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Blizzard Themed Shoot

Lesson 11 from: Commercial Portraiture

Joey L

Blizzard Themed Shoot

Lesson 11 from: Commercial Portraiture

Joey L

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Lesson Info

11. Blizzard Themed Shoot

Lesson Info

Blizzard Themed Shoot

when we left off we had tested all the lighting all right we have tested everything individually making sure we're at a point where we want to go with the image right everything is a good starting place but the poses little stoic right so now that everything is sort of you know figured out with lighting aiken work with our model brett here gets um like kind of more dynamic poses him looking off into the distance finding his way through the blizzard right now that all the lighting set I don't have to worry about it right I can just know that as a photograph everything more or less is going to look like this and I can concentrate on how he looks in front of the camera okay so now that that's out of place if you remember yesterday I put some custom color settings on the photos as I was photographing and again the reason why I'm going to do this in capture one as we tether is just because as we shoot this color settings and these effects can be applied to my photographs as they come in on ...

the computer so there's a lot of people watching our set today but also when I do commercial work there's a lot of clients on set and I'd rather have everyone know how the image will look closer to the finished product that me just photographing here so this image is not going to need much at all there's not much retouching at all that goes on most of the effect is done in camera but I'm going to do a few things first before we get started shooting so again we're in capture one here alright and we're shielded behind a jessie's jessie's ah computer jesse how is this for you ah photographing when their snow are you worried about your computer yeah I we've done this kind of set up before and because the particles air so soapy it gets really sticky so I even bought since our last since our last year I even bought this cool little nifty plastic keyboard cover case because it was really hard to get in between all the cracks and stuff so when you're on location which for me joe from when we're in bolivia teo even here it's really important to keep the computer safe because yeah he's not shooting two card so it's pretty much all relying on my computer so my computer craps out it's it's my ass and push ups that alright so I'm in capture one here oh and by the way if you want to follow jesse on instagram his instagram is at jesse corman k o r m a n jesse it's about the regular run j s s okay if you want to find followed jessie's adventures all his dog pictures okay anyway so we're in capture one here and the first thing looking at this image what I want to do is I'm going to get rid of some of the saturation right and again this is something that I would do an adjustment laywer later in photo show but you can see just what happens when I turn this saturation down I'm trying to make all the tones of the images kind of blend together so we had to have a more cohesive field I noticed when the saturation is like normal his skin tones like pretty red but as we kind of take the saturation down it comes becomes looking like a little bit muted right I think this looks a little better we're already kind of contrast c I'm not going to touch the contrasts lighter but one thing I might do is give this image a little bit of color grade and again as I'm shooting these same effects will be applying any single photo that I do from now on so in the blue channel on the curve just as we learned before earlier and today I'm going to just add maybe like a little bit of coldness to this image right so I'll just turn that up ever so slightly it's going to be very very subtle bend the red channel down just to like suck a little bit of the life out of this make it look a little cold let's compare ah version without color grade two version with so again the difference is extremely subtle but I would have I would rather have the adjustments on the right come in to the computer screen because they look a little bit more cohesive they look a little better so jesse if you could do me a favor and let's have these color setting saved and let's have them apply as I photo shoot and as we go on throughout the day so now anything that I take from this time on is gonna have those settings let's see so I think we'll get started here the other thing that I want to say is we're going to have to make him look more dynamic right so this is kind of like our starting place all the lights good as I said before but we're gonna kind of work with brett to get a more dynamic post so what's going to make it more dynamic let's look at the picture first he's like turn straight onto the camera I think the first thing that I want to think about is like his shoulder so we don't see his feet but the way he places his feet is going to dictate a lot of how he's posed so why don't you put like one foot in front of the other even though we can't see them kind of like get low and maybe like mess up your shoulders a little bit so put this one like toward me okay so we could do something like this look here let's see your eyes here turner shoulders away for me more and bring your chin down like here something like that could work right the other way around so switch it up with the hair like that way then looking that way that could work all right the other thing that I want to do is we're in a blizzard to be a lot of wind can we get one of the panels and just blow his hair with it if you could free up some of your hair so it's in front of the in front of the hood let's see what happens killed do you wantto come come from this side um john let's get some more sand on this just to be safe okay so let's see what happens with this hair giving little loft okay maybe free a little bit more here it's like stuck in place from I