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Set Up Studio Environment

Lesson 25 from: Anatomy of a Photoshoot

Mark Wallace

Set Up Studio Environment

Lesson 25 from: Anatomy of a Photoshoot

Mark Wallace

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Lesson Info

25. Set Up Studio Environment

Lesson Info

Set Up Studio Environment

So what we're going to do now is we're going to show how we've set this room up for the shoot for tomorrow, and then tomorrow morning we're going to come in here and it's just rock and roll all day, it is executing this photo shoot, and you'll be able to see everything we're doing the entire time, so well, I'm going to show first it's craft services, and I don't know which cameras following me. Is that you? Yes. Okay. Here we go. Gonna go back here? Craft services. Oh, yeah. Jones back craft services. All right, so this is behind the the creative life and say, hi, everybody. Uh, this is where everybody works. Craft services are extremely important because it's what? You know, if you don't have enough food, people get tired, they get grumpy. You need to make sure that people are well taken care of. We've got a big ice chest here to make sure everybody's hydrated, it's really warm in this environment. Usually studios are pretty warm, so I wanna make sure everybody's taken care of so that...

's craft services. And it depends on what kind of shoes you have. You might have a shoot that's got a huge table of sandwiches and food for lunch, things like that. But in right now we've already had lunch this is just sort of twizzlers and energy bars and stuff like this that I get all day so I don't have my hyperglycemia issues so we're gonna go back teo the other side way haven't shared this falling over that's pretty cool so um first one to go to the staging area john's gonna run over here to a staging area is awesome chaos now the staging area you again I'm a staging area in a normal commercial studio uh you're gonna have an area similar to this what we've done is we have all of our our lights stage we have our pack stage we have our meters out we have our cameras out we've got things that we know we're going to use a clam something clean the lens of the camera, different pieces of equipment in normal commercial studios you'll either have an area where you're staging your own equipment but more likely than not at what you have is an area that the studio has where they're renting you gear and so usually it's a chained off thing and so any time you say hey, I need a, uh light or whatever you're coming back and saying, hey studio manager I really I didn't think through I need a soft light reflector can I get that one? Yeah and then he is going to go shushing you just spent twenty five bucks and so that can cost you money but most large studios have a rental department medium to small studios do not but they usually have an area that you can set everything up I'm going to be using this to really get things on enough quickly and you've seen sort of today and yesterday mostly when I was like a bring the x they knew her ex was because it was over here in the staging area and so we'll use that okay now behind these guys over here these guys are students right now they're acting like our clients so normally our clients have to go somewhere and so normally what we do this isn't built out right now because there's just no time for that our clients are in sort of way build tables for them and those tables what they are allowed them to do is take notes there's usually a big screen that's tethered to the laptop so they can see what we're shooting while we're shooting it they could make decisions we can have powers all that kind of stuff so I don't have that but we're going to pretend this is the client area for right now we're going to change this for tomorrow but that's normally what we have there over here zip over here we're gonna go teo we'll do postproduction can you do post production are you ready for that? Okay, so post productions right over here this is michael, and what michael has is ah lot of different things, so it can you explain to us really quickly what you're working on? Sure. So right now what I have in front of me, I'm working an illustrator, I've got cs five up, I've got a template based on the creative direction that we talk with with the client, other tools I have of a branding page that I've created for them based on their color palette, some of the colors that will work with their brand palates, that we can talk about wardrobe and talk about makeup tomorrow, I've got a creative brief that I'm views based on our meetings with the client, and then that all goes into a template that weaken drop the photos into I also have the website up so that I have excuse me a sense of their brand, and of course I have the workflow so that I could keep up with what everybody else is doing and then a backup. So I've got back above all assets on a thumb drive. I've got a back up on the c drive so that's my work space? Yeah, and sometimes this workspace could be as simple as a fold up table this is really common sometimes it's really fancy and there's like a moving cart with a mac pro on the big monitor and lots of space. You really have to be flexible because your studio sizes change constantly unless you have your own studio. A lot of people I do. But a lot of post production stuff on site is one of those places it's just like find a corner and make it work. And so, um, michael did so he made it work. So kelsey has this tether table right here. And this is the producers station. Normally tell us about where this is. Normally I am out. If mark shooting, I am out with him right next to him helping him manage his photos and just being as an extra space for this shoot. I've been running around. So I've kind of been after the side. This was intended to be my space, but I never sit back here because I'm always running around. So this is my mobile workstation. And what is this? That is my planning binder for creative life is crazy detail. And it is crazy detail that has all of our packing lists are called times flight information hotel information receipts. No, this everything lost luggage checks last like, yeah, is everything in there? So kelsey has everything there, the thing is this that kelsey has all the time so you'll hear me I don't know how many times I've said it already kelsey taken note I need to insert whatever here I don't know if you've heard me say that I've said it many times because I know she has this and she's actually taking notes and then what we normally have is a wrap up at the end of the day or I'm like okay, what are my notes, what I have to do, what my missing and so she's tracking all that with the station and it's on wheels because we we move around quite a bit in fact, this is one of the first uses of the tether tools tables that were like man, this is awesome to have this thing okay over here we have diane's makeup station, so walk us through what you haven't specifically tell us about this kind of stuff and why you have these own lives and stuff this is actually this group of things is carly's makeup for today her brushes her palate I am a freak about keeping everything really clean so that models don't get sick from being with me tomorrow we have to model so there'll be two sets of brushes to two pallets to separate everything I d pop make up a lot to keep it really clean what do you do? Dee pot it's actually taking