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Lesson Info

Things to do with Hands and Arms

Eight things to do with the hands and arms this was one thing that it was hard for me to fear out doing earlier in my career um and this is like I could get the pose down and whatever, but I had no idea what to do with these these things and how to do it how do you know? So I'm going to give you eight suggestions on what to do now there's many more, but I'm just going to give you eight and I actually don't use a lot of these but I do once in a while the first one is what I call the cigarette and it's as if you were smoking a cigarette it's everybody do that get their arm up and you're smoking a cigarette, right? And this is with the palm up right and so that's kind of the feel but you're just touching your face I'm smoking in there right and that's the field the palm is up and that's this but I call the cigarette with the palm up this is the incorrect way to do the cigarette why yeah because there's a stiffness here and that wrist is not broken okay? And so that's why I say palm up bec...

ause I break that wrist so let's actually let's bring hanna and so she content kind of demonstrate on what I do so if so what I want you to do is kind of, uh put your hand like this all right? And so if she would I sometimes they'll just do this they'll keep this restraint and so what I do is I just like it has to be have to feel this shake it out get loose and then yeah right and so it's gonna be really loose I'll just like they break it this way there they have to feel that you go like this and then feel that brick see that feel it that's what has to happen so it's either palm up or and then kind of touch her chin this way with your index finger or you could do palm down this and she could do the same thing whatever chan are right here but they're both this is what I call the cigarette feel that that field tio thank you so breaking the wrist is very important it needs to be broken okay another huge thing is what when I was doing head shots didn't I say that the line that she created on the headshot with sacred don't get near it with the hands where is her hand it's on the shadow side because where's the line that's the sacred this's sacred don't mess with that because that's defining the face so you could put all the other stuff on the other now if you look at this what happens if you didn't have light to create that shadow? What could cover up this area? The hand right there so you could use your hand is a slimming feature to but don't do it on the line side, so if I'm doing this and I'm posing and and you tell me to turn here my line is here, then I would do something over here. I want a mess with this area here and throw off that line because that's defining the face okay, palm up so now you could do palm down the line is on this side here and believe me, trust me, I've got a lot of photos where the hand is on that side. I darn it. Why did I do that? I still make mistakes even to this day it's like, you know, uh, you're going to keep making him, but you just get better and better as you yes, you do lightly touched the face. Another reason why you want to lightly touch it is because you don't want to distort it, right? So if you're touching it and it's like this it's distorting the face, right? So you just want to lightly touch things because you want to keep that that face tapped the shoulder, you see that all the time they're tapping that shoulder, they've got the bent wrist the head usually oh usually always goes towards the shoulder that she's tapping so if I'm doing this pose and I'm tapping this shoulder I'm looking this way because it keeps it so that what it's doing is that hand is drawing attention doing this right? So if I have the face looking the other way then I've got attention here attention there and it's kind of split but if I keep it this way all the attention is here so the hands really just magnify the face see that tap the shoulders she's leaning her head towards that way same thing here now this is the sort of the same thing, but I call this the necklace it's like if you're playing with the necklace right here and again it's on the shadow side because that line is sacred you don't want to mess with that line and so you keep everything away and so it's a natural you're looking like this, right? And so if you put the hand over there it's cluttering and it was like a right same thing here what do you looking? How you looking there side same thing with this way it's more of a side you this is what I call the polite clap, so you're posing and you're doing things as if you were clapping politely and so you can, you know, right so now this one right I actually did on the wrong side if I were do this again I would do it on the other side because that's the line right there and I'm messing with it so I would have probably done on the other side okay through the same thing too is that that it's on that's wrong it's all wrong look but I couldn't find any polite clap where I didn't write but anyway so I'm showing it right and so but it still looks good still looks good that's the polite clap and then another one is to hold my heart type of feeling right a lot of times that works where they're closing their eyes and anything in there you can always do that with your hands too right has that sort of feel to it I made sure this arm was away from that there oh now look it this is my hold my heart with the polite clap together it's like wow she's got some talent there found out that she had done some posing before it's a like no wonder why I see I didn't even tell her to do that she just automatically did it herself well that looks good to take a picture uh but so that's two and one there boy that's in talent this is what I call the v frame you see this a lot where the arm will frame the head okay, this v here creates a framing of the head and that's why it works because it frames and centers that hank is the head's all over the place and that's why you see this pose a lot because it helps frame that head and what has to happen this way there's a v there and what has to happen is if there's a ying there has to be a yang what I mean by that is let's say I'm posing if I have this post and I tell this person to stick this arm out right here doesn't look right that it's awkward and that it looks like it's going to be like this so if there's a young there has to be in yang so I can create yang by doing this and this it starts to balance so whenever you look at your hands that's why they never say to keep your hands on the same level once higher than the other because there there's a young there's a