think all the fake snow okay that's nice you bring some out and let's try again there caleb c okay there it is very nice so that is going to add a lot of drama going to slide it down just a little bit show me again s o mr wolf man from yesterday there is do you think you can you can go this hard way with it I don't know during burpees during the break he didn't realise there's cameras rolling okay all right let's see yeah except you're going teo to take a step back all right let's see if this is going to get it going toe work ah ha there it is just be careful you're coming up a little high if you take I'm going to be on sync with you and I know you have to come in close to get the hair blowing so I'm gonna actually trigger when you're like down all right the other thing is we're going to have snow coming from that way so another thing that I first see happening is if you're wafting you're gonna actually take a lot of snow out of the way so we're going to have to be very choreographed I'll just be calling out like loft loft loves snow snow snow and we'll just like try to make something here okay all right so let's do another dynamic version we had a break for lunch where all the gear was off so let's do a quick test before we get too crazy okay so bread if you want to look at me here first let's get a little test let's make sure everything's still looking good and our color presets are being applied to the image and they're not um do you want to just apply house ones on is it is I gotta register let's let's do one more hold on and there it is okay very cool okay like quality looks the same I'm looking at his face making sure nothing too crazy change about the shadows I like that we freed up his hair I think this is going to do a lot for us so since we're working with so many elements it's going to be really hard for him to like actually move around a lot because he's going to shift focus it's hard to refocus when there is like a walk more heard and snow in front of the lens so I'm going to kind of place you and maura or less as we're photographing just move your head slightly between each strobe so let's get you in place first let's turn your shoulders away from the light first exactly and then look up this way turn the shoulder a little more toward me let's do something like this and okay yeah this is gonna be good let me see and just relax your mouth a little bit because I think if you're in the snow you would be like to be more like all right so let me see what this looks like with a bit of wind let's do a little bit of a test all right get in there don't be shy okay perfect let's stop there and let's see what this is gonna look like first before we added some snow okay so that's going to be like way more dynamic especially when we add in some falling elements I'm looking at his shoulders and the way his arms air down and it feels like although but to like loose so even though I can't see your hands I can see here so yeah exactly if you want to do like one of those to me it's better if you do like more like this yet so again turn the shoulder toward me okay let's let's compare that walkman hold on given more come on let's let her rip their it isthe perfect thank you okay so let's let's see what happens now that we moved his arm's okay compared those to jesse that to me is like a way more dynamic pose let's see that there it is okay so we can't see his hands but its arms being up added quite a lot to the image all right killed let's get you climbing up that ladder let's get a little bit of snow in here you ready okay so again it's really hard for me to focus when there's snow in front of my lens so I'm going to find my focus now feel free to like move around slightly but I'll give you some direction as we go let's turn the shoulder a little bit more toward me okay perfect right caleb let her up okay waiting for the snow okay I'm just waiting for it say save your strength all right let's let's let her rip lewis what let's walk away and the expression on your faces you're exploring you see something around here bring your eyes where my hand is exactly let's go up raise your chin up uh I was wrong razor back down all right and let's have like a little bit of integrity on your face all right turn the shoulder toward me again oh yeah that's awesome great great great uh chin up a little bit and I need to really feel it in your face that you're out in the cold and this kind of environment here it is awesome let's bring your eyes where my hand is right here beautiful all right let's let's save the wafting let's get a little bit more snow in okay great and let's walked again bring your chin down and I really need to see the like furrowed brow on your face oh yeah that's great that's great bring your chin up relax your mouth a little bit thank you jessie okay awesome alright bring that shoulder a little bit more toward me oh yeah that's great that's great walked a little less you're blowing too much snow way okay perfect let's let's stop there and let's review these images caleb let's kill that thank you all right how did that feel that was that was awesome and there's definitely some good expressions in there let's flip through and if you want to come look at this I'll tell you what's working for me and what's not oh yeah these are awesome man knew knew knew knew a facebook profile picture for you I think okay so look this I love how the hair's falling I left a little bit of negative space toward the area where he was looking um just so we kind of like have a little bit of interest off camera go back jessie I really so I really love this kind of expression how like your browsing but furrowed like it might feel a bit like stupid to do it inside of a studio but really when you see this I think I think it comes together pretty well um jesse let's keep flipping through those you have really nice nice blue eyes which was really helping here that's like kind of a happy accident that I didn't count on your eyes they're sort of tying everything together here oh that's