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What Factors Dictate Growth

Lesson 5 from: Creating a Fine Art Series

Brooke Shaden

What Factors Dictate Growth

Lesson 5 from: Creating a Fine Art Series

Brooke Shaden

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Lesson Info

5. What Factors Dictate Growth

A look at how improvement in the categories of technique, conceptualization, clarity of voice and vision, and impact all work together to create growth.

Lessons

Class Trailer
1

Class Introduction

07:25
2

Overview of Brooke’s Journey

20:13
3

Your Timeline is Nonlinear

05:37
4

Using Curiosity and Intention to Build Your Career

03:26
5

What Factors Dictate Growth

08:24
6

Organic Growth vs. Forced Growth

05:18
7

Niche Branding

04:57
8

Brooke’s Artistic Evolution and Timeline

24:27
9

How Can You Get Ahead if You Feel Behind?

10:02
10

Ideation and Conceptualization to Identify Meaning in Your Art

05:54
11

Idea Fluency

10:33
12

How to Represent an Idea

07:01
13

How to Innovate an Idea

07:07
14

Creating a Dialogue With Your Art

05:48
15

Conceptualization For a Series vs. a Single Image

03:43
16

Transforming a Single Image Into a Series

03:12
17

How to Tell a Story in a Series

03:28
18

How to Create Costumes From Fabric

07:20
19

Brooke’s Most Useful Costumes

02:19
20

Using Paint and Clay as Texture in an Image

02:56
21

Create Physical Elements in an Image

10:22
22

Shooting for a Fine Art Series

05:45
23

Conceptualization: Flowery Fish Bowl in the Desert

04:08
24

Wardrobe and Texture

04:54
25

Posing for the Story

05:32
26

Choosing an Image

01:23
27

Conceptualization: Rainy Plexiglass

11:34
28

Posing for the Story

04:17
29

Creating Backlight

02:37
30

Photo Shoot #1 - Creating a Simple Composite

17:51
31

Photo Shoot #2 - Creating a Dynamic Composite

06:31
32

Photo Shoot #3 - Creating a Storytelling Composite

07:40
33

Shooting the Background Images

06:14
34

Editing Samsara Shoot #1 - Working With Backgrounds

24:35
35

Editing Samsara Shoot #1 - Retouching the Subject

04:20
36

Editing Samsara Shoot #1 - Color Grading

02:45
37

Editing Samsara Shoot #1 - Floor Replacement Texture

15:24
38

Editing Samsara Shoot #1 - Final Adjustments

03:21
39

Editing Samsara Shoot #2 - Cropping and Editing Backgrounds

05:25
40

Editing Samsara Shoot #2 - Selective Adjustments

03:55
41

Editing Samsara Shoot #2 - Adding Texture + Fine Tuning

03:21
42

Editing Composite Shoot #1 - Compositing Models

06:58
43

Editing Composite Shoot #1 - Expanding Rooms

02:17
44

Editing Composite Shoot #1 - Selective Color

02:47
45

Editing Composite Shoot #1 - Selective Exposure

04:04
46

Editing Composite Shoot #2- Masking Into Backgrounds

10:45
47

Editing Composite Shoot #2- Creating Rooms in Photoshop

06:11
48

Editing Composite Shoot #2- Compositing Hair

05:07
49

Editing Composite Shoot #2- Global Adjustments

04:49
50

Editing Composite Shoot #3- Blending Composite Elements

05:00
51

Editing Composite Shoot #3- Advanced Compositing

08:46
52

Editing Composite Shoot #3- Cleanup

03:34
53

Materials for Alternative Processes

06:20
54

Oil Painting on Prints

05:41
55

Encaustic Wax on Prints

03:09
56

Failure vs. Sell Out

05:14
57

Create Art You Love and Bring an Audience To You

03:35
58

Branding Yourself Into a Story

05:40
59

The Artistic Narrative

05:26
60

Get People to Care About Your Story

03:36
61

Get People to Buy Your Story

11:36
62

Getting Galleries and Publishers to Take Notice

03:41
63

Pricing For Commissions

06:43
64

Original Prints vs. Limited Edition Prints vs. Open Edition Prints

02:11
65

Class Outro

01:00
66

Live Premiere

16:14
67

Live Premiere: Layers of Depth 1

04:41
68

Live Premiere: Layers of Depth 2

07:12
69

Live Premiere: Q&A

16:10
70

Live Premiere: Photo Critique

47:33

Lesson Info

What Factors Dictate Growth

so think about intention is testing it Z throwing a stone in the pond and seeing what the ripples do and if they take you where you wanna go. So then what dictates growth? What factors dictate growth? And if I think about that, it's There are a lot of answers, and I want to try to provide this roadmap for you, too, to intentionally grow to intentionally follow that curiosity. One thing that obviously dictates growth is technical improvement. But I have a very specific philosophy about this that I feel very passionate about telling you, and it's that were given to many tools. We're so often taught that technical growth is necessary in our careers, and it is. And so we sit down and we'll watch five hours of Photoshop tutorials and someone saying, Okay, here's my studio. This is how you take pictures, and I'm not saying that those air not valuable resource is. But what I'm saying is that it's too much information all at once, and we're not equipped to know how to put those technical aspec...

