Lessons

Lesson Info

Shoot: Sasha

what's your name what is it you have beautiful hair you know that how long is your hair really long let me see you turn around oh that's really alone does your mommy have long hair too mom they're c'est si mom how long is your hair well it's your wedding stature has all the long hair huh daddy have long hair you know he doesn't have long hair do you want to come out can we take your picture today and then guess what daddy could stay with you and when we're all done do you like candy too candy like a lot of candy how many do you like one two or three four five hundred five hundred o you get a tummy ache if you eat all that you think I wasn't okay with mom if you have some treats no it's not okay so should we do it anyway huh yes yes yes all right let's get away from all these people let's go hide over here let's go hey ho let's go all right good girl yeah there you go have a seat oh good girl dad you could just stay right over here and you could stand all right so we're going to get wha...

t did you say five hundred candies no you would get it how about maybe two or three or four ten well we had a negotiator in the house this is good because you have a question for you is good all right so you want ten treats how about if I give you ten but you could have five right now and five later is that good okay that's good and then maybe daddy can have him and he could give them to you later you can have it for tomorrow and the next day okay what we're gonna do to we're just gonna take your picture and were to play games do you like to play games you look like a princess are you a princess which princess do you like who's your favorite princess like ariel sleeping beauty she's cinderella I love her which your favourite one who's your favorite ariel I love her too you have hair lie ariel very long hot but what color is her hair her husband because you're here is it round very beautiful all right princess so you're going to be princess ariel today and we're gonna make you like a little mermaid is that okay all right so first we're gonna go with a little more formal pose so what I'm gonna do is she's old enough to go tell me waste I'm gonna swing you this way teo and crash your feet because you're a princess can you stand up for a minute though because I'm gonna fix your dress whenever a little girl sits down always pulled the dress forward and now sit down that just gives you a lot of fluff to cover legs swing this way and this outfit is designed revolution by the way uh this hand goes down and down no stay just like that sort of really tall like no turtle backs now I can start refining things and posture I can play with all right hand's right here don't move and we're gonna get lots of candy for you five hundred no ted just ted we don't wanna have five hundred you would have a tummy ache all right stay right there baby girl you're doing a good job all right now although this is just a light test and I believe that we switch our camera back where'd I s a one hundred they're good got it all done for me thank you all right princess hey did you fall asleep over there just leave being so little details where she's old enough to work on details so we're going to get dressed perfected all right set up a real tall agan real tall and what I want you to dio is do you know do you know what this is what's this particular particularly mommies or tickling sasha what do you think I think it might be for mommy the first time when you fix your feet I think we're gonna get mommy first and then maybe sasha ready oh daddy you want me to get daddy all right hold on ready I'm gonna get her one should get mom she better save rr and scare me away samar tombo forget daddy is a dad eastern alright say get him good once in a while tell I'm gonna get him once and tell teo he better say rr and scare me away oh daddy that'll do it I think your dad is really scary heady well friends dad you're really not oh sasha's turn oh man sit up tall sit up tall ready oh she's gonna do what I know she's a good one too oh my goodness I can't believe how scared you are you are like a real are you sure you're a princess or you a lion I think yeah lie and that's what I thought set of real tall again ready one more time now guess what oh I don't think my camera's working don't know can you tilt your head this way didn't flash or no flash did you see the light a little flash yes ok several tall again good tilt you head this way we'll see if we can fix it can we fix it put your head over here good look right here and say say you're crazy say I was crazy but I have to get you okay stand up real tough hop up and now we're gonna get rid of this say bye bye chair did you talk to a chair hears daily can you hold these for me ok scoot over here right there and you hold it with two hands right here who could hold it across your tummy like that don't move now these poses air very formal and normally I don't know that I would go super formal but um I'm just kind of showing you the difference between classic photography not gonna come way back here so we can push some of these things out let's get all these guys out I'll go your way if that's okay helen can hear this chair out from behind me she's taller so I need a little more room just needs on me now look at the details I could now work on things like body finessing like height thin posture and toes so first thing I need to do is they're ladybug on the floor no is there a lady bug in my ear now put those flowers on your tummy put them down then you tell me can you get them down there you go now look right here and savor you're so good okay now