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Month 2, Week 2 (Oct 13-19) - Feedback & Weekly Review

Hi, everybody on Susan High. And this is our weekly video of the week. Um, I'm coming to you live from my front porch. Actually, you know, it's a lot of us get into wedding photography thinking that it's going to be super fun and, you know, kind of glamorous all the time. But some days you end up recording videos on your own front porch because the studio that I share that I was videoing from last week is actually being used by my studio partner. And the inside of my house is actually full of people right now who are working on my house. So you know, in order for us to have any sort of semblance of privacy we get to see on the front porch. So welcome to my front porch. I am working from home today, doing exciting things such as emailing balancing my checkbook and cooling down a wedding. So it's a very exciting day around to the home studio. Now. I went to go open up the document to answer all of your questions from the week on Lee to find out that no one actually asked me any questions...

for the week So what I did instead was I went and reviewed all of the homework that's been sent in so far for the month and tried to establish sort of some common problems in common issue areas that people are still struggling with. So hopefully addressing the problem that I have been seeing with the homework that's been turned in will help some of you, you know, on your path as you continue to do the homework assignments and also as you continue to shoot. So please feel free right in your questions, just like last week. You know, I want to make sure that I get to answer all of those questions, so feel free to send them in Creative alive will send them over to me. And in the meantime, I just want to go through this list that I put together of sort of common issues that I'm seeing with the homework. So without further ado, the number one definitely people are mostly sending the ring shots, and that's great. You know, we're still you still got plenty of time to do the rest of the assignment. But the month is sort of taking onward, and, you know, you do have a bunch of other things to shoot, other than just rings and jewellery. So I would highly recommend, if you're still stuck on the macro work, keep doing the macro work. Obviously you want to improve, but you need to make sure that you don't find yourself at the end of the month with all of these other things that you should have thought you should have been shooting throughout the month. Another that got done. So So there is that what I'm noticing most of all with people's range shots that they're sending in is that a lot of people are still struggling with focused issues, and I'm seeing a lot of for lack of better word, a lot of excuses. Uh oh, I'm struggling with the focusing of the macro or oh, I'm having trouble with this or I'm having trouble with that. And yes, focusing with a macro is really difficult, which is why, 99% of the time when I'm shooting rings, I'm focusing manually on those rings. You know that 105 millimeter macro, even though it is fantastic, and it is a wonderful, sharp, responsive piece of glass it's still going to struggle when I'm trying to focus on a sparkly piece on top of a sparkly piece. So if you're struggling still with the focusing of your ring shots, please don't be afraid to switch over to manual focusing and do it that way. I find that with practice, it's actually quicker and a lot easier than sitting there feeling frustrated while you're macro tries to focus over and over and over again. So the second thing that I'm noticing with people's ring shots is very slow shutter speeds. You know, 1/15 of a 2nd 1/ of a second. And you know, I've talked a little bit about making sure that your focal length and your shutters be kind of go hand in hand. But unless you're putting your camera on a tripod, it's going to be really hard to get a ring in focus, using a macro with no camera shake if you're shooting at a really slow shutter speed. So that's another thing to sort of be conscious off when you're working through your ring shots. You know the other thing that I'm seeing is if there's there's a lot of focus, I mentioned this a little bit already. There's a lot of focus on the details shooting, and I know that that's really fun and is also really easy to do. If you don't have a lot of weddings or you don't have models lined up to help you shoot that, it's easy to sort of start on the details and stick there. But after a certain point, you know, while it is absolutely important to keep shooting them and keep working on them, you need to also start focusing on the other aspects of the wedding day as well. You know, a lot of people got far behind in month one on the spreadsheet, homework and the financial homework, and I just don't want to see you guys experience any of those same, you know, personal frustrations if you start falling behind in month two. So you know there's that. But the other thing that I'm seeing a lot of is, um, and again, I you know I love you guys, So I want to be completely honest with you. I'm seeing a lot of people making a lot of excuses, right, Like a lot of people have sent in getting ready shots and said, You know, the lighting's really bad, but the room was really tough in there. You know, I couldn't do anything about it. And yes, to a certain extent you can't do a lot about a bathroom or a crowded room or a room with mediocre light. But to take a picture and and say, Well, it could have been more, But the situation was tough. It's your job to make the best of a bad situation and, you know, putting posting a picture and sending a picture in that says, Well, I know the lighting's not great, but this is all I had to work with. I feel like as a wedding photographer it's dark job to learn how to do above and beyond what we have to work with. So if you're lighting is bad, make more lighting or bust on your video light or move something around. You know, if the room is crowded, clean it up a little bit. Yes, it's frustrating. He's getting ready. Rooms are really frustrating at times, but that doesn't mean that that should be your excuse for, you know, a photograph not working