a and so when you're posing if you say have some somebody posing in there reaching out there you know, this possible is like oh, maybe I should pop this this um well a little bit more because I got a lot of motion this way forgot oh, that maybe she has to put her hip out more if she's leaning that way to balance it out so if you remember this principle with your arms and the hands that there must be some down so a lot of times when you see this you're going to see this two on the other side we're creating two v's that's kind of like a v but I call it well I didn't but it's like oh, I got a fever okay, look this this's a v with a polite clap this is in paris on dh actually what was funny where's doing this work so she's actually a student it's just very pretty but and she bought her wedding dresses and she wants some shots of her and that's which is fine and so we were what we were uh going through the subway there was this ballerina and she did this pose and so every time we would go to our hotel we passed by this poster with this ballerina doing this type of pose and so access so she did it there and it looks great you got bright light I'm gonna talk about this a little bit later in the light but what your nose towards the light right put him in there now I got this beautiful shadow here I got this line here I've got this v here, right? And I've got the yang and I got the yang there and I just did this other saddle in light room very easy that other shadow wasn't there so actually you let's say you didn't even have this shadow you could create both shadows if you wanted to so that's something for you to remember you just get if they have extreme bright light you have no idea what to do you could just posers like that now you don't make her look into the bright sun that's why their eyes are closed okay and put two shadows on it in like room bam there you go okay the chin pointer this is almost like the tap the shoulder where as you know the tin poulter I always almost due at a profile like this I never do the chin point turn like this doesn't look right right but you could do the chin point and it's usually that elegant it works with the diagonal lot that elegant feel right see how I did this the profile and I had this side lighting and I got that nice shadow across your face there okay? This is the ravage hands into the hair slightly squinty eyes and I actually don't even have any photos like that so we're gonna bring hand up she could demonstrate this shot where you got this rabbit so handy when I want you to do is I'll be right here and you're going to just like, put your hands in your hair and you're gonna give me that squinty kind of oh, well you could just kind of fake it right see that so that's little squint in your eyes there look at me her there and then just kind of push your hair up a little bit right and then try to keep one hand separate from the other right there like that that kind of feel to it right give me that kind of squinty look kitchen down looking me right there you see that right there loved that see that that's what that's the feel that slightly squinty field teo it right? Thank you. Um and that's thanks to do with the hands that gives you so you could actually you know, do the same pose but you could just change the position of these hands you've got a lot but the material they actually okay if you're going to do the kind of ravage me feel that's completely different than the cigarette field but it's the same exact pose so depending on these hand positions so whenever I say let's say chin pointer oh already in your mind you're thinking elegant and this feeling s o the hands have a lot to do with the expect or always like hold my heart right what do you feel this so the emotion can be expressed with thes and this is the final piece I feel when a photographer gets that out world class lover level they know what into with peace that's it because it can add so much to the photo but you can screw it up so easy too so it's really difficult but that is the fight that was my final step I don't know about everybody else but and then just judging photos I ca n't tell good hands or not a lot of times you get great hands when the model knows how to do it you know but you're going to be your we're goingto work with normal people and they've never done this stuff before right and you're going to show that to them and they're going to be amazed about uh what you khun do with how you work these hands so these are the eight different ways to do it um any questions on these yes so these old work with a female right although many of these would work it all with a man I assume I don't know do I look good doing this you look fabulous but I don't know maybe you could try and ice uh cool there's another thing that I forgot to tell you when you're doing this head thing if you could come back over here I'm gonna film over this way okay so let's say you're doing the lean thing right you got the thiss out and you're looking this way right don't put your arm this way because it's very natural to use the arm when you're leaning on something okay, so whenever you're doing this thing it's always it's leaned against the wall because that's what looks natural please that's what we normally would do right would you do that? Oh maybe yeah guess what we could do with a guy that's like this or something I don't know is that look good I can't see myself but if you give me split lighting I guess it would look good so that's the one thing to do with that arm there if you're going to do this and it's next to the wall make sure that the wallace here make sure you're doing it against here and not there because it doesn't look natural cause what you're leading on right if you want to do the back post okay the important thing about doing a pact both this exact same thing but you're just you know, turning around so let's say you're doing the curvy like that right it's actually the exact same thing looking back ok, but the important part about this poses that you need to see what makes a woman a woman right? So you need to see this they're the chest area and the booty so it's always so if you look in the magazines they're always going when you see that typos you're goingto always see that feminine feature come out so you can do it but just make sure that you see both there okay okay, this is um uh doing the poses with wide angle so you can capture the locations uh, of it okay, okay, this is very important. You can predetermine your unique pose if the location is iconic let's say you're going to new york or you're going for the eiffel tower if you think in your mind of a unique pose in that iconic location, that