details we're gonna work on dress I would get the shot before I'd mess around just in case whoa I almost went fallen on my nose stay right there okay now we can work details with feet because we're gonna pull back all right princess guess what guess what I didn't tickle you yet I didn't get you I think it's time that we do that so don't move your feet ready one I'm gonna get her chin down a little bit tio what's that good luck right here and say no way yes wait come you very fast you got oh my goodness you're crazy now can you do me a favor can you look at those flowers for a minute how many of them are there are there a lot ok put him low on your tummy can you put them down on your tummy like this just bring him down there five you're good at counting let's turn him this way because we want her toe look down this way so the lights fall can keep him right there okay now look down at those flowers again you know that there are five but did you know there's a ladybug on one can you smell it you can't smell a ladybug that's oh why would you smell a ladybug okay there's no lady but can you smell the flower see if you can smell it already went too good now hang on again we're gonna get that actually I wanna play with toes and that'll come in production okay can you do me a favor now a two three they can't do this but at this age you can can you crash your toes like this can you do that nice don't move oh can you look right here hold those flowers cause guess what all that was beautiful shot by the way guess what I'm gonna do should I throw it all the way up to the moon you think nose can you see the flowers can you see my ears no can you say you're crazy I know ready say go you go whoa I got it now guess what I have to do I have to kind of get you so I'm gonna get closer so I could tickle you can't put the flowers on your tell me again put them right on your tummy and put them right up in the middle like this you're doing so good you already get one treat I'm gonna get you more treats okay let's hold let go for a minute put him down here and hold it with two hands again hold him like this don't move ready alright princess that's beautiful so we're gonna go for the rule of thirds throw her off just a bit get a little more drama because we could do things like that so yeah that's awesome look right here say hey lady good now watch how words change her expressions look right here and say go away uh now look right here let's get a big one like right here and say say daddy wears diapers what does your daddy wear diapers no watch what he does are you gonna get me in trouble you silly girl are you uh do I wear diapers you you better not say yes you are crazy can you hide your let's see smell those flowers again can you smell him good beautiful look right here one more time smelling warmer time looked right at me good now watch the eyes do keep him right there hydra knows smell the flowers ready now we're gonna get keep it right there do it one more time we're almost done now this time look right here and say we are watch her eyes the difference between that expression of more serious get these other they're in control so you can see the serious eyes versus the smiley eyes as well okay we've got good stuff there now little princess let's see what we're doing stuff over here to write so I am gonna wait for continuous light to do anything down on the floor so the last thing I want you to do is I'm gonna see how much room I have back there I want you to hold this right here movement at this age is really important and this is a good example of why struggles are important because I want to stop motion so strobes air going allow me to do that I'm shooting at s o one hundred had uh probably sixty three one twenty fifth sixteenth of a second but I know with strobes that I can stop her so she can spin and dance where with continuous light I would not do that with the with the lighting that we have actually in here there's enough volume of white I might try it but with strobes I'm assured that if she's moving she's gonna be tack sharp if I wanted to be look somebody moved the wall please there you go you're good okay for instance can you go that way a little bit little step right there uh let's get that reflector out just a hair all right princess what I want you to do is put your hands down like this and spin in a circle because you're a ballerina spin you go now that I know I have the room I want you to put your hands out and spin in a circle go and smile because you're the best dancer do it again ready oh you're not the best dancer I think you're the best dancer can you try a slow spin she saw people in the corner so she kind of pulled back a little bit okay hold the flowers to actually we'll get rid of the flowers to make it easier for you to say goodbye flowers throwem I got a good girl all right let's see what we can do here uh oh it is oh that's awesome no I have not okay cool so ready where's my princess did she leave me did you go to sleep did you what is she doing back there what did she do hey she can't do that tell her no way she better not he's gonna get in trouble good now put your hands up front can you put your hands up front good girl no tell her no way she can't get me she better not hey okay good girl now just put your hands out we're gonna spin and they're gonna go somewhere else ready go in a circle oh that's beautiful do you know how to jump can you jump pretty jump good girl now can you do it can you look at the light turn that you're such a good listener I am definitely going to give you extra candy you're doing a great job so turn this way a little bit now this