Lessons

Lesson Info

Creating a Pitch

So mood boards in pitching someone talk about how they're important, what is a pitch and how do you get to stage of doing a pitch? So I want to move on to talking about pitching, which is very much in line with what I've been talking about with the mood balls so the mood boards have been showing you hear our mood ball so I've made help myself onda stylist stylist has made to inform me on dh two kind of inform each other. So when you're pitching for a job, a mood board is something you can present to show what your ideas are for particular job and give the client or the agency whoever you're pitching too an idea off what's going on in your head and what you're planning, what you can make possible inspires them. They also give you an idea of where you are going with something as well. So when I talk about pitch I mentioned naturally answer the question of how to get to the stage of doing a pitch because usually when you get to that stage you're already you've already got the interest of ...

the client or the agency and they're asking you to do a pitch to continue the process because you're probably up against a few of the photographers so it's not so much that you send pitches two clients out the blue is something that you're invited to do but then again, these this is also relevant when you're pitching to fashion magazines, and you're asking a fashion magazine too believe in your idea for a story so they can give you pull letters so your stylist could go and source outfits to be part of that that shoot that's going to go in the magazine, they're going to publish short, you know, poor, mr publish or on their enough promised to publish, so but what I want to do is everything I'm saying is relevant in many different ways, on different levels off the ladder, you know, if you're doing kind of mutual collaborations or you're, you're presenting a mood board for your own shoe. But this I wantto talk about with particular reference it's to a pitch that I did for comparison, or last year or the year before remember exactly when it was, but I did a pitch for a job, but I found a very interesting experience because it allowed me to really call upon, um, a lot of interesting things about my own portfolio or when I wanted to go with it. So first of all, just a visual show you what I mean by pitch, he is just like the whole thing laid out. With the title through to the textual, she eats through to the all the images and in the final sheets that's what I mean, talk about a pitch in this particular case on in the kind of anecdotes that I'm going to be following up with so the purposes of a pitch depends on the stage you are at with a client. So while you're putting in a pitch depends on obviously whether you have actually got a job, usually the whole point of the world pictures that you're pitching, you're trying to get something, but also once you have got job confirmed the process of making mood balls on making things that continue from the pitch, they continue because your your your communication keeps going and you keep your hatching ideas of developing ideas and you keep having you keep needing to get those approved so that you can get your ideas approved in nine with what they want, so it depends on the stage right with them. It depends as to whether there asking what they're asking you for basically asking you for your ideas, then you're presenting your ideas in that pitch they're asking you for how to actually make something happen, then you're showing them how you gonna make your ideas happened? So the perp in the picture is shaped by the brief they've supplied to you, so they may have already giving you very detailed storyboards so for this particular campari pitch that we did we were given very detailed storyboards drawn by an illustrator very detailed you know, full of color on our job would have bean to basically recreate those images stroke for pixel but then there are situations where you don't get anything new half as detailed as that you just get a few lines of it description and it's up to you to kind of respond to it and to do that kind of speculative idea until you get more information and sometimes you are gonna put in a situation where you are expected to respond quite creatively and you're a bit like well, you know, how do I know where to start with my idea and you really do have to kind of gives some idea because often clients struggle with you know their imaginations they want you to come up with ideas as well and they want you to come up with really interesting ideas and sometimes it's scary to know you know how high to jump but that's part of being a photographer is being able to use your imagination at the right times the purpose of a pitch also to sell your image and flare so throughout the whole thing you're selling yourself you're digging yourself up you're making yourself look a zit definitely know what you're doing you have images that are brilliant already and you're going to make some really brilliant for them, and so you're using your language using the power of your best images, you kind of put yourself across nearing pressing them and it's also to instill confidence that you can produce so you have to the verbally describe, you know, how you're going to make every part ofwhat they won't happen, so when I use the word produce, they might be that they've told you what they want you to do, they want you to make a picture of a woman on the beach, you know, with with ray of drinks around her, and I don't know what I can there's got to be some other interesting props in the scene, how we're gonna make them, how you gonna get those props made? You know where