out the way that you wanted it to. The other thing is, that kind of goes along in the hand in hand with that is the misconception that I get my way every single time I go out and shoot wedding. So is saying a lot of like on the Facebook group or in the homework where people were like, Well, you know, not all of my weddings are like January by star hotels. And you know, not all of my clients will clean up after themselves, like I don't I apologize if you guys ever got any sort of misconception that, like I have these phenomenal clients who get ready at the Four Seasons every single weekend in these immaculate rooms because that's absolutely not at all. What, what happens for me? I and in people's small homes, I'm in their parents, small homes. I showed him getting ready about two weeks ago, and there was food like everywhere all over the ground, and it was a disaster, and there was hair and makeup everywhere. But you have to roll of it. And, you know, I have to make sure that my photographs don't don't suffer because the conditions that I mentor difficult I just have to learn to surpass that. And that's definitely something that took me a long time to get better at. And it's something that sold frustrates me every single time I go into it less than ideal getting ready scenario. So if this is happening to you instead of making excuses about it, or instead of saying, Well, you know, you guys be Susan easy for her all the time. You know, know that it's not easy for me all the time. In fact, it's almost never actually easy for May. But you have to learn tips and tricks, to be able to get around it and to make the best of really bad situations. Some people who have started sitting in some getting ready stuff and sending in some portrait. It's one of the things that I've noticed is that there is a lot of shooting up people's noses. You know, I talked a great deal about finding angles, right, like finding interesting angles, finding different angles. But you also have to bear in mind that when you're looking for different angles and you're looking for, you know something you need, it also has to flatter your client so, you know, shooting a getting ready of a bride and you got a 60 millimeter on and you're sitting down by our feet and you're shooting up her nose. While you might have found a full England, you might have sounded like you also have to remember to look and see is the scenario that I put my clients in flattering to them, which is sometimes an easy thing to miss. And I guarantee you, no matter what somebody looks like, shooting up their noses universally, pretty unflattering. So definitely keep your camera angle and your vantage point on the scene in mind when you're putting these things together. And one other thing that somebody said in one of their homework assignments that they sent 10 said this stuff only works with models. They were working on a picture of a bride sitting in front of a window, and they said, Well, you know, it is clear that this only works with models or very young women with very good skin, and that's absolutely not true at all. You know, my husband photographed me in the exact same manner when I was 35 years old, and I don't look like a 21 year old. I can guarantee you that I don't have perfect skin, but it's still very flattering whether you're 21 or 61. So don't feel like your clients have to look like models for your wedding photography to be beautiful. And that's one of the things that people say to me a lot when they come in. To meet with me is, well, that everyone on your website looks like a model, I say. But you know what? Every single person that's coming to meet with me, they've said the same thing to you know, all of your clients look like models. It's it's because I have done a good job flattering people in finding their best angles and making them feel comfortable in front of the camera, which is what gets that final results. And I don't work with models. My clients aren't models. They're just lovely every day, people who love each other so I don't feel like good wedding photography only happens when your clients are models because that is absolutely definitely not true. So less come over here and pop over here and see if you have any questions from the group. Great. We have two questions. All right, I see more than use this question. Number one, I see more than use contacting us to supplement their advertising by charging photographers to advertise on their material. What do I think? Well, I talked about this a little bit last week there. There was a company a few years ago that came to Philadelphia, and it's the same type of company that they create these marketing brochures for venues and they go to the venues and they say, Hey, listen, we're gonna make this really great brochure for you, but in order for you to offset the cost of the brochure, you know, you should definitely charge your vendors a premium toe advertising the pressure right. And in Philadelphia, when they tried to do that, you know, 45 years ago, all of the vendors collectively band together and said, Absolutely not. We're not doing that that shady. And so that endeavor never really got off the ground. I am never going to pay a venuto advertise in their material because that means that there are only referring me because I'm paying them, and a year down the road you know, we have no relationship whatsoever. I'm just check in the bank. To them, there is nothing to say that they're not going to raise their rates and somebody else is going to be willing to came or and then I'm out and the other person is in. It's a lot. It's a lot harder to be out and let them bring in another person when you still spend the time building a personal relationship with that venue. So while I will, you know I will freely give venues images to use as long as they watermark them with my name or give a credit to me. You know, I will provide them things for their website. I will provide them things for their slide shows. But I'm not going. Teoh pay to play, even though that doesn't seem like pay to play. That's exactly what they're asking me to do. And it's just not something that I feel comfortable with, and I also feel like it's a very slippery slope. If I start, if I say yes to