time you're gonna and can you scoot back a little bit there you go good listening now this time when you jumped this is what I want such I want to put your hands up and I want you to jump up and look at the sky ready one two three jump oh it's awesome good girl and one more jump and spin this time can you jump and spin ready get set jump spin that was beautiful now turn around and look at that wall turn around look at the wall turn around turn all the way around and now I want you to jump and spin towards me one two three jump who wear I think we got it that's awesome that's crazy now last one can use hold your hands down like this and cross one foot over the other don't fall over and look right here and say you're crazy girl now look down on the floor right over there good and you speak right here who was that a mad face did you give me a mad face you better not mean that at me are you mad research is that state look right here and say no way good girl right we'll lead her out here let's change her clothes and go over to the other side I want to see my mom we're almost done it's almost candy time now at this age uh changing has to be in privacy because she's at that age where she's not gonna wanna strip down in front of the universe here so we can ask questions while we're switching all right great so um a question from mig and a lot of other folks have been asking this do you shoot wide so that you can crop anyway you would like actually don't shoot very wide the only ones that I shot wide on the last ones because I know I would sell that as a panel we love like thirty inch forty inch panels like ten by thirty twenty by thirty we like odd sizes out sizes are more artistic tow us we don't like the standard eight by ten eleven by fourteen so when I'm shooting wide like that I'm definitely shooting for odd sized panels you could sell more that way as well ok I have a question from egg in the nest it's teresa and she is from melbourne england and she asked how many images per each set up would you normally take theresa says and belize and babies you would typically have five shots that you take with every set up do you have that kinda with these ages it's about ten shots that we take but we're gonna probably edit it down to five and we typically with any child do three I'm closer to three sets helms closer to five ten twenty two seconds helen will pre plan her day and this is all helen I mean how long you can see she's got charts and graphs her schedule when she looks at her schedule in the morning and she could probably tell you this too she will come in and say two year old six year old eleven year old two year old and she will lay out entire sets four children so she's got three to five outfit choices knowing that she may only get two to three if that I'm totally opposite I walk in and look at the child to say red hair this outfit you know this background and go to it I think helen does a better job style izing than ideo I think I I don't sweat is my stress and sweat as much as she does because I'm a little more just like go with the flow kind of a shooting so typically it's five to ten shots per siri's um a difficult session like our little one that we started with she wasn't I mean she was wonderful and I really wish I had ten more minutes I could have engaged in really you know credit wow factor but we got great shots we got the point across with her I was shooting quite a bit more because what I was trying to do is just kind of get her over the fear of what was going on that all that flashing and stuff so so we're pretty true to form three to five sets with um eight fifteen fifteen shots per set and then we edit it down to about thirty to thirty for me and about forty for helen for the client to see and that's based on how much variety all right did we wed and re great balance here right white balance great balance purple balance I don't know so another question while you're doing that from sanders photography have you found that children in this age group photograph best at a certain time of day or does it mostly depend on their schedule absolutely I mean little ones schedules changed the first year they change all the time so we tell people early morning is the best period for every session that we dio however sashes age uh you can do like an after school type thing hang on a second um you know she's old enough that she definitely could handle off school but after school there's a lot of stress that these kids go through in the daytime so you know it may not be the best time I say early morning as much as possible with children and then the middle of the afternoon is your most most risky because of nap times and things like that so early morning for everybody after school for kids try to avoid the window twelve to two is just a tough time for everybody in the universe I think we should take on siestas and sleep those two hours just because it's a tough time for everybody including photographers and parents so I think we're good you have one more question sure we can always ask another question um one shot had said that when you're when they're goofing around and they're trying to use the mirror technique that it's not always the best option for them okay so they want to know if you if you use the mirror technique and kids easily mirror your behavior you kind of saw the difference with our little one it was more directional how was school back slide of it now with sasha she could take total direction so I could say go this way go that way I tend to do you saw me moving my body with her so she can mirror really easy but some kids can't do that sometimes sometimes