ts into practice in our own lives. So ah, lot of people lack the clarity of vision to know when those tools are appropriate to use in their own artistic process. And if you lack that clarity of vision to know when to use those tools, then they're just tools and they're not going to help you. And I have met so many people so caught up in mastering technique at the sacrifice of vision and style that you can't tell that their images air there's. And now that is totally okay when you're starting out when you're practicing, when you're trying new things, I am all for new techniques. But what I'm saying is, think about how it relates to you and how you can incorporate that into your vision and your style. Conceptual. So how do you grow in your career and in your heart? Well, you think about conceptual improvement. How can you take a concept and actually make it better and better and better and grow with it? So part of that is that there is a depth of concept that we often don't think about, and I would like to introduce the idea of the cosmic onion to you because I think that this is a very important concept. Okay, I made it up so don't try to like Google cosmic onion or anything. But everyone says that art is like an onion and that there are all these layers, right? Like there's just like, Okay, there's the concept, and there's like how you achieve it and there's the technique, and there's the blah, blah, blah. There's all these pieces that go into making an image and especially a conceptual image. But then that implies that you peel the onion and then you get to the center and that's it. And I like to call it a cosmic onion because there is no end. It just keeps peeling over and over and over, because really depth of concept does not come from a single image or from a Siris of images. It comes from exploring your own depth within. And how much deeper can you get to know yourself and your curiosity and the way that you're going to navigate this world? And it's endless. Every day I wake up and I asked myself, How can I go deeper today? And there is always somewhere deeper to go. I remember sitting with someone once, and I went through this exercise with them of writing down, over and over. Why do you create? Why do you create over and over and eventually they said, This is it. I know why I create now because I like I wrote this thing and it's perfect. It's exactly why I create. And I said. But then every day after that, you have to ask the same question because it will change. The answer will change. And if you think that you have found that that reason why you create and that's it and you're ready to go, you're wrong. There is always something deeper to find. There is always a deeper place that you can get to to explore the endless cosmic onion of your being thing is the weirdest thing I've ever said. Yep, probably Okay. So once we think about conceptual depth and we have to think about clarity of voice and vision, and when we think about clarity of voice and vision, then you think about your art. Your brand being recognizable is yours. Can you put any five images from your portfolio together and recognize them as yours? And I have a slight problem with this way of thinking, because I believe that if your curiosity leads you to different types of art. Do those different types of art. I am not going to say no. You have to pick one thing. But within those portfolios that you create within those interests and those pieces of curiosity, can you create a clarity of vision that says that this is your work? And this is where Siri's comes in Because you may be thinking, No, the answer is no. I can't pick out five random images from my portfolio and say, Yes, these all go together. I could tell that their mind. That's why it's so important to focus on a Siri's. Because if you could make one Siri's cohesive as opposed to your whole portfolio. It's a much more manageable way of thinking, and it's going to help you with getting recognized for a certain style, a certain voice and vision and also getting into galleries, museums, contest grant, stuff like that. We will talk about all of that eventually, I promise, and then impact. This is the one that I think we most often don't focus on. Enough. We, you know, you confined classes Gloria about voice and vision technique concept, but impact is much less spoken about what is impact. It's the connection that your heart has to other people the way that you intend for your art to leave you and go out into the world. That's impact. It's It's the legacy that your art leaves behind. And I am obsessed with legacy. And I am obsessed with this idea that we can hone our story and our narrative. We can put something specific, vulnerable, beautiful into our art that has impact for other people. There's an argument that I get in with people sometimes which I always win, I think. But that's just me, which is that art can be and often should be created for other people as well as for yourself. And I talked to a lot of artists who say No, my artist for me on Lee, But then equally those same artists will say, But I wanna make money or I want people to look at my work on Instagram. Well, then, it's not just for you, it's just not and there is no shame in that. As somebody who has been in the fine art world for over a decade, people have made me feel bad for thinking that I can't create for others. And the perfect example of this is that I went to a portfolio review in 2015 and a really, really big gallery looked at my work and I was so excited. It was like one meeting that I was most eager tohave, and she looked at, like, three of my prints, just dead, silent, just looking at them. And she said, I think you're not a real artist And that was her feedback to me and I asked why and what I could do And she said, Well, your online you're creating for other people That's not what a real artist does And I fundamentally disagree with that statement because what she was saying was, You can't create for art for yourself or for other people. It has to be one or the other. Either you're a commercial photographer or you create work. That's fine art for yourself. But I think that the best art takes the audience into consideration. You say, How can I impact people with my work? How can I create something that resonates internally that I can then flip to the outside and give to other people because art is a gift. The best art in the world makes you feel something and changes your perspective. And I think that the best artists in the world know that they know that their work is going to change the world somehow in some way. And that's why I fully believe that artists should consider their audience To some extent. I'm not saying that should dictate what you create or how you create. But when you're ready to share that thing that you have made, think about how you can do that in a way that will most serve others because you and your art or our gift, and if you don't give it to other people in that spirit, then it won't be received in that spirit.

Class Materials

Bonus Materials with Purchase

Worksheets.pdf
Student Practice Images (large 1.9gb zip file)

Ratings and Reviews

a Creativelive Student
 

Brooke never fails to deliver. I found this course superb from start to finish. From exercising your creative 'muscle', demystifying taking self portraits, and showing that they don't have to be perfect before you begin editing, to walking you through her editing process and how to price your work. Brooke's enthusiastic personality and excitement about the work shines through it all. Definitely recommended!

Søren Nielsen
 

Thank for fantastic motivating an very inspiring. The story telling and selling module was very helpful - thanks from Denmark

Rebecca Potter
 

Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Brooke for this amazing class. Inspired and so full of practical knowledge, this is the best class I've ever watched. You have given me the confidence to pursue what I've always been afraid to do. Watch this space!

Student Work

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