you're going to shoot this, how you're gonna make it happen, and it's also how you'll produce every part of the shoe. So, like I said, you know, the props and the things you're expected to source where you're going to get them from how you wouldn't make it, we're going to make them out. All of you know, even these very tiny details you're expected to think about, well, on this particular picture hours putting forward now there's expectation that we're gonna describe everything that how we're gonna make every little detail happen, and this is before we're even. You know, given the job are told that we have a chance of getting the job it's about convincing that we can do it because they want to be in still have confidence that they're going to pick the right people, just as you would be if you were hiring someone but to do something very important for you and like I've just mentioned it's, ongoing communication told team members. So the interesting thing about when you're pitching for a job even before you have a job, you're gonna start thinking immediately about all the things you're going to need for that job, because if you do get it, you want to know that you're your head and you boarded prepared some things so you might show your pitch shortly after two team members that are going to be part off the production for that particular job. So what I learned from making a pitch, I've put present tense there what I learned because I learned every time I do a pitch it's not just about what I learned from making a particular pitch, as in this case, the compartment one I was excited to put this into my workshop because it was really enlightening time for me to put this pitch together for campari because it caused me toe look upon my portfolio with almost like new eyes and to think you know how much of this is really relevant for this particular job now, obviously it depends what job is it doesn't mean that everything you've done up to that day is all for that one job, and you have to, you know, cast away everything that's not relevant, but it doesn't make you just suddenly look at all your work and you want to put the best quality into that pdf on dh sometimes you look at work with different eyes than you might be with your kind of when you were maybe kind of locking in a different way of your work when you're in the moment and you were so kind of carried away with it, you might look at it differently went from a commercial point of view, which you know, in my case, sometimes I look at some of my most experimental kind of fine artwork, and I consider it development for a lot off commercial purposes because a lot of the time what I'm doing in my fine artwork is distracting for commercial purpose or fashion purpose. So for a situation like this, it may be that the images that I had the most fun making are not so relevant and it's more about pitch these are strong, have a good foundation, have good composition often also helps to have someone else have their input on your work as well. In my case, you know, matthew's opinion is very useful because he can be brutally honest about what he thinks works and what he thinks is rubbish, you know he'll just walk over and say so that pretty much no, I shouldn't put that picture in that's fine, I appreciate his honesty, I think so, it's it's great, because it just makes you think differently makes you think, ok, let's all my work is going to stand to attention, which is going to cut the mustard so it's just a slide from the campari pitches not particularly important to read just cast your eyes over it, but it kind of gives you an idea of set by set what I'm talking about. So we had this calendar of storyboards presented to us and we had to basically describe month by month how would make each image come to life? And this was the initial response to the storyboard we were given, so we didn't have a great deal of information about budget and what have you? So we had to that wasn't ideal, you know, ideally, we would have an idea of budget to give something clear, but this was an initial response, so we were talking about, you know, how it would sauce bespoke props where we would get styling from how it would introduce color what kind of lighting would ooze got february there that didn't have a storyboard so we just wrote that will address that later there's all these different themes that were going on in each page of the calendar that we were responding to and it was very interesting sounding job so we were very keen to be considered on dh another part of the pdf is going together images from my own portfolio that relate to the particular things I wanted to see so they wanted to know about color and lighting and styling on dh playfulness all these things that they wanted in their brief they were asking you know they wanted to see whether I can ex experience in my portfolio of portraying these different things so I put together spent some time putting together this nicely presented pdf of images which organized images from my portfolio according to these key words so you've got here color so I picked out red now readies his key color for comparison I put the whole pdf on red as well so read it it's important branding part off their image so I wanted to pluck out images where use red I remember thinking I wish I shot more red dresses so I could put them all in so it made me think about you know, how could I shoot more dresses that could be appropriate to use in a pitch like this, so it's already had got me thinking about I'm thinking critically about my portfolio and what I could be doing, whether or not I get this job lighting. So looking at lighting one of our responses is that we were