picture could be one of your signature images. Okay, if you're in a very, um, iconic location but you think of a pose that's different or creative that pose you could be famous for because you're combining two things you're combining a very popular area and you're combining something that's unique and done properly and it could put you over the mark and that could be one of your signature shots. Uh, so just remember that I so this this is a very important picture to me because this is very first time in my life I imagined that exact thing in my mind three months before I was there. I knew I was going to do a session in new york city and I go what's new york city times square. Okay, what can I do in times square that I've never seen before? I could do the death bride pose and put her on the ground and make it something different and that taught me about the power of having vision so if you're going to know you're going to go somewhere, think of something or it's the same thing with this picture, this picture has been seen all around whenever, like magazines contact me and can you send me something energy? They always picked this one out every single time, but I had this picture in my mind before I even shot it before I went okay? And so that's the power of having vision so if you're going to do a portrait, you're going to do it in an iconic area. This is in hawaii with the diamond head that mountains very famous. I had that shot in my mind even before I shot it use white angle to capture the environment in it also that's in spain that's you know what that is, okay, makesem, raw emotion into your portrait session, so just don't do all these things you also have to have some raw motion with it, um and blend that into you're posing and that's reflects on you. If you can't generate that positivity or that lightness and that fund us, they're not going to give that to us now or it's not even going to look natural and there are this is, uh they just they won't buy into it, they have to buy into you first, you lead him there you're leading them they're into that particular emotion I know for a fact that's one of my strong points I can do that so um and it's something that I learned I didn't even know it was my strong points in some someone pointed out to me but I have this natural positive energy and I can make people feel relaxed and that they can give me this raw emotion so I always try to have that part of my shots so this is what you could do for people okay I did this session she has never taken any photos in her life before and she literally this is who she is this is what she felt doing going into that session but after working with somebody you can actually not that this is not beautiful of course this is beautiful but as your job is a photographer you're supposed to show them different sides of their beauty that they've never even seen before or that they never even seen exist before they didn't know sometimes you shoot these people and you make them look gorgeous and sexy and I go I've never seen myself that way before and they're almost like in tears because it's such a different type of beauty right and so now I'm doing this working with them see look at the look on the face there versus that right you need to bring your clients into this area where you get the look and that okay, you could have the posing down and their hands and everything but to bring a client from here to give you that look, I could take you several years to master and that's the difference between world class that's the difference between being good and being world class is bringing somebody through that process of doing that that's the special sauce I call it. Now, look at your photos. Look at your portraiture. Does it have that feeling of that special sauce in there consistently and that that will show you where, you know, we need to work at some things. Most important rules your subjects will mirror you. Ok, say it over and over again. They're gonna do what you are, and so you have to go there. You have to get through that baggage or whatever that you're feeling, and you have to just go to that area. Okay, cell anyways, now we could go for questions, but that's from dim sum girl whose question is, how do we know what style or feel to use for each of the brides? Like when do we do sexy? When do we do? When do we do the innis that is good and sending love from tails go? What I do is exactly kind of quickly assess who they are, how they're dressed, oh, how high their heels are that'll tell you a lot isn't there a difference between ah woman walking in it has heels that high versus wearing flats, right? And so I've kind of assess on how their dressing and and very quickly you're going to kind of discover their personality as as you go and so I start him off usually what I feel that they are but if they surprise me and do something different and really get into something sexy, I'm like I get whoa okay, we can go there too and you have to first start off thinking feeling and it just takes practice is not something it's kind of this innate sense of reading people okay? There's no like rules is the rules on how to read a person not really right there's things that can tip you off and that's what dressing is like there's somebody the way somebody dressed tips me off to the person that they are but it could be wrong, right? So but it's just a clue. So I go there I start there they start gaining trust in me and I see what they're capable of doing and then I go from there um and it's the it's just a learned skill that that that you pick up but what makes allows you to do different things is distrust that they feel that client has in you uh, and so the more they trust you, the more they're willing to try different things. So I hope that answers that question that's great. Alright, scott, we're going to one last question. Shall we go to break? This is from a bb photography ix do you plan? Your pose is based on the dress the bride will be wearing. And how much does the dress come into those situations? Yeah, because if if the dress is very huge and you can't really sit them down and do the rollover type of thing, right it's not possible. So you're gonna have to, like, stand them up and do something more elegant. For example, it was very hard for handed to sit down, so I didn't have to do any of the rollover type of pose is because difficult, so you do have to kind of assess it and that's why I gave you those to kind of curvy vs the elegant, you know, the walkaway type of tall pose versus this type of posts so you can kind of go from there. You can expand on that, of course, but that'll give you something to start with.