it's totally opposite if a child goes opposite of your turn then they're not connecting to that and so then I have to physically move them but with sasha it was turned this way and she could do it so it's just it's literally a one hit wonder if they could do it the first time they can always do it if they can't do it you're always gonna be moving them which is okay because she all dressed up yet okay good and you when you're like being really goofy do this sometimes they get out of control and just take goofiness question if I if it escalates to where they're they're usually kid comes in rambunctious you're not going to see some of the monkeying that I do because I'm gonna keep it very low key like the gimme five game and then stop it for a minute there biggest problem photographers had is they just keep railing the same technique and it's they wind him up like that rar game two times three times and then by the third and fourth time it's right out of control and arms and madness and so you got to go to something else so the biggest thing is it's this we always say it's the ups that's the atonality is how we control them and you can hear my voice that's the biggest thing honestly anything I could teach you about children is the totality of your voice you will hear me go ok I'm ready to do it oh no and that's exactly how I make moving them through these sessions and it's all totality has very little to do with what I'm what I'm doing fascinating I have a workshop on that alone atonality my voice is shot now though I'm sure by monday now I lay me down to see if I'm gonna be a six packs a day so but no where do you think I could water would be really good if I could get a little little sip or something but these are great questions too because I think that um you know you guys were hitting all the things you can see when I start to address the audience even for a tenth of a second with children I completely get cut off even with sasha when I start talking when I break the wall all of a sudden she looks down she looks away and she's old enough to keep attention but it's that it's creating I always look at what I do it's like a little fantasy land and I live in a little castle and the minute I touch this camera all those walls go up and we are princesses and princes and we have animals and literal visual things and children see that too you can see how they play along but as soon as you break the wall somebody opens the door to your studio mom makes a noise camera guys move those walls come down and all of a sudden there's a whole world so we love playing oh that looks so good way do a commercial for the water and if you buy now if you buy creative life today you get this awesome goldwater right I will read the next question slowly so that you can go that water uh this one is from a david soto photography who is in puerto rico okay and federico he's asking do you ever allow or do you photograph children with riel animals and if so do smiley little tip this's yeah bunny just kidding I do we bring we have bunnies that we have actually pet bunnies that we bring in you have to be very careful and I mean first of all a puppy doesn't mean anything if it's not there puppy so I have a beautiful dog named kanan she's awesome boxer there a million times a day that I'm like oh this would be so cute with a little dog a little rascal kind of looked but it's not their dog and so it doesn't make sense to me if they have a puppy we want the puppy if they have a kitty we don't want the kitty but we'll take the kitty not that I don't like cats but cats are the non directional they don't really care what you're doing so little harder but we certainly do it goats pigs chickens forces skunks snakes weave spiders torrential as we've done them all um I will take anything I would never say no to a session but they each come with their own unique I mean a snake it's going to be edgy and dark the person that owns a big big snake they're going to be kind of edgy personnel into torrential is probably edgy very few five year olds own torrential I owned one by thirteen I wass skunk I had a pet skunk what I d oh yeah so you know that excuse yeah you can you can get them de sculpt and so they don't stink on you so yeah so uh so yeah we've seen it all in the studio but the most common or puppies and dogs and we look at a puppy in a dog the same way we look at a twenty three twenty eighteen to twenty four month old you're dealing with a baby and it doesn't matter unless they're an old very well trained dog anywhere from puppy to two years old it's a toddler and you have to treat it that way it's gonna they actually become the most important thing in the siri's so a lot of times we'll tell um we'll se if it's a child only a couple kids will say let's do some with the dog and then take the dog out because the priority really is the children in a family photo however sometimes a rambunctious star dog datil say you know I just take the dog to do a few with the dog and get the dog out I never let them do that because I realized the dog is a part of the family that would be like taking the toddler and saying you know what he's not being good just get him out of the picture I can get a forty inch of fifty inch sellout of a dog in the picture if the dog's not there and they brought the dog and it meant something to them they're going to say you know what we did get the dog and let's just get a smaller one so I'll go for all work for the dog alright still don't have a child so we do one more question okay and I just wantedto remind folks once it is she's nervous she okay they're clamping her up okay but if you