going to use flashes a mainstay on dh, hating my lights as accessories to the flash so pretty much the same way we're doing a shoot tomorrow, so I put examples here of flash and where I've used flash on just to illustrate the different ways in which I have utilized that drama in my work. Then we've got attitude, so I plucked how images where the model is conveying attitude, wanting to just kind of stimulate the senses to show the variety of images. This is not something this is only that I would always do fora recline presenting him pdf slides like this is something that they wanted to do. So, like I say, the people, the pitcher is shaped by what they want, so they this is what they wanted to me too do they wanted me to present like this, but it certainly is interesting, I think, for people to see this because it means that if this client wanted this presenting to them there's bound to be other clients at one this is well because they want to be convinced that you've done work and that you could do their work they don't want to feel like they're putting they're taking a punt on you they want to be able to trust you they want to be able to see what you've done and like I say it's about proving to the world but you you could do something rather than the old just being something you think you can do and then you got playfulness you've got images that point there where I've got examples of the model being playful this is part of the brand that they wanted they wanted kind of sexiness and playfulness in the same time so I was trying to show how all these different move that conveyed in my work but again the reason I'm kind of showing this extensively is because I want to show how I have bean looking at my work with these labels and so I'm looking at these in line with these labels I'm thinking how much work do I have that shows playfulness how much work do I have that shows the strength of my lighting how much work do I have that shows color deep reds or you know drama this is a kind of work I want them how much work do I have to actually show that I wanted fantasy and intrigue so we have visual response to fantasy and intrigue images what I've used surrealism in particular ones that have a kind of like, timeless look about them on also surrealism, so one of the main reasons they approached me to start with is because of my cereal fashion siri's so surrealism was very relevant to show examples of where I have used compass it's andi used this element of bizarre in my work on dh, how it might be used in their own, what else might be in a pitch? So I just showed you these examples off what I've kind of spiced my portfolio into these different sections, but also you might have suggestions for locations, visualizations of those locations. So we did a form of pitch a while ago, where we responded to their brief by showing initially, I like my five location ideas, potential location ideas where the big description as to why we were suggesting them and these were responses to there to their pitch to their brief. This was a a simple pitch in the initial stages for them to kind of wrap their heads around whether they wanted like an opening thing, if you like, but it all depends on what they're asking you for suggested stylist, makeup artist, model concept props all of these things again, no in line of what they might be asking for it I wouldn't necessarily suggest the makeup artist and it's not something I would normally suggest initially, but if it's in line with a concept that you need a really creative makeup artist because there's going to be a serious of head shots in the campaign, and you want to make sure these head shots are really spectacular, it might be that you suggest the top makeup artists, actors very creative makeup. It depends on what the brief is, if they're after, if they're after campaign with a really top model or celebrity than you want to put forward your suggestions for that as well. So these things are going to be things that are in line with making yourself look, but I can attractive option for them to pick their photographer mood boards off externally sourced images from where you'll draw inspiration. So this is like what I've been showing already all those mood boards I did, these are things mood boards you can put into pictures as well, showing a couple of them in a minute off, I've done four clients, so this is where you are showing the client waving inspiration from thes this great there's, the job we pitched for lately, where we've put images in there that really nicely show something we're trying to say, and they've really effectively seen them come across in the pictures we've chosen from other photographers is not that we're trying to replicate them, there's just something in the picture that is key to what is going to be an element of our response, our own creation for this client at also storyboards. So and this depends on this might be something that you do further down the line when you actually got a job confirmed, but you want to create something that actually visually draws out what you're going to put into the scene. This is something we've started doing more of lately it's very useful way showed one lately to recline, and they looked really thrilled when they saw it, because we were finally able to actually express in the storyboard what was in our heads all this time. Now neither matthew or I can draw, so we had someone else do it, you know, paid someone else to do a storyboard, and it was money well, really well spent because we had this visual thing on dh didn't just excite the climbing also excites elsa's well, because we can see what is in our own heads because a lot of time it feels