Lessons

Lesson Info

Attracting Detail-Driven Brides

Focus on how to attract detail driven brides and there's a few points to this now what we first talked about where those first kind of first weddings in two thousand seven, and I really appreciate the support because I was putting together the presentation, there was always that, like undercurrent of doubt, that kind of like fear kind of settles and be like, do I really want to show work from my first year it's kind of scary putting yourself out there? And I do. I do know that I open myself to a lot of criticism, but I definitely just think everybody, you kind of came on board and said, hey, it's, fine, like we've all been there, so thank you for that. I love the internet makes you feel all warm and fuzzy, so we got to this point and I knew that I wanted to change, but I didn't know how, which goes back to that idea that I had mentioned earlier. Sometimes we get sit back and relax and think, well, this photographer gets this and that photographer could set, and why don't I get weddings...

full of details? Well, I kind of got two point two, I realized I might not have details, but even if I had those details I wouldn't even necessarily know how to shoot them outside of the simple fact that we can understand that ok, we have a bouquet we could put the bouquet in front of us and then we shoot the bouquet I'm not speaking to that sense I'm actually speaking in a sense of how can I shoot it editorially? How can I shoot it its maximum potential because shooting a bouquet is it just not enough for it? From an editorial perspective, what you need to do is you need to stylized ok find the best light for the bouquet and figure out the west the best way that it would appeal to an editor and this is just from my perspective I needed to know how to shoot details, period but there was nobody out there. There was no forum. There was no anything on the web that actually walked me through how to shoot the details so I had kind of had to put together my own curriculum and my own curriculum was free. Jd dropped me off at barnes and noble and he went and watched a movie that gave me about two hours to go in and it grabs however many wedding magazines were on the shelves, I pulled out all the wedding magazines and they sat at a table and I got a hot chocolate because clearly weddings and hot chocolate go together and I laid out all of the magazines in the rial wedding section. Yes, I love the editorial spreads at the white wedding magazines have but I need to learn. And what I was learning was from other photographers who had been featured, and as I was going through the work, I started dissecting what I considered to be patterns. Now, the patterns of what was drawing an editor to choosing certain photos. Now we can simply I think that especially in american culture, will become consumers. We consume everything the way we just soak soaked, soaked success. But if you take a step back and actually to lay everything out and see it from on aerial perspective, you begin to see that editors air choosing very specific photos, not once, not twice, but again and again and again. And he started. I asked, asking myself, why? Why is this happening? And how can I start understanding with the pattern? Might be, of course, it is not a hard and fast rule, and of course, there is not an equation. However, what we can establish is there are similarities and what works, and I started asking myself listing what those similarities were. I wanted to know what editors wanted so that I would be able to give them every reason for them not to say no to a perspective submission now I understand that I can't be everywhere at once but because I started itemizing the list in my mind I use jd very much as a resource if I'm at a point in the day where I realized I don't get this jd please go and get the shot for me because I know that I need it not necessarily for the portfolio because I do think in my mind we have enough photos but I said in case that this might get published I need to make sure that the editor has her options so not only my shooting for the client who's my absolute number one priority most of shooting for myself to satisfy and quench an artistic perspective I'm also shooting foreign editor in the back of my mind now of course he might during my first wedding I'm not thinking ob gyn foreign editor of course not but I think the earlier you start taking this into consideration you start adding a third list of items that you should be photographing on a wedding in a different capacity so I think this is going to lead us into a section that I referred to as how I shot it then john cain sergeant absolutely those three perspectives in mind what you want what you want to your bride and wouldn't want for an editor in the shooting where do you put the images you have all those who that you end a wedding with some going, you're blogged, some go to magazines, what goes to the bride? Just kind of saying, well, everything goes the bride, of course. So what? How do you distinguish what you put like what's different from what's on a blogger for sports submitted? Um, so the block is a really siphoned down version. So what actually goes on to a block is nineteen to twenty two images from a wedding day that's all I'm posting and I'm posting what is going to attract a future bride because that is always the trajectories. As I make business decisions, I have to understand I want to make a long term business decision, and for me, a