nice hey caleb you know toward the end there how you really like let the snow blast let's let's do that again because to me it looks nicer yeah oh it's a misfire okay that's nice too so to me it's nice almost there it's like you're standing here and you're like leaning forward and look looking out that's gonna be good expression as well keep keep flipping through these jesse a bit of hair yeah so I think go go back that's like way better yeah something around here before we move on I think this might be a good opportunity to probably get some questions on that on that first round do we have any questions from the classroom to start off before we do another round of this I just a quick question for you joey is further tell us again exactly what you were looking at when you were going through that siri's what you were looking for was just the x oppression was it tell us again why you're so at this stage in the game in the earlier segment we let everything right we threw up everything were very strategic with what the ratios were we're being very careful about the background being the perfect uh lightness in comparison to the snow write all that stuff is set nothing has changed so now in this segment we can really work on forgetting about all these technical things just work with bread and get like the good expression so when I say good expression in this particular set up I'm talking about like getting something where he's engaged so when I was looking through the camera I noticed like his mouth was closed and when it was male who's open it looked more like he was in action moving I also noticed when I told himto look off the camera he was looking like a little too far and I saw just whites in his eyes so I like put my hand as a reference points for his eyes to go and as I was like slightly shift composition you notice I was kind of like moving my hand so he has a focus point I was also getting variation getting himto look down and up because we just have someone look up look down there's nothing really here for him to look at so I'm just giving him somewhere to put his eyes so I can be like a little puppeteer needed it and be able to do stuff that's what was going through my mind on that great controlled chaos which you saw that right right and then when you're looking through flipping through the images again you're looking at all those factors of what you were trying to get teo yeah I really like that when I was flipping through I really like the selection when you have like kind of like a furrowed brow is like on that's how I imagine explore walking through a blizzard and now you'll build off of that yeah so now I took brett with me to the monitor so he can at least see what's gonna happen what looks better so that that could be his starting place and I'll still work with him also be shouting out directions on set we might be like blaring music you know to get him in the drive but at least this is a good starting point for him to be gaining question in the audience yes sir is it common for you to what you just did with brett to bring him over to the monitor to go through images and kind of used those to coach him and you have any advice for doing that what to do what not to do yeah it's it's it's very common for me to do that again because it could give us a starting place next time right so when we do another round of shooting it's like I could stand here for half an hour to get the same kind of shots but instead I'd like to do things in segments right so we go we unleash for a little bit okay get some different variations we find a place where I'm happy to stop we review and then draw off what worked from that last segment and go again and it can only get better can only get better so we're not sustaining the level of quality were before we're getting better any other questions from inside here would you be ah bumping the william tell overture or jay z for this right now oh for this one I'm trying to think I know I would be blasting um what does that leads up um maybe like what's a led zeppelin song goes ah come from the land of the ice and snow maybe that would be more today immigrant song right that would be more fitting I think any other questions from our audience before we moved to maybe what people are asking on the internet really quick if you could clarify um kind of the step of bringing into capture one and the process that you're putting it through there if you could care clarify um the decrease in saturation and capture one and also in photo shop so right now my camera's tethered with a firewire cord it's going into jessie's computer so we're not saving the images on a compact flash card instead regarding directly to the hard drive so that's nice because jesse commend back things up as a shoot progresses and it's also nice because who we can see a preview of what we're shooting so it's not always the case that I have this kind of set up but when we can it's much better because we can flip through the image is a little easier than seeing them like tiny on the back of the screen just to follow up on that why no card in addition teo tethering like do you do both no because if that like it's kind of it's kind of one of the other I mean there might be some systems where you can do both but where his hard drive is like a giant compact flash card right now s o as jessie's going like suppose we have a break during the day he'll just know to like throw on the hard drive so we have our images in two different places so he's using just like the finder tool and mac just to drag things over and if you asked to drive later he might use a program like chrono sink to ensure that their exact clones of one another cool all right well let's keep going absolutely okay so let's do another round let's draw off where we were going before I'm going to fix I like when they're kind of hanging yeah that's awesome let's draw kind of where we left off before caleb ural ural there is that it is ready and you're you're all good ready ready to rip all right here we go