like this mangled mess after so many conversations, so here are some more meatballs. These aren't my images that a couple of my images in there but most of them are not my images their source from the internet they're part of a mood board that I put together for commercial client so in this case we've got to move balls this was for a job for hasty sea last year where we were putting on an event for them so it was like a shoot slash event so we had to host an event whilst also doing a shoot in this scenario as well. So on the left there you've got this street style boot board on the right you've got this cut your mood board so two very different looks so in the one on the left we're showing how the location that we've chosen is going to really lend itself well to the street thing because the location we've chosen was a location with this kind of an indoor street, a building that was built over on old victorian street so it's got these outdoor elements in the indoors and then on the right hand side you've got this control you got ideas of the dress you might source ideas of the model, the lighting and also the props from that same location that we've been to before that we knew had these gothic props like devil's chair and his old fireplace and candles and we knew that those were props we'd want to show the client so they know what kind of look like getting from this particular cut yourself thought so taking the street one first of all taking up mood board here's the resulting shoot now this wasn't actually supposed to be a photo shoot, so these air the's just how the actual set up looked it wasn't actually a proper folks you it was more like a a scene we were acting out because we were demonstrating a smartphone on the use of the smartphone, so you've got this set that we built in accordance to the mood board so got the models and the autumnal outfits. This was actually a summer event, but we have to steam it in an autumn way because or fall way a cz we were coming up to that season, so we wanted the writers ofthe magazines to be able to show these images in line with the upcoming season, so we have to do everything full themed and we had a set designer who came in, brought a park bench, brought bike decorated set with ivy and leaves to make it even more on theme with the way that we envisioned in our mood board on then the kitchen set up is one where we produced it was also not necessarily made for a photo shoot was it was made of set, but we also got chance to shoot a decent image with my dear salas well off the model in this set up so he produced the final image from this as well so wei have the model looking very firing hell like just interestingly calling upon that reference in the mood bell there of the the woman with the bright lighting so you could see that kind of back lit idea coming into the final thing and you've got the dress from a designer baby and blue so the dress on the mood board is from her we had a different dress from her for the shoot, but it shows the quality of the styling that we wanted to put into it so you can see how the mood board is really important to conveying what's in your mind and it's this it's this is this subtle diagrams like a map to where you want to go it doesn't exactly spell out stroke for stroke what you're going to get what is tremendously useful so he was a mood board again not my images but images sauced externally from different places a mood board for the shoot we're doing with grave life that she were doing tomorrow that we've tested for so you've got a picture of the location there that was in the main things I was responding to in terms of thinking what I want to do in this location I've got some dresses there that I've just kind of plucked from searches online dresses with inelegant locations as well dresses with drama. I've got a picture of the couple pictures in there that I'm not quite sure what if they're relevant, they just kind of struck me as this kind of some kind of mood that I felt was going towards house feeling about this shoot and the green of the peacock feathers. That's not something entirely relevant, but first I felt that possibly she could be wearing a dress that is the color I felt like the way to show the stylist that thought is to show a picture of where of what initially gave me the idea, rather than just saying, well, how about a green dress? Why not show him the picture that made me think of a green dress? Because it may be that peacock feathers might become appropriate to the way he designs address. So you have also an image in there and annie liebowitz image that was really relevant to the powder blue off the dress that lean it has designed for the shoot, and I really think of that image, especially mohr. Now I've done the test shoot because that's, a very kind of whimsical fairy tale image that I feel is very appropriate to the kind of running away in the middle of the night type vibe I like somehow to get in the picture that we do. And also here is a spice out version of a pdf, but I made two also pitch the shoot because we wanted to wait. We needed to pitch it to, in particular the model agency that we wanted to get the model from so we I wanted to set out to set out a pdf ten that clearly showed the details off the shoot really important because a lot of the time it's important to make things clear to people very, very clear, because sometimes you been telling things they forget them, you want to set out, you know what the job is, what the dates are, but you. Luckily, I had the creative life team to help with that, so my main job was to kind of sell myself and lune it to make I was locked like way could really do a good job, make us