are if you are somebody who's interested in learning more about photographing pets with their families last weekend yeah talker was here and did a whole three day session all that so you could go check that handsome interesting animals all right we'll take one more question uh friend vega had asir says I'm interested to know what your rules for composition are if you use the typical rules of composition for kids or you try to always center them you know what we call it croc because for us it's absolutely it looks like I'm always centering it and I'll have to crop later but again I'm working on a twenty minute to thirty minute time schedule with these kiddos so I cannot normally I have an hour and fifteen minutes so I just wanted to everybody to keep that in mind that I'm shooting for a sellable images today so I'm getting things I could sell a serious and five most clients walk out with forty six images I'm shooting for that compositionally I will crop later into artistic crops we use the rule of third a lot we use s curves a lot on dh that's what I would go for later in my studio I would work especially with sasha would work a lot harder to get the you saw me at one point say I'm going to use the rule of thirds because that would be where naturally I would go would be that artistic field but remember crapping is a good thing I shoot if you look at my shots they're pretty true to crop if I pull back it's because I'm thinking panel it's not because I'm thinking crop later well technically I am but visually I'm thinking I need that extra length to get that otherwise if you look at everything else we're showing you eight by tens look at gate by tens five by sevens look like five by sevens I'm shooting almost which could be a bad thing sometimes because if you want more space but oh in the crocodile I didn't finish that so the final answer that took twelve minutes to get to uh is this when I shoot I have a formula it's wide tighter tighter tight so it goes horizontal horizontal vertical vertical tight almost always you will see that uh today not so much because again I'm going just for a good strong syllable shot but when I shoot it's white ist tighter tighter tighter and when I say so it's horizontal fact I'll just deal with sasha right now and I always shoot that way so it's post number one one two three four pose number two one two three four and I know that sounds very formulated for some photographers but remember that's how I start every session and then the second half of the session is run and jump and play and spin and those were the ones that a third of them are garbage and a third of them are the absolute smashing shots from the session so let's get our little sasha girl in here we're almost done so come on back are you ready hey helen did you show her the candy bag yet way gotta shoot mom can come in we have mom jump on the couch yeah all right let's see let's start with traditional so we're gonna have to stand I remember we got to stand up again cause I gotta fix your pretty how you look like a different princess do you know who you look like bell bell has the same dress can you sit down all right princess right there crash your toes so formal post would be tell me away in fact I'm gonna go the opposite with her feet would be tell me away from the light so hold that there this should be classic photography you scratch your nose scratch mine no way okay so tell me away from that turn this way a little bit and then knows I'm gonna turn your head back towards the light this classic portraiture stay right there and I will give you a big bunch of treats you want a thousand million trillion zillion candies right yeah cross your feet when you crashed your feet good girl now we had a lot of light in here so you may not see the detail that I'm looking for let me get a test shot before I have her sit up perfect okay princess ready princess it's princess bail now huh sit up real tall sasha real tall there it is right here and guess what we're gonna play a game how many is this that's beautiful right there so there's our classic shot that was one okay now I'm coming in how many is this good news sort of hotel here goes another one I bet this one's gonna be really hard for you so that's q how many is this oh my goodness you're smart and here comes out last shot so I've hit for in this series how many and this is the final shot we're gonna use the rule of thirds how many and I want a serious one do you know what guess what sit up tall and don't bite your lip but your lips out there you go one hang on look right here and say I'm going for the smile they'll see I want candy I know you do and look right here and say stay what's ing on I think it changed something here look a here is there are I got you okay so we've got a good series have full body three quarters three quarters tied all the way tight with a serious and a smile and I will do that a million times a day hey pretty girl you look amazing okay so we have that now let's do something fun can you jump off the couch for a minute we're gonna lay down on your tummy put your head right here and your feet back here at school she huh you're gonna get lots of treats for this one ok cross your feet up here can you bend it bend those legs he's been been men can you banned him there you go and we gotta scoot back can you scoot way back there you go give you some room so you're not squishy scoot back a little bit more let's go back back back back got it okay feet up gonna put your feet back here and your arms back here good can you come around this way good girl so we're gonna start traditional and they were in a little play