so let's have some focus first hold on I'm finding okay hold on we see something interesting maybe I'll try a few this time from a slightly lower angle jesse tell me if I'm going to flare thes back lights if I do this hold on you look at the stands this is gonna be so embarrassing okay and my flaring or no nice okay all right what's literate and uh bring his shoulder toward me a little more okay great let's watched really really blow the hair let's throw that brow exactly bring your chin up a little bit awesome and just uh bring your eyes right here for me yeah and I need to see even more furrowed brow let's get some more snow toward me caleb stop the wafting okay and walk let's blow the hair blow the hair stronger stronger amazing this's very nice uh open your mouth little more beautiful walk harder more snow right let's awesome snow fled our scene okay brett keep that same expression hold on don't walk the eyes here chin up a little bit chin up a little bit okay and watch let's blow the hair amazing perfect perfect okay all right that's good that's a good around nice work let's have a look at those jesse and let's see where we're going if we can get this next uh kale but if you want to get that thing plugged in we're going to go there next okay so let me review these photos again here these were looking awesome I think looking at these I'm kind of at the stage where I might decide to add in another element to the shoot okay so flipping through these we talk a lot about depth on we talk a lot about being lost kind of like in and in an environment and having snow behind him and in front right and having this kind of like um three dimensional kind of take although we're inside we're looking through a blizzard remember from yesterday were using a heyzer machine I think who we just put a little bit in front and behind the lens what would happen is these black back lights might flare a little bit and what happens to snow as it bunches up as it goes into the distance more and more it's just kind of like a blurry haze so my feeling is this since we have a haze machine let's hayes it up in here slightly and what might happen is then we start seeing layers of the light getting caught and right so we have a lot of backlight so in this kind of setting it works but if we're somewhere else it might just look like flair or like backlight being caught where we don't want it but in this particular set up it might look like a layer from an actual blizzard so that's what we're doing here with heyzer machine so caleb that's warming up it's going to take a minute oh it's ready all right let's let's let her rip okay and looking through these images again I think in terms of expression I really like what's going on here I'm going to be my care careful myself as a photographer to frame of these glasses a little better on the bottom because we can't really see what's going on there and I think they're an interesting prop jessie can you flip through those again for me looking at everything else like going going going uh this is awesome and awesome expression looks like it's really good well okay let's have another crack at this you can even bring the haze or maybe yeah it'll it'll philip in here pretty fast oh yeah no it's fine they're guys perfect all right so let's do a quick test once the hayes gets to a pretty good level I think we'll just work on the same pose and once we get it with the haze then we'll do something else so right now guys this room is filling up with like a little bit of haze it's not smoke based don't worry it's just like uh it's an oil based sort of fluid that goes into it why's everyone coughing it's just oh there breathing in the snow okay yeah so yes so we're filling up this room with hayes the goal is is hopefully some of the particles of my flash will get caught in this haze and it'll give a layer of depth to our image so keep that on killer but uh john but let me do a little test to see if we're seeing any of this haze yet jesse could you just turn your computer twelve let's see if this looks any different huh so it does look a little bit more washed out if we look at the right side of his face it is filling in a little better than before let's see do we want to get this heyzer in a position where it's not like spraying this way but maybe plugging in somewhere over here and have it pumping like to this side of the room or even if you want to turn it against the wall that might be better yeah yeah that's that's that's gonna be good okay so let's see what's going on here people watching the broadcast and still see us it just looks like bob marley's house here it is okay good so yeah so we can see a little bit of definition there but we're not going to really see it until their snow so caleb can we get up there and let her rip okay so let's get you in the pose again awesome that's perfect and just bring your chin up a little high again the shoulder more toward me all right and let's walk beautiful really want to see that that furrowed brow for me yes exactly don't be afraid to over exaggerate it since we're just taking like one still photo it's uh it's gonna be easier to cheat this look here oh I love this perfect raise raise your chin up a little bit it's here in my hand beauty alright let me come a little wider like how you're looking a little cold this is good let me go even a little wider now raise your chin up and let me see like a really like forlorn uh cold expression on your face hopelessly lost exactly where it is president let's bring your eyes and more this direction great gray this is awesome walked harder open the mouth more beautiful eyes here shoulder more toward me uh fix the hood so I can see more of your face toward the light a little more perfect okay great okay perfect everything looks great once again uh chin up a little higher yeah look up beyond my hand can you fix your hood again like you did before oh that was nice bring your bring your hands back into it like you're adjusting your hood but just move slowly uh do with the other