an interesting job of the model make them want to be involved, basically, so I've set out these examples images from my own portfolio where I've worked with limited so because lena, my working on this shoot, I wanted them to see a flavor of what we've done together, we might be making on this shoot, so I showed them examples of where we have done colorful images using his stresses on dh an idea of what we're going to be doing at this shoot so this kind of pdf pitch slash mood board helps everyone you know, it helps the people within the crew it helps myself for matthew planning it, and it also helps people outside of it like the model agency or a creative like team themselves now storyboard, this is kind of like a storyboard slash rough concept sketch by leonid that he did a couple of weeks back to show his idea for the dress, so so I kind of asked him to include some of the location in it to show how the location is going to become part of this image, so he's included the chandeliers in there I love this sketch it really got me excited because it made me feel a ziff we're heading towards the result that we want we're reporting on paper, it's becoming real give me an idea of his vision for the dress and it's such a rough sketch knows it, and yet it's so informative and so useful and inspiring on that's. Another side effect of doing a rough concept sketch or our storyboard is that it does give you that extra stroke of inspiration and excitement that gives you extra passion for what you're doing as well. So mood boards pictures on storyboards are a map for you to use the literally a way for you to find a way from a to b when you're in the pursuit of creating something and it helps other people see where you're going is, well, you might know in your head roughly we are going to communicate to other people is invaluable because ultimately usually involves off people when you're working on jobs on when you're working on anything that's, a veering towards fashion usually involved a team, and you want to communicate that team communication is really important that the mohr team members you have on the march driving you on your pictures to bay help you think realistically so they help you really think about how you're placing a model in an environment that really help you think about what you're actually going to ask the her size to do you know, they help you think really? How is it gonna happen? Help you communicate with others in the team and beyond as I've already covered, they make you aware of inspirations as well on this is really nice going backto everything I've said about inspirations that help you become aware that inspirations do always go into everything you do and when you can make them into conscious references, it means that you're aware of where inspirations coming from where you wanted to go so you might be inspired by a fashion photographer, but you want to take those fashion references into a more to stick direction a direction that's not necessarily all about the dresses or selling something or maybe all the way around, you know, you want to take elements of paintings and put them into your fashion images because you want your fashion images to be more intriguing and less just about the dress, then you still got to make sure the dress is an important element of it. If you want to keep it as a fashion image, they make your aims really motivated it's, almost like you're making it more riel by putting it down on paper or in the case of a mood board into a pdf or what have you gives you a sense like being a map, but it makes I feel as if you really want to do it, especially when you get a storyboard or sketch done it makes you feel like you actually want to make that come to life rather than just being an idea stuck inside your head, and they don't necessarily rule out the right brain spontaneity, but they give you a much needed starting point. This is really important part, a really important point on this reference to myself, because I've talked to you all about this right brain way that I've got into making my images and the instinct that is powered a lot of my early work without the notion of exactly what is going to have my pictures. So how does this corresponds to what I'm saying about his mood balls? But all these mood balls help you communicate with teams and help you tackle big jobs that you want to get cracking on, whether that's something of your own a collaboration that involves many people or a job for a client where they're expecting you to work with many people? Well, they give you a starting point so everything you do, even commercial jobs, where you're working of clients and director's on set, you still gonna have moments where something happens where they're something spontaneous happens or the chute leans a bit in a certain direction because of the conditions and in which your shooting or because of of something looking great, that you didn't expect to look that way, or you try something a lot of experimental, and then you can act upon that inspiration in the moment. And it might be that the client also is fully on board with that or communication in that case is is very important. So this exercise of doing a pitch really helps you get to the nitty gritty of what you want to spend your time doing, because when I was doing that pitch, for comparison is a pitch that I didn't get the job for, but it was so interesting for me, I mean, I don't look back and think, you know, damn I got a job I look back and think wow, that was really generally think that was really interesting exercise for me to see what they wanted because it made me it made me it called to mind what I want to put in my