long term business decision is booking a bright because my business comes about twelve to fourteen months in advance, right? We book weddings roughly a year in advance to one, they happen, so I need to forecast that so I'm choosing images that will appeal to a bride, which is dress shoes, bouquet father walking her down the aisle moments of the first look fun, happy photos during the reception for stance, those air all you'll find that again, when you go to with somebody's block, you just kind of scroll through them like it okay, moving on now like you going on, but if you actually were to follow photographer ardently and see his or her voice, you'll begin to see that there's patterns within that I'm choosing very specific photos to attract a very specific bride. I am choosing these photos with a reason and a y once you start doing that, you'll start noticing that you can start marketing to a very specific type of client that will attract what you want in the future that cool, but the bride gets everything, including what I shot for myself and for the editor. Now the editor is not getting photos of people completely sweaty and any breed it on the dance floor right way got it. Show the classic side to the wedding so we are here at how I shot it then and how I shot it now this's a slight detour from actual the text, but I thought it would be a good idea to showcase how a shot what, how it shot specific details during my first year juxtaposed with the lessons I learned to how I shoot them. Now I simply am not showing my current photos to be like, well, this is such a good photo, I actually I'm going to talk, hopefully about the things that I learned along the way and things to avoid, so the very this is the very first ring photo that I took on my own. Why I put it in a doll house I have no idea I was trying to be artistic or something, but I own it I'm going to own it and I didn't have a macro lens of the time I did have the twenty four to seventy two point eight with macro capabilities and that's how I shot my rings for about two years before I got invested in a macro lens you know it doesn't okay job with it, it's not the best, but it's certainly not the worst so that's why I shot it? I don't think it's a particularly great angle also says it has great light find one good thing about a boat has good light, so I'll take that that's what I'm gonna own for my first picture, but I wasn't telling the story of the day that's one thing I'm gonna get to that in a second. This is from the second wedding that I shot and you can see the differences between the photos in between these two photos, I got my hands on my very first set of our second set me perhaps of the fender shop actions and I was like, I'm going to run about one hundred percent because I didn't know any better, so this is like a photo that a taken of the rings for jodi and vips wedding and I ran like an action at one hundred percent so now I'm parsing back and not processing my photos with any one particular action that's at that degree again, this was also shot with a twenty four to seventy two point eight so this is a rain shot from a recent wedding. I am shooting this. This particular photo was shot with the macro lens, the l series two point eight s and what I wanted to do is incorporate a detail so that very first wedding that I shot I put it in the dollhouse because I had this idea that maybe it was supposed to work. But now, in very strategic, the bride had incorporated postcards in to her reception and cocktail hour details, so I pulled a couple of those with permission and I took them outside and I laid them on the floor to incorporate a very detailed photo of her day that reflected the style izing of it. The next photo it was from a recent wedding that I shot in november. Now the differences between these two photos both this is also shot with the macro when one hundred millimeter macro I s l series lends to put it, these photos look extraordinarily different from each other, but I feel like it's important for me to get a classic photo, which is very traditional rings like perhaps in the box or just simply in good light plane just in case that bride just wants a deep photo plane of her rings, and then I incorporate a photo that incorporates the details of her day either a particular color, an element mixed with something else and something that's really reflective of her personality. I she had already shot the rings in the morning with, like other elements on her day, and I felt okay with it. I felt confident with it. I was like, whatever I got in the three shots that I wanted, and once I get the three shots that they wanted straightforward ring shot incorporating details on one islamic of her personality, I'm a ford, and I don't look back because there's. Too many things going on in the wedding day, however, at this particular wedding, when I walked into the reception, they had glass tables, everyone sat at a glass table. It was absolutely beautiful and she was a little bit more glam, more glam than I had anticipated up until this point cause I walking two receptions like, whoa, I didn't know that her colors or black, red and white in november, and she was all about like the diamonds and the judge I asked for their rings again while the guest were dancing. For the rings on top of a glass table, I think in retrospect, this was the ring shot that she chose to include in her album, and I think it's because it reflected her personality much more than the other option