hand okay that's nice bring the hands down alright and bring them up slowly and just slowly adjust very nice let's take it off and then put it on okay and now put the hood on looking the same direction beautiful okay that's great alright let's stop it that's good for now let's let's let's let's kill the hayes for a minute look this this is good okay all right let's have a let's have a look here that was an awesome rounds I think we're getting some some some good stuff all right so let's listen to these backwards okay so I saw something when I was photographing him I saw like when I got him to adjust the hood I just saw his arms go up and I kind of added like a dimension of movement so I kind of got him to go back and forth and keep playing with this hood and in order for it to look real I didn't want to just like lock his hands into place I just wanted him to slowly like take it on and take it off to get something looking like a little bit more realistic if you look at this version like with hayes and without haze you can see that we're like just a little like a milky er in the tones so where those shadows faded off to complete black before there's actually a little bit of detail in them right it's a little bit of a washed out black in this case that's whatthe heyzer machine is doing as well as go back one jet jesse if you look at that backlight now we can kind of see like where it's actually coming from it looks like that might be where the sun's peeking out in the blizzard and I like when the lights like not entirely perfect on his face but we just have like this kind of back light coming from that side that's me looks really good and again remember that that beauty this backlight is powered stronger than our other one so we kind of have like a motivated source pretending that it's a son can we keep those doors close please just so we can keep the haze inside thank you um let's keep flipping through back here and let's see what's working I kind of like when the hood goes in front of your face and messes up the light quality slightly but because since we're hayes since we have a lot of haze here we have like so much depth in this tonal range that's very nice very nice okay so I think we got this pose there's like a million things which could be used here let's do something a little differently now okay so let's get you back in place and you're all good you don't need some water anything nice don't need like a warm blanket freezing so let's do something a little different here I kind of want to try show me what happens when you turn profiles to me looking this way and so I looking toward toward toward the wall before we get any haze or anything like that let's try to add a little bit of variation to our photo shoot I'm gonna pull that slightly here let me see if this could be something that's a little difference you see just I'm just kind of we call this fishing we're just kind of like fishing around for the composition no go profile turn that way the office it of what you're doing and then just maybe peek over your shoulder or slightly here okay let's pull the hood like this if you could just be careful when it's too far this way it's going to block the light if it's around here that's perfect you might have to keep bring your hands into it but that'll be good for the shot anyway it's also been that down okay so let's see when you're like mostly term profile that way and just peek over your shoulder slightly yeah okay okay actually that's really nice hold that there let's see what this looks like most of the white is being thrown behind him but let's just see if this actually looks nice on his face or not if you just hold that for me okay interesting turn a little a little bit more toward the light now they were kind of back where we started aren't we all right let's not do that let's do something else okay let's get something more straight on like kind of how we started show me what it looks like when you put these goggles in your hands no that doesn't work either okay look look at me here let's see okay what about something straight onto before remember how we're adjusting the hood straight on eyes on the camera adjusting that let's see like up and down that's great can you turn your hand so I can see like less of this here like turn turn your arms out of it yeah exactly and let's see put it on and off uh huh and then come out and if you could relax your fingers little more so briskly like kind of grabbing it like across all sides and let's see what that look looks like um you're putting on a little lately I just want you to be like um I think it would help if you put one hand lower than the other exactly and look let's talk show me what that looks like that that's that's going to be good all right so let's get the let's get the haze there going again let's do a quick test shot here just like and show people what I'm kind of thinking about I think this would be a great close up hold on even if I'm like this close might be good let's see here okay nice yeah this this this might be a nice variation yes no that's fine that's what he's good did we lose the light in the background yeah did we lose that umbrella okay I just didn't fire that time can you also I think the light's looking a little clean okay it's looking like a little too soft and nice let's mess this up a little bit let's angle it toward me and let's feather it off him slightly let's dirty it up a little bit right it's looking little clean now that he's straight onto us turning away yes this's just gonna get wacky now all right turn it jorge okay let's see what this looks like again I'm using a lens hood so I'm not going to see the flare of this pointing directly at my camera might be a little too far but let's see what we can get okay turn it turn it back on him slightly and also if you could walk it back a step that way way keep going keep going back okay that's good turn it a little bit more on him okay stop let's see this quality of light okay one second oh oh there it is that's way