portfolio for the next age because I was wishing I have a certain type of picture to put in there I was wishing I could maybe show examples of more this or this or this so they makes you really think about who really inspired you what do you want to create and how you're going to create and get in your portfolio in time for the next pitch? So even if you don't have a job to pitch for preparing preparing a hypothetical pitch off I'm pathetic all job is so useful because it makes all the work that you've done no matter how little how much work you've done so far in your careers as photographers it makes you think about where it's heading towards how is this work a map your own mood board your own map to where you want to go in terms of proving you can do a particular job so later in the workshop I'm going to be talking about the dream job and what your dream job might be on I want you to keep that in mind because I want you to bury mind how you would put together images that you've already done to pitch for this particular dreams in our air that you envision so that's something gonna be coming back too and talking more about we just keep my mind so I will touch upon that mohr because there's all this I find very interesting because ultimately the passion of what fuels the images that you make the passion I I have when I make my cereal fashion images I'm really thinking where is this going? You know where I want to go with my work? I'm going to talk more about where I want to go with my work but when I look at my cereal fashion work yes I'm proud of it and I love it and my heart's in it but I know that somewhere I'm going next with that that makes me excited everything that you're doing your work is like you're showing a flag to potential clients of what you can do and how you can make it bigger and better and obviously it's not the case for all work because some work is more final oriented it's not all about clients, clients clients but ultimately if you do want to make be a commercial photographer, you do have to think about how the work you're putting out there what what is messages saying to potential clients because ultimately is what it is it's a siri's of symbols and signs ins to those potential clients wow, I this bit right here the segment there's I think about when I think about creating a I was going to say the word profile but a portfolio thank you ah portfolio on editing down the images just to create a portfolio is such a big process this is like that amplified and so what an amazing exercise for everybody to go through step by step of what you've just showed us in order to create this pitch combining all those different elements that was really, really very educational thank you. We have some time for some of you fined a few final questions we'll start with our studio audience and then we have some online you can feel free to add some more in there in the chat rooms if we have any buddy sam assi so you're talking about editing down portfolios I have the opposite problem I feel like I don't have enough work and you know, if I don't put anything in than this seems to be like nothing. So what advice do you have? People who are sort of more at the start of their career and don't have so much choice about what kind of images they put forward for that? Oh yeah, I mean, I wasn't necessarily always implying that I have too much work to pointing to my pit shop portfolio is more a case of what is relevant to that plan? I mean, at some cases when I'm preparing a pitch it's a case of well, I wish I had more of that picture mission which I had more of this all that serve eleven this is what I want more of that. So yeah, I mean, your situation is one I can identify with it's um I guess I guess thie answer that comes to mind is that you need more time to go out and to produce what you to just basically produce will stop because then you get an idea of more idea of where you actually want to go or what you want to be pitching for. So tonight I think you it za time maybe to check in with your inspirations and calling upon why you actually want to be a photographer on a certain type of photographer what it is you want to create, what is you might be aiming for and to think about what work you could go out and create. It may be that you need to go out and just indulging, creating more work before you organize it into a pitch for a potential or hypothetical job on but you might look at your work and think, you know what? If I was a potential client, what would this work say to me? You could even you know he'd even ask the question continuing in this imagine situation of being a client you could ask yourself you know why don't you create more of this? I want to see more of this from you it all depends really which direction you want to go in because it might be that if you want to go more into fashion jobs then you need to work more with you know, fashion situations, dresses and styling or s so yeah, I just think I think it's I think it's something that you have to check in and create more work it's like with me I mean if I think that I need to create more work for the next potential comparator job, then I would want to create more images that I know they'd like to see in there that are in line with their particular kind of aesthetic or the aesthetic the aesthetic that made me want to pitch for in the first place because there was something about their work and there and look on their past work that appeals to me why is that? Why am I drawn to them? I've got just using the time to make more images to put to get in there and imagining for example that you've got a pitch coming up in I don't know two three months or something like