that I had given her. So when you're thinking about that don't ever feel stuck like this is probably I mean, this is a really low light, and I was using probably thirty two hundred s o, but it was fine, and I felt like, ok, maybe there are imperfections of the photo, but it felt like really did reflect her, and she moved forward with that. So the next photo is a sample of a very straightforward photo. There was moss in between cracks of brick, and I simply took the rings outside and I placed them in the mosque, and this is what I would refer to is very straightforward photo. So again, cooperating details, one islamic of the personality and one very straightforward. So those are the lessons that I learned from the first time I shot what brings to how I shoot them now moving forward. I don't know how how often many photographers are doing table shots I'm just going to call it for what it is they're like the bane of our existence who likes table shots nobody like stable shots but I understand that they're part of the wedding day I will not offer to shoot table shots unless I'm specifically asked that's just out in the open I'm not goingto do something I don't want to do and it takes forever I will not forget that as we did these table shots we got so pushback in the timeline that all of a sudden the day was a mess and I felt like it was our responsibility because there wasn't wedding coordinator keeping us on track so this is very this is misa and andy's wedding we had just shown their wedding earlier and this is very typical of what the table shot was looking like for us in the beginning part of our career what you'll see the lower portion of the picture is a plastic cup filled with punch you have the paper plates you have soup, you have chopsticks, you have just portions of the centerpiece it wasn't looking good and how we have to understand as we shoot across anything the thing that is in front of us should be so killer and out of sight or else it just makes the photo looks terrible so what we learned from that is now what we call a system if we do have tohave table shots and it's always met with a little bit of resistance but we our professionals we know how to do this I look at my bride and I say you can choose to walk to every table and spend forty five minutes to an hour or we can get it done in twenty five minutes if we bring everybody to you she's like let's do twenty five minutes we bring them into the center of the dance for what people are eating I am shooting them jd is getting the next table and keeping them in the wings so when that group is done we send the next group in yes it removes them from the dinner but that was not my prerogative that was the bride's prerogative my responsibility is to be as efficacious and quick as possible with the photograph and this is how we get it done thiss is a sample of what it looks like this is a recent wedding that we shot in january the bright it changed from her traditional wedding dress into a chinese wedding dress they got married the day before chinese new year and celebrated right into chinese new year so we move everybody onto the dance floor and jd will either hold one of either hold video lights if I feel like I don't have enough light or we just simply set up an external light off to the side and illuminate our subjects with that and it also allows us to create to capture that indian light in the background this photo was photographed with a thirty five millimetre I'm on the dance floor all the way on the side all the way on the opposite side of it very straight forward moving people to you really expedites that process the next photo was shooting food on a wedding day I really do understand after looking at the detail photos in magazines because this is remember at the time not don't remember because you don't know think about at the time there was maybe one or two wedding blocks that were out in the market and prevalent and nobody are very few people understood how to leverage them in a way and they were just at the time building their content on dh I wasn't necessarily looking to that as a learning source because it was still building in and of itself I was looking to magazines as learning source now I think that both of them are extraordinarily good learning sources so as I was looking at the features it was oh incorporating details of the food so I was like oh note to self I need to start shooting the food when I wasn't shooting the food because clients had chosen and invested in that so this is what a first photo of food with like I don't think it's particularly bad and anyway, she perform, but I don't think it's particularly good either it's simply a photograph, I think that quite honestly I was shooting my food too tight unless you're shooting it with a macro lens and you're getting a very detailed photo of it pull back a little bit to get the story around what it is because it's a food in its environment that actually makes it editorial editorially viable from my perspective, this next photo is what I learned. What not to do is when you're shooting food is when you put food in between food between food and want to shoot food across from it doesn't really look good because it just makes it look not as appetizing have you again, this is before I have learned the power of style izing, but I should have done was taken that plate off of that ring and shot it at the edge of the table in good light that's what I should have done, but I wasn't confident in removing or