just a little bit all right right there hands here set up a real tall lift your backup oh man you're gonna get the whole candy box I think do you think mom would get mad at me if I gave you the whole candy box I think she would she would have oh I don't know she might hey you didn't tell me how old you are how old are you four and a half five and half five and a half your very beautiful for five and a half ready look right here and commute and put your hands out so they have something somewhere distant heir you ah that's perfect look right here and say you're crazy I am not now look right here and stay say yes you are no I'm not nuts it up real tall and guess what oh you know what my camera did you see is my camera working again I think it keeps getting broken what are we gonna dio what if it's broken we can't finish will you still get your candy I hope so said april tell yeah I think you still get your candy look right here and say say candy please yeah you could just see we're just gonna control that expression whole time now look right here and say say I want chocolate and the great here and stay you wear diapers no no that's awesome you are crazy okay now what we gonna do she sit up on the chair you wanna sit up on the chair okay stand up let's put your bottom actually you know what so we want tell me away I need somebody to grab this in so remember tell me away knows towards the light so we're gonna take the couch off right about there can you put your bottom right here put your feet on the couch so I'm up there good girl right there and we're gonna get a traditional pose and then we'll let her goof off a little bit right there and look look over at that light over there can you see that light so we're gonna go classic sort of real tall now we're really gonna control this light and go for something really kind of old school classic and this is important to you know people I know that the trend now is to just be natural running around and I really just hope that you guys realize that a big part of my day is that but I was trained in classical photography I mean that's how I learned where all the old rules which I'm so glad I did because you know this is something that I can sell thirty forty fifty inch portrait set up a real talk because I'm gonna go get the candy bag turn that way I can sell turn a little bit more wall porch it's classic walled fortress time and time again you know a five year old in a formal traditional look like this is an incredible cellar okay princess sit up real tall and there is a ladybug in the middle of that light can you turn and look at another like this one over here over there to see in the middle of the light look at that ladybug and say no way good won't you follow you want to see miss sandy fly lean over and I'll be over there and be good that's beautiful one more nice and tall and look right here and say I want all your candy I know you do got it and when we look right here and say right now good girl and hold on let's get rid of that one hang on one more lick right here and say oula that was beautiful good okay I'm unhappy down with me one more thing because I think we're almost out of time so we're gonna put you down and then we're gonna get come on down can you get there you come all the way around here this couch is a little short but the same thing last time tell me away now we're gonna work on details so look right here babe you see that and I need you to take your toe and point your toe out like that little bit more like a princess way out here smashed that ladybug no we don't smash ladybugs that's not nice you smash ladybugs no way do smash tigers know do you smash hot dogs no who says that do you smash pumpkins no alright guess what I think I need my particular and we'll finish the day who is getting tickled this time that's amazing who is it gonna be my tickle me I don't know mmm where did it go ready can you point your toe over that way a little bit more oh that's far there you go butt scooted in a little bit bring it in towards your body a little bit more here I'll help you bring it right that's really pretty bring it right over here right there now I guess what I'm pretty clothes like I can get you you think I wasn't you're ready and you know what this time instead of going so formal let's just have you hold right here just hold that right there and point your toe out keep your tummy this way and point your toe out this way but you tell right there put your toll right there can you move that toe good stay right there hold your dress is the last one look right here and can you stay and hold your dress with your pretty princess fingers hold it up a little bit there you go on the other hand hold the couch good right there and look right here and say you wear diapers no I don't and look into the light because there's that ladybug again turn your head and look into that one good and look at that light and say stinky light no that's beautiful one warlick right here and say can I be done say can I be done no and last one look right here we're gonna go rule of thirds otherway look right here uh it's not working again turn it it keeps breaking on me click right here and say are you kidding no and the last one tilt your head this way we'll go full finish with a serious go that way nose down a little bit just a little right there beautiful and say hey that's awesome you want to say anything who all right let's give her a huge round of thanks what time it is any time there iss all right you and mom now she gets a lot because she really did good so she could meet him later but she definitely gets good you're welcome thank you