better so what I kind of did was just jesse can you compare this one uh this one here let me let me pull this up to see if there's a difference so you can see just that movement were kind of missing him with the main light now right we feathered it off him this looks like completely wacky to the eye it's like we're not even hitting our subject with the light he's just getting everything that's coming off like that nice feather to me the example on the right it looks a lot more painterly because it's kind of like spread out more even and it's less focused on just the side of his face toward the light does everybody see that all right so let's do around like this this looks very good caleb you ready to rip up there looking straight into the lens and also if you could just grass down here and then put your hands like uh right there like finger spread out firmly grasp me it just like a stern expression on your face okay let's let's get the snow going yeah that's awesome chin up a little bit uh I was wrong chin down that's great and let's let's take the hood on and off walk harder here we go beautiful beautiful oh yeah this is great this is great spread the hood out a little more okay on and off uh spread your hands out a bit so I can see the uh like the size of the hood okay let's do it again I love the expression everything's perfect ok and go again open the mouth a little more okay one more time like that more intense expression let's stop the wafting let's get a little snow well done killed point the machine behind him just like get my focus okay alright bring it bring it back here all right and watched uh beautiful one more time chin up exactly washed harder let's get the hair blowing more exactly beautiful let's be a little bit more like firm with the grass on the hood yeah hold on hold on okay great and that's like really just dragging on faster all snap away I have perfect chin up a little bit okay let's get some snow in here stop the wafting here comes we'll stop for a second uh more toward here caleb toward my camera okay ready guys here we go walked and pulled it off I love the look on your face this is great take take it off slower beautiful and let's get your elbows out so I can see your face more okay and again bring it back down okay great I think we got a lot of this stuff they're all right kill it good right can you turn the computer toward me so again that's what I call like another round of working we got like a little bit of a different variation from where we started we're destroying this place that's good let's review these images come take a look so now we can really see what's happening with like that feathered quality right this is looking really really bad ass now so looking at these images I think if I'm going to this variation which is to say his face is darker from the feather I think we can actually lose a little bit of light off the background do you want to take one stop out of both of those umbrellas so I'm looking at these images they look great but the background is too light in comparison to the majority of what's going on in his face right keep flipping through those jesse so we can kill the background lights slightly we're kind of at the mercy of the haze because it's flaring here but these look good yeah that's nice very very nice oh yeah see like when your chins down like that as long as we take like a tiny step back swing it a little more light in the eye that's that's really awesome winter is coming okay cool let's so let's let's let's go again so again the only change for this next set up guys is everything in there look great I just noticed like the background was a little too bright in comparison to what was going here john I know I told you take it down one stop let's take it down another stop just so we're really really contrast yeah this is gonna be good okay nice let's let her rip so we took down both of these lights perfect alright so everything you were doing before was like perfect let's get a little a little time more like their step step where you were on your mark one second before we do the snow caleb pull pull pull pull your sleeves down a little bit yeah if you could take that off and can I see a little bit of the sweater and the coat you have underneath exactly here I think if you like yeah exactly that's bad ass man uh don't roll them up but if we saw like this around your hands bracelet so what I'm doing as I saw his sweater there looked really nice oh so that is from the coat from your sweater nice so yeah if you want to pull it up like past your knuckles or maybe like tio here and this one too it'll help you feel like a little more yeah exactly let's see uh that's so much nicer okay cool all right let me do a quick light test guys since we moved a few things uh attorney but a little more straight to me and then you turn this way yeah exactly oh yeah now but the backgrounds little darker alright killed this is good let's get the snow going everything's perfect you guys great position great expression everything's good will on take this no office space kill if I gotta grab focus oh my god okay alright bring it back okay and same thing you were doing before brett everything's great beautiful beautiful yeah bring the chin down again turn your face little more square to me exactly let's get the wafted in oh yeah perfect perfect winning changer thing everything is good let me just fire off some rounds here oh yeah so good let me come a little wider yo jessie tell me if I'm flaring from here ok ok all right let's let's go another round walks harder beautiful let's get a little messy with that hood so it's not so perfect exactly now taking on yeah love it walk hard uh uh killed let's get some more snow toward me oh yeah awesome uh so just watch just watch the light when you come here with this arm if you want to take it back hold on one second uh okay I'll take the snow off my camera okay there it is all right let's go again walk go ahead and back this way kale this perfect and lower your chin slightly