o I can post on when we're going to do this again? This is fun, so I don't want to do this often regularly on others where you're starting these up, so more more peace to come. We could do a crazy, stupid light one, too. Yes, I think that would be a great idea. I was, I was looking, and I joined a life a few weeks back, so going back to the catalogue, and we're going to start busting these out hope we'll leave once a month, maybe more so. Everyone stay tonight and watch the creative life facebook page, your emails, if you're subscribe for all that good stuff and all that information with that's a thank you, not robert limp and thank you, thank you guys out there for watching he are done.