that and what can you do in that time? Even if it's just one picture or two pictures off three what could you really put in those pictures out just kind of will blow them away and concentrate on how we're gonna make this picture's happen so yeah, no there's not a bad problem to have it just means that you haven't got maybe enough that you really believe in so you need teo go and just make it happen is great, so we've got one in the back we're going to take one from online and we'll go to dallas after that. Janine wants to know are there any contracts signed before the pitch? Are there any type of agreements in place or is this purely just you're doing this work in order to get the job in the first place? Um, pretty much the latter, like I say, depends on what stage you're at with them, but usually this would pitch implies that you're pitching so therefore you haven't got the job you're trying vying for it. So most of time, when we talk of a pitch we talked about, you know, not necessarily having the pitch started having the job often your might be asked to sign I could nondisclosure agreement because often the client or the agency to show you something that they don't want kind of publicized, so you sign that, then they show you the brief and then you develop a pitch based on that brief, but it doesn't there's no guarantee all they're going to get the job it's just something you're doing speculative speculatively it's almost like they're having like a free consultation with you if you like, so it's can be hard because sometimes you know you do a lot of work on this pitch and you don't get the job and so it's time you spent doing research on obviously only layout and just all the work but never necessarily is wasted effort especially if you're just starting out because that effort like I've been saying can be really useful for helping you define where you're going with your work because ultimately it's all about selling yourself and you can't sell yourself to the whole world at once you're trying to sell yourself to some particular audience, so if you've been interested enough to make a pitch for a client and you haven't got the job it's not a waste of pursuit because there's a reason why you pitched for it and it may be that you've done really great preparation for the next bitch because that will be a job that is it's most likely related to what you've just pitched for because it's something that you're interested in it's just a question about logistics and etiquette when you're putting together a pitch and making suggestions like models or stylists is that something that you'd suggest you touch base with those suggested people with beforehand or like would you kind of be committed to it in case the client is really on board with your idea or would you approach those people after the fact uh you could question because my answer is kind of a bit of both I guess yes, I know I mean sometimes if there's someone we've worked with before like leaning for example than we'd feel fairly confident putting them forward um but in if we know that the budget and the dates are kind of appropriate for them but then to be honest, even if you suggest someone and then it turns out they're not available, I wouldn't I wouldn't sweat that necessarily because I think as a photographer and the producer you are basically kind of in this industry, people are often become available on very short notice and you have to just find a substitute and I don't think the job would depend on you getting that particular ingredient because the client has chosen you you're the main ingredient that there that they want and it's more about they I should trust you enough to be sourcing and using your judgment to get those particular things like for example, when I mentioned the location pitch that we did suggesting this five different locations if anyone one of them wasn't available than we would find a close alternative and I think the client is pretty much in a position to to accept that because they trust us it's not about the importance of anyone ingredient is more about why we chose them on if we can get that same effect or same skill or whatever it is same location law could say makeup artist skills same styling quality from someone else so I wouldn't I wouldn't I think that was a big deal if you have to swap things out but a lot of the time you pick you put forward a suggestion because you may have a close relationship with that person already and you know that they may be available and interested and free for that job great question always have time for a couple more this one is a quick one but dance lady from new hampshire what type of the magazines were you selecting your pictures from when you do your mood board set ups where some of the other places that you go types of magazine where I am source the references from for your for your mood boards yeah liston I mean I see pictures in magazines that I like what most of the time when it comes to practicality I just look online for them or I just search online keywords that relate to whatever it is I'm looking to be inspired by so yeah just to be honest to be honest most all of my mood body images from the internet just from search engines and sourcing those online because sourcing for magazines you can obviously do, but it would have involved scanning and placing that into your pdf, which is more time consuming because most most images that you can be the magazines, if you know how to search them here, he can find them online anyway and just use that so that's easiest way. So we have a question from our friend adrian farhadi, far in england, when when starting out and you have no clients kind of