brett and let's get that really for lauren expression furrowed brow okay oh yeah lovely and put the hood back on okay that's good alright stop guys kill it that was awesome man really nice all right let's go through these I think we got it so it looks like we got all degrees of hayes were so easy hearing like barely see the background so good uh he's a great man you know what I might do is maybe one more around but I'll just go extremely close to your face yeah we'll do the extreme close up I'm not gonna worry about framing in the hood or anything but we'll just do one more round I'll go extremely close to the face before we before we call it a day but everything is good with like the snow the way everything that's falling looks awesome okay let's let's do one more round and then we'll move on with hayes yeah I think we're at a good level now though don't worry about let's just let's just keep it off caleb let's let's do a little bit less amount of snow from last time just almost the same but just like a little bit less it's in the background for this you're gonna have to really chuck it toward my camera because there's going to be like this much distance between him and my camera let me frame this up first so you're just going to be really careful just because of focus just to keep your head on more or less the same position so let's get this right now first c bring a chin down shin down more lean forward toward me I'm gonna switch to my longer lens give me one second guys what's that so I'm noticing that on my fifty millimeter lens um it's not quite given in the eighty millimeters not quite giving me what I want so I'm gonna go for the one fifty years so for this next set up before we call the day with brett I'd really like to get in close and see his face and see all like the nice makeup and expression so we might as well get this variation while we're here you see do we have can you grab me my adapter rings I think this one oh it that's going to work this yeah I just need a lens cloth for this has been it's gotta like a layer of dust on it it's been it's been a while since I've used this thing just just nice julie tell us about what you're what you're putting on that so this is I just switched to the one hundred fifty millimeter lines because I realize that eighty millimeter we reached this maximum or minimum focal focussing distance so you might say I was like up there and that was like I can't focus that close so instead I switched to a longer lens because I know I want to get like something like here so it might not even see the background but we'll get like a nice expression we'll see thank you let me find this so this this lens is a total mess dude give me one second to find it oh my god all right lower lower your chin a little bit and lean forward for me personal god wait a little more than a man to focus this thing okay so the out of focus on this lens is a complete disaster so I'm going to switch steal the old manual focus I don't have the best vision I wear glasses but I think we can do this with the die up there in the camera okay all right caleb let's let her rip I just think you're kind of tilted to tell me exactly one second wait here we go all right uh loosen your mouth little day for your chin down all right and let's um let's blow let's blow the hair right more yeah this is great this is great one second yeah perfect lower the chin down great uh you can put the hood on don't don't worry too much about that comeback lower the chin a little bit more snow toward here let's start the walk for a minute hi and what thank you okay way gotta guy stuff okay let's review these last forms and I think we got enough variation to move on that was really nice but let's review these to make sure so quick recap of what went on there the auto focus on this lens is not the greatest so during that round I had to switch to manual focus and just dial it and with my hand it's something that I'm not really comfortable with because again I wear glasses and I'm just like not the best at manual focusing but because I'm still using a five point six it wasn't that bad of a choice to make I could still get it in and if I missed it a little bit we'd still be on us so these air great man nice variation to get something a little different and you can see now that we're using a longer lens those the flakes of snow are more blurred and more speculum and circular shape yeah this's really nice stuff man should be your christmas postcard to your family and friends all right there it is let's let's let's give ourselves some breathing room you can open the door get all this out of here went a little intense I think before we go to the next thing might be a good opportunity to do some kun let's do that joey and let's give it up for britt yeah let's give it a rest great he might have ah a career and being a bearded model we'll start taking questions and see see where we land sure go for it yes sir so I noticed like where he put his hood over on dit blocked that catch light would you have done something that you did like with fifty cent where you have something else that creates that catch like so what would what would you have used so if I wanted to maintain the catch light remember that I was taking burst like crazy I was taking this this is to get the full degree when I make a selection it I might steer mohr toward one where we can see the I better write so you probably saw a lot of images that I'm not going to use from this whole set up we'll pick one right so that has to be said first however if I wanted to in a controlled environment at that catch light my go to school here might be like a smaller rounder off the bank because then I could control the intensity by itself it wouldn't be like reflecting because like look what's going on here like we don't want another surface here that could move so I might have someone just hand hold it and like follow his chin dialling and on a really low power and then we would have the reflection in the eye like the fifty cent portrait

