Lessons
Class Introduction
05:21 2Business Portraits Overview
04:14 3How to Find Business Portrait Clients
07:05 4Business Portrait Lighting Philosophy
07:56 5Portrait Lighting Location Kit
09:42 6Shoot: Basic Lighting Setups
09:18 7Shoot: Three Light Business Portrait
13:41 8Posing Basics for Business Portraits
08:04Lesson Info
Class Introduction
(applauding) All right. Well, my name's Dan Brouillette, as you know. Live in Omaha, Nebraska. I'm originally from Iowa by way of New York and between, where I worked for a lot of those companies and made contacts and everything like that. I lived in Omaha for a few years, and I wanna talk about business portraits. It's not the most glamorous thing in the world. It's not the most exciting but it's really necessary when you are in a localized market trying to make money being a photographer. So, here's a quick sample photo. This is basically what we're gonna talk about. Nice, clean business portraits, a little bit of personality. Clean base, and we'll get into how to create that, how to market to get those clients. The lighting, the posing, the whole works and a little bit of add-on sales you can do on the back end to increase your income and do more with your business portrait business. So, I wanna thank WHCC, White House Custom Color. They do all my printing and everything like that...
for my portfolios, and then Profoto, who helps me out with all the lighting. So, two great companies that I've used for years and love their stuff. So, let's get into it. A little bit more about me, like I said, I'm from Omaha, Nebraska. Lived there since 2013. I have a studio there that... Well, my business is a little bit unique in that I have two separate businesses. I actually have Dan Brouillette Photography on one side. That's all my mostly editorial and commercial work on a national scale. Then, I have Look Portrait, which is my local business, because when I moved to Omaha... My last name's a little bit difficult to spell, so I wanted to Google-able. So, I went with Look Portrait, so you can find that stuff at lookomaha.com. That's all my local stuff, whether it's the business portraits. I do some senior portraits. A little bit of everything there in the local market. So, I keep everything separate just to keep my clients not being confused when they're viewing the work, and it works for me. So, that's a little bit about me. I have about a 1,700-square-foot studio there. That's where we do a lot of these business portraits, and to be honest, a lot of them are on location. So, I'll also talk about the equipment I bring and how I have to set up for location setups for these commercial portraits. So, let's get into a little bit about what we're gonna talk about today. So, we're gonna do an overview of why. Why you should be doing business portraits if you're not. What the benefit is and how it can help your business. We're gonna talk a little bit about marketing. Basically if you're not photographing commercial portraits, how you can get into it, who the clients are that you can be targeting, ways to find them. Then, we're gonna move a little bit into my lighting philosophy. So, it's why, why I have the equipment I use, what the goals are with the lighting, what I bring on location, all that sort of thing. So, we'll go over just general lighting philosophy. That'll be pretty brief. Then, we're gonna actually do lighting setups. I'm gonna do... We're gonna bring in a model, and he's going to be in business attire, suit and tie, the whole works. I'm gonna then sit him through three different lighting setups using one light, another one-light setup with a reflector, and a three-light setup, which is the most common thing I do for business portraits. We'll explain all the settings, all the modifiers, and all that. Then, we will move along into posing. So, that's obviously an important part. Business men and women aren't necessarily the most natural models, so when they're in front of the camera they don't know what to do generally. They're not real models, they're just there to get their picture taken for their website, their business card, a billboard, anything like that, so they wanna look good. And it's your job as the photographer to make sure that you're putting them in a flattering position to make a successful photo, because if you don't, for one they won't like the photo. It's the worst when you have to go back and redo something that it was your fault, or you might not get the opportunity, so I wanna get it right. Make them feel comfortable and confident in front of the camera, so they like their photo. That comes down to the posing. Then, we're gonna go over one more thing. We're gonna talk about group shots, too, and how I... That's one of the add-ons, so that'll be a little bonus at the end of the keynote. But, here's a few examples of my work. Like I said, it's just clean business portraits. A lot of it is not in the most photogenic locations. We're talking about the conference room of a law firm or a bank, or the lobby of a hospital or a doctor's office. So, they're not areas where the environment is always the most photogenic. You can see some of 'em put me in interesting places but other ones, we just throw a roll of white seamless down and start shooting on that knowing I can either cut the people out in Photoshop, or we just light it and leave it as is. So, we'll go over all the techniques that I use to get nice, clean portraits that look flattering on every body type. Because, another thing we know is when you're doing business and commercial portraits, you'll see in the samples here, the top middle image is a woman who owns a gym. So, obviously in great shape. But, then we also have people of all ages, body types, males, females, all types of skin tones, and anything like that. So, you really need to know your lighting and have a nice neutral setup because you don't know who's gonna be walking in the door. In August, I had a law firm with 91 attorneys over the course of a couple days. So, I had to have a lighting setup that was ready for anybody to be walking through the door, because that's just kinda how it works. So, you can't just plan for one person or know what one person looks like. You have to have something that will flatter anybody. So, we'll talk about that when we get into the lighting setup as well.
Ratings and Reviews
TRacy Sullivan
Great class! Lot's of usable information. Loved Dan but wholly cow he talks fast. lol I had to rewind him a couple of times. Thanks Dan - You rock!
user ccf5d7
Loved it! What a great course. I certainly learned form this one and found it to be excellent. I am a full time photographer specialising in Real Estate Photography but I am asked every year to shoot head shots (hence buying this course). I found the information to be really good and was a bit surprised as I did not expect to learn as much as I did! I mainly learned small things here and there but they are invaluable for me!
user-d1a938
I really enjoyed this class! Lot’s of good information! Thank you so much! 😊