maybe similar to your question, but is showing your personal more creative work still a good route to getting noticed by clients? Or should you show more toned down shots instead? Um, I think it depends, really, it depends on what you I think they want e I wouldn't ever really show pictures, it just depends on what the client previous work that they've done, like previous examples off work that the client has done that's most in line with what they're asking you to do. Andi what the nature of the job is if they're more interested in some kind of really intricate concept, then, like, we've had clients that really interested in what, what the story is in the image, more so than necessarily all the glamour of the styling what have you so I'm not afraid of showing images where there is something maybe more less fashion based going on and more intricate and story based but then again I wouldn't want to show that to potential fashion magazine that is all about, you know, selling the dress selling garments is, you know, your work you're free to do whatever you want in your work, but when you showing it to a certain point you just have to think about he was showing it to you you're selling it to because I think when it comes to a pitcher's well, you've got into a situation already where they well, it depends on who's pitching to whom usually when you're pitching to apply and they've invited you to pitch already so there is something they like about your work already and it's just a case of you kind of like showing images that are most appropriate to the job, so you don't necessarily have to show everything it's a case more of just using your images of tools to show you can do certain things. So really I would like to go into more specific without a particular example I think it really is a case off case by case that that's one of the most important things I learned as a photographer, you know, there are many situations, many different situations I've been asked to do some kind of work for an inn on dh it really because even though I do portraiture and it's mostly all portraiture of its surreal there are still many different things going on active careful about not confusing potential client with too much off too many of those pockets so I will show a particular thing that I know will appeal to them and that comes down to research on communication as well actually important that all right? So I think we have time for one final question started out this segment by talking about inspiration and about how to actually, like, create and maintain that inspiration after wants to know how do you keep the energy and inspiration on going? How do you re energize yourself when you find it most difficult to be inspired? Um you mean during the actual process one shoots or in general I'd say in general, in your career, you know, as we as we go on, you put so much energy into each one and it's easy to kind of lose a little bit of that and yet tired of the grind how do you just how do you keep that inspiration? How do you keep that fresh? Well, I think it's like I was saying earlier about looking, you're looking and looking away equally being important, well, looking is just important, I think just checking in with the other artists, not just photographers like they're a lot of sites on the internet that kind of collect together interesting people like my modern met on dh think it's called colossus from fossil, where they actually do a feature on different creatives, so not just photographers, but, you know, people sculpt our people pain or draw all these different things and those to me, a little interesting sparks of inspiration that you get in your, you know, facebook feed or email inbox just kind of keeping subscribe to those, and those could be interesting because they remind you that there's so much creativity going on, and that was so much to be done and so much to explore. So I think, kind of subscribing to things like that even I don't use pinterest often, but I know that a lot of people do use that, and they collect these visual pin boards like official move boss it's, ongoing mood boards of things that inspired them and that again, khun b great as well. But then, like I've been saying earlier, looking away is so much equally important because sometimes you can become so overwhelmed of ideas that you kind of become in a state of paralysis as to how to make anything happen, so you have to then check in with how I'm gonna make something happen. You know how maybe maybe you've seen the big using dressing in a vintage shop nearby and you're going to buy this dress and you're going to put that money you're gonna invest that money into making really great image of your portfolio. You make it happen. Make it happen is just as important as being inspired. So you have to go with his little inklings of inspiration. It's not just about, you know, just having a whole library, that you have to also go with little little little feelers that not make you and that make you kind of motivated to start building a shot, because when you have got loads of things to put into, the image can be overwhelming the shoot tomorrow. You know, I love the location, I love the dress and I want to to use the best lighting I can maybe use folk and always thinks that the danger of overwhelming me, but ultimately I bring it back down to the dress on the lamp posts on dh, maybe a bit about the murals around her. Those are the things I want to focus in on and let it build slowly, andi organically through the shoot. So yes, sometimes it's just about going backto back to basics and letting it build back up again when your brain becomes a bit to fall into about to explode