Ratings and Reviews

mc
 

Are you keen to learn about creating painterly portraits - as much in-camera as possible? Then you likely get how important lighting is. What you may not realise is how little a role photoshop plays in creating such effects: what such JoeyL like portraits seems to mean is: - thinking about portraits - what they are - how light creates them - how therefore to see and manage light "if you can use one light you can use many" - how to tune the image to create the output in your vision. Within this there are thoughts about photography as a business, workflows and data management. It's all remarkably accessible, too. Joey's teaching approach is calm and effective: he has mastered the art of the recap to make sure everyone is on the same page " first we did this; then we did.. then we did..." THe pragmatics of the course - the lighting/shooting sessions - are sensible progressions from one light (including using a flashlight and a foil lined cardboard box) to a multi-light set up. Intrigingly the lenses are limited no. of primes in the dlsr sections; the medium format is well motivated too, and clearly not a limiting factor for creating the desired image look. This course should get bonus marks for going above and beyond expectations on two counts: the portfolio section for people looking for work is v.well done in that a) it exists at all and b) Joey is not just highlighting his own work, but showing the work of others to allow him to explore options in presentation. Fantastic. The discussions of workflow- including data back up strategies - and image processing including print and web - are also sufficiently detailed and rational to be able to test out quickly. Delighted to see this work being done in PS v6 for those who haven't leapt to CC versions yet. It's also rewarding and inspiring to hear Joey say "i don't have a studio" Likewise, though Joey does work with a crew, it's clear they're working as a team and for very specfici purposes - all of which get costed into a budget. There's a lot of questions about the experience of shooting for a client - about the air of calm one has to maintain even if freaking out - to get through these points. It's all very real. WHile joey is clearly very confident about what he does, he's not arrogant, and the confidence is earned and reassuring. IT's clear he's an alpha kinda guy, a little competetive, and working for him (preferring folks who don't sleep - oh dear) may be different than attending a class - but this IS a class and his manner and way of teaching/organising/presenting work extremely well. Because the course is so complete, going not just from a to z but -z to +z it seems, these next bits are small beer: There's a rather surprising section with CL founder Chass Jarvis - but many CL courses have guest teachers bring in guests to add perspective. Here the section mainly demonstrates how gracious Joey is as an interviewer. And because all the other bases are covered it's no loss to have this business discussion of de-bunkings about how to get into this game. In other sections we see Joey as a patient guy too - answering quesitons it seems several times that had been answered previously in the course - while not everyone has tuned in for the whole thing, it's undrestandable why live questions weren't better filtered to highlight new questions - but Joey calmly will indicate as discussed before...and then give the answer. Never get the sense he's irritated by the repetition. While we hear his father as a strong critique his folks must be well pleased with how Joey's doing. This course has no extra materials - and that's ok: the links to the portfolios and software used are all in the discussions. Joey's blog also goes through a lot of discussions about gear lists. So head to his blog for supplementary detail. Overall it's hard to find a more complete course in CL on a complete portrait photography workflow. Scott Robert Lim's somewhat more frenetic but incredibly detailed 10k wedding photography and Joel Grimes Strobe workshops are also v.good in this end to end regard. But this one goes a bit beyond these perhaps in terms of vibe/cohesion (that may be unfair - it's just a feel thing between the three). Some folks label courses as "something for everyone" - i don't know if that's the case or if this case largely appeals to keen beginners who are exploring lighting and thinking about business thoughts, or if more experienced/pro photographers will be gripped by each moment, but my suspicion is that even for experienced portrait'ists it will be engaging at the very least to see how a fellow pro manages a shoot. Excellent excellent offer. With the guarentee, this is a no risk, slam dunk if commercial portrait photography (or painterly /cinematic and maybe earthy portraits) are for you. Thanks CL for bringing this together.

duane hodge
 

This guy is amazing, so easy to listen to, great personality and style; very engaging, worth every penny and more. Joey L. sparked my creativity and tied up some lose ends and misunderstandings I had concerning lighting. Creative live has some great courses but this is one of my favorites, thank you Joey I hope you continue on in your success and I love the end of the class when you said what is the worst thing that could happen if you fail. Great point of view, very encouraging, AWESOME ATTITUDE!!!

Vinh Huynh
 

I think this is a great class. You can definitely tell Joey L is a master of his craft because of his simple explanations. He's concise in the way he teaches, demonstrates, etc. The most important thing is his workflow or process he uses while setting up the shot, how he builds, etc - it's essentially a "checklist" of how he likes to do things. Something newer photographers need to know. He did forget a couple of the models' name here n' there, but I'm sure he met them shortly before filming for the day started, lol. This is something you should not do, but he apologizes and openly admits. There are times a couple questions are asked and he has no shame in admitting that he's just "openly thinking of what would happen," but does not know for sure because he shoots in a specific style. For someone his age (younger) who has penetrated this tough industry, you can definitely tell why he's successful - very mature with a great knowledge base. You can definitely tell he sees lighting differently from how an advanced amateur or even semi-professional photographer does... even in the introduction he talks about how important lighting and the quality of that light is. For those who are more advance, there might not be as many nuggets and pearls. There isn't any information on how he got into the industry, how he grew his business etc - with exception to how he feels you should display your portfolio in both web and print format. Overall, I think someone who's looking to get into commercial photography would benefit from this workshop. However, someone who's already getting paid and just looking to advance his or her own career probably already has the skillset that Joey L teaches and is best spending time just studying light. A little about me... I'm primarily a natural light portrait photographer specializing with families, kids, pets, etc. I'd consider myself an advanced amateur and I found this workshop beneficial. I hope that helps!!

Student Work

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