changing. Certainly what I'll do is sometimes if I feel like it's a really complex senate, take a picture of that complex set up and then feel at leisure or the freedom to move things around and say di allies it so that you feel confident and how it looks, get the photo you need and put everything back to where it was good moving on so this is how I shoot food now taking a quick step back, finding good light and keeping it within its environment we know that the clients have invested in this money and this particular family was richly italian so they wanted to have bread, cheese, figs, grapes all lives and I knew that I needed to get that photograph in a way that displayed exactly what they wanted for this photo is using the fifty millimeter one point two and I likely shot it at an f two point. Oh, this particular photo I showed it at a one point e because I really did want tio focus on the sausage in the foreground. I'm sorry I got weird sense of humor anyway, this is absolutely ridiculous. So finding good light now there were six plates on the table. There is six weeks on the table. It was very important for me to find the plate with the best light I don't arbitrarily pick a plate and shell you need to stop because I'm just gonna lose your way need to keep this professional find this sausage ok, so yes that's exactly what I need to do. I need to find the plate with the best sausage the best light and even if you find the good light now here's the thing sometimes the soup would get up on the sausage you have to us, and we just need to stop going to professional. Sometimes it's soup would get up over the sausage. I would get the plate from a different location, bring the clean plate over to the position of the good light and photograph that one co great room with from this life because you guys are awful. You guys are just awful during cocktail hour. This is what I want. Janey photographing is pictures of the food. He I know that he shot this with the fifty millimeter because he takes with him as he shoots called our fifty millimeter, as well as the twenty four millimeter that's. What he kind of just shoots details. Fifty, twenty four guests this's what I think editors are looking for, and they're not looking for plates that have a few pieces removed. So what I'll do is I'll camp out by the door where the servers air coming out, because as they walk out into the party, people have already taken glasses from the drinks, or they have already taken food from platters. And all the sudden you go, grease marks left on the doyle, ese no, no, no, no, no, get them as they come out the door said, hey, can you follow me over here and the servers will always give you a hard time they're not hired for your photographic services it doesn't matter your bride hired to get the details I never have a server was like oh sure I'm like listen, I just need thirty seconds of your time the bride requested this photo she really didn't but whose wife is it really okay so how I shut it then this is a prep detail for my second wedding remember I told you I shot indian wedding my second for my second wedding this is jody getting ready? I don't particularly think that this is a bad photo in any way, shape or form but what I'm going to show you and I'm not saying that I think it's a pretty amazing photo but what you're going to see was with my work is that there was a pattern this's jodi getting ready and again this is jody getting ready again this is second wedding I'm still into my photo shop actions at a hundred clearly right? I mean, look at that skin again. I'm going to show a third photo of jodi getting ready pattern for me was that I was shooting these photos extraordinarily tight and I felt that while that isn't a bad thing, I needed to diversify their portfolio in a way that appealed both to me both to an editor and to the bride so this is a shot of jodi getting her shoes on what a photo looks like for me a little bit more recently is cheering getting her photo getting her shoes on still close but it gets a little bit more of what is going on in the photograph her bridesmaid sitting off to the side just the light hitting the side of her face I didn't I didn't feel like I had to show in the entirety of her face just the kind of crest of her bottom lip was fine with me so kind of taking a step back was the thing that I was learning about details which is what was happening as isa I showed earlier with a black and white picture jodi her getting her julia honor she was doing her hair in the back I think missed the point of what was going on in the story and to me and editorially the story is more important than getting that awesome detail of that finger filled with jewelry get both but making sure that you're seeing it from two different entirely different perspectives. The last photo for prep would be mckayla with her sister whitney and her mom resa to me the photo is what it's intended to do a photo of her getting ready but it's also equally important to showcase her mom and her sister there and from an editorial perspective those types of things work better when girls are around the bride getting ready just from what I've noticed from my patterns, not to say that this is a good thing or a bad thing. Like don't like bridesmaids. Go run. I need that shot. But either way, making sure that you get those options, because I did get michaela by herself. But having making sure that her mom and sister were there, too, was also a thing that I wanted to focus on.