makeup out of the way original packaging and putting it in a cheapie plastic sixty nine cent art palette, because then I can read ip brushes and things into that and use it on the same face over and over again, which I'd never do with my mascara. I have lots of disposable things. Why is it important? Keep stuff clean, people could get sick, and I hear stories for models all the time about oh, I did this runway show or whatever in the makeup artists, I ended up getting a staph infection in my eyes, and I couldn't shoot for three weeks because the makeup artists weren't real makeup artists, and they were sharing makeup on all the different girls and that's disgusting. Okay, so you have that I don't see any lights or mirrors here? No, we're on location at home, in our studio, and when we work at other studios, they usually have a proper makeup station that has a mirror. The mirror is for me, not for the models, um, and lights and it's it's evenly lit, which is more important so earlier I was using window light because I could face the model at the window and have nice, even light, that really helps me, um, but you know what table works, I have my little backpack so that I can be portable I do work a lot on location so I can pack everything up stick it everything in the back pack and travel with it and it gets through security really easy so I am portable it's very cool and the other thing is we have got to get a wardrobe next but makeup wardrobe are almost always next to each other and so diane come on out so aaron can pop in here and so erin just come right through this so aaron um well zippy over there we have tons of stuff here and obviously we have lots of medals teo first tell us how you've laid this out and then how do we keep track of all this stuff? Well, normally well keeping track totally different thing when I get anything if I pull anything anything like that um get it from a store I take pictures I label everything I'll write it down so I know exactly how I'm bringing it back where the tags were I have re tagging tools bring it back exactly as I got it is incredibly important um then usually at home I have a way to lay it out in a system off of you know, a floor anything like that but here we're on location so we kind of just had to work with what we have and so these air laid out specifically for the shoot or these laid out in any order from from first set to second set I know that they will be they will let me know they will, right? Uh, tomorrow when we when we have figured out exactly what the schedule is, we'll have, for example, all of the wardrobe for the first shoot is gonna be lined up all the wardrobe in the accessories for the second chute will be warned lined up, and so when we come back, we could sort of look through exactly what we're doing, and then we have to be other repair things live and so tell us about this little table right here. Well, between diane and I actually both of us, we have to have just in case emergency crash kits anything that can go wrong will and I've learned that time and time again at multiple shoots eso we bring everything pliers, wire, scissors covers, uh, safety pins, clips, anything threads right? And there I mean, there are things that you have to sort of face as a makeup artist and as a wardrobe stylist that maybe people don't talk about, but modesty is important, so you have to have patches and covers to cover body parts, yes, to make sure things aren't showing you have to have tape to make sure that, uh, wardrobe doesn't show things that it shouldn't show on that, you know we need to make sure that things are kept under control and so that's a lot of what all this little stuff is here is well, I usually have a belt as well that I as I'm walking up on the shoot and diane and I tend to get into shoots in fixed things so I have a belt on just like she does um have everything in my pockets so I could just get ready and get on there that's, right? And then the other thing that we have behind us over here is on I'll go slowly here so we don't kill somebody way have this is a changing area so it's really important that you have a private changing area for your models usually it's off site somewhere bathroom where they could go and change in private so this is the mock changing area I'm not sure we're actually using this and then we also have a wardrobe rack that has shoes and all the dresses and everything and then in the very, very back and see if you can see if there's a steamer back there and so all the clothes are steamed including mark's shirt including sure yeah said I have a shirt steamed constantly but that's uh that's normally uh how we do things so no irs it's all steam unless it's a dress shirt sometimes you prefer to get those pre packed pressed before but and so that's the space, the other only other space I think your cable it's not gonna work somebody's gonna have to rotate around stereo awesome. You should see the I wish you could see these guys beyond the cares like wow, ninjas were like cameron ninjas it's awesome. So anyway, what normally we also have is my work station and that workstation is what I've been using all along it's my other tools table and the cupholder in my laptop and all that kind of stuff it's this right here and so normally I'll have my, uh, meter on that and I'm just returning to that all day constantly and very close to that also is kelsey's production station on then I have a tripod that I'll use teo usually the tripod is just for me to hold my camera it's not for youth I just excite shoot um handheld mostly and so that's how he normally set up a studio. Um obviously we've got a workshop and a shoot and a live broadcast all going on at the same time in a space so this is a little bit different but you get the feel for those were the major areas of our set up. The only other thing that normally we would have is a lounge area so almost always we have a separate a totally separate room uh, that is set up with music and maybe a big screen tv and refreshments where models and clients khun, just g o and sit and get some refreshment and get out of our hair. S o we shoot in loft nineteen, a big studio in phoenix. They actually have a loft upstairs, and so people can go up there and rest and look over the loft to see the shoot. They also have a front lounge. And in our in our studio, the conference area is also a workshop area and it's also the lounge area.

Class Materials

bonus material with purchase

Snapfactory Color Theory
Snapfactory Lightroom Workflow
Snapfactory Workflow Example - creativeLIVE
Snapfactory Model Release
Snapfactory Commercial Shoot Workflow

bonus material with enrollment

snapfactory creativeLIVE overview
Snapfactory Purpose Worksheet
creativeLIVE plan

Ratings and Reviews

Brian Geoghegan
 

Mark Wallace, Brilliant at what he does, so clear to understand, he is amazing, well done Mark great workshop, I learned so much. Thank you, kind Regards, Brian from Ireland

Sean
 

Mark really knows his stuff. He was very well prepared and Mark did a great job teaching this course. Mark went through all the steps from beginning to end in great detail. He also answered questions from the audience an online viewers which helped fill in any blanks. Great course.

a Creativelive Student
 

I loved this workshop! Many things I struggled to understand about exposure and many other things became so clear! Just wow!

Student Work

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