one, then you like this, I'll have to say yes, other venues like this and then it will be really hard to extricate myself from that situation. If I started a relationship with a venue by pick basically paying to be their friend, it's going to be really hard to stop paying to be their friend and then become their friend organically. So just be very careful if that's a path that you decide if you want to walk down. All right, Um, can we see some of your straight out of the camera ring shots along with the final product? We would also like to see some backed up shots of the ring setups so that we can see the actual lighting along with what the ring is sitting on and the background. Okay. I mean, I I basically wrote an entire book based around seeing, seeing backed up versions of things and then seeing what I'm doing with them, it's the case studies book that I wrote where we basically go into a room and I show you what the room looks like. And I showed you what the set up is like talk you through the process and then see the final shots. But you know, if you think that you're going Teoh, I you know, and I understand the urge to ask for straight out of the camera ring shots, but guys, I started over the camera ring shots Wolf like my final ring shot. You know, maybe the final ring shot has a little contrast. Bumped Upper might have a little and yet on it or a little refining of the color balance, but it is not far off. It's within, you know, a 32nd week of being her. So seeing something straight out of the camera, which, you know, I'm glad to show you guys when we come to do the live day, it's not want to open up any insight because what I'm doing is it in post production. So the raw files that you are going to see the un retouched files that you are going to see are going to look very, very similar to the final shots. Um, and if you also want to see some backup shocked to bring set ups, I follow me on instagram money. Miss Susan Stripling on instagram. I post a lot of, you know, set up sovereign shots on there. All right, next question. Do you ever make a special effort to educate your clients regarding. They're getting ready, for example, clearing up, choosing a room with a large window, etcetera. No, I jumped on. The reason why I don't do this is because I feel like this that can sit down and start telling my clients. You know, this is what you have to do to get good pictures. This is what you have to do to get the pictures and makes it start sounding like I can only shooting pictures in certain scenarios, which is definitely, um, you know, not the case. So the second time. So no, I don't really Um however, that said, if I show up in a venue and for example, you know, for example, I was working at the Ritz Carlton this past Sunday or Saturday. I It's wedding season. I don't know what day it is. Really? Um I showed up and they had the Brian getting ready in a conference room. Now I hadn't talked to her beforehand. I hadn't mentioned, you know. Hey, you should probably not get ready in a conference room. But when I showed up in a conference room was our only option. I said, you know hey, any I know that you guys were staying here tonight when you get ready, would it be possible for you to actually get ready in? You know, when you're in your hotel room, that would be great. And if she hits? I don't know. We're not staying here tonight. We're staying at the Four Seasons instead. That would have sent conference room It is and made it work. So, no, I don't give them any sort of pre information as to where I think they should get ready. But I will suggest a room change or sort of a location change if I could do it when I get there. If that makes any sense. Question for how do you handle shooting in low light situations when a flash or a video like just isn't cutting it? How do you handle high I s O images? Um, I mean, to be honest, if I'm in a little light situation, I've never really encountered a situation where a flash or a video light isn't cutting it. I'm not I'm not sure what situation might occur where in a flash or video light, wouldn't you know, be enough to get you a good quality of light of the person that asked that question could either re ask the question, give me a little bit more detail, maybe an example, or come back next week posting the Facebook group with an example of what you're talking about. But I really haven't ever found a scenario where, you know, I can't make a flash or video like create the light that I'm looking for. All right, next question. Um, hi, Susan. Do you have any best practices you personally use when the getting ready is in a nondescript, poorly lit, messy room? I've seen how you found old heat radiators, made beautiful shots. But I'm just wondering if you have any additional rules of thumb to create more beautiful images and lackluster situations. I mean, guys, there's no trick, right? Like there is No. If you do a and then you do be and then you do see you'll have a great image. All Aiken do when I go into a scenario, no matter how big, how small, how dirty or clean is. Look for the light first. If the light isn't there, I need to figure out how I can make the light and then I need to figure out how I can either rearrange cleanup or move around the room in some way to make it as flattering as possible. That doesn't mean that even if I do all of those things, I'm going to be in an ideal getting ready scenario. All we can do is the best that we can dio. Honestly, um, question six. I'm struggling with getting my business started. I've shot three weddings to date to a very small and one larger one. As a second shooter, Any tips on how to get started? I mean respectfully. This is what the entirety of month one was about, right? Like if you look at all of the assignments above and beyond, just doing the financial stuff, which is incredibly important, the vendor spreadsheets decides enough your competition that figuring out a social media calendar earthy looking for marketing opportunities. All those things are the things that I would suggest that you do to get your business started. So if you're just coming in at month two, if you didn't really get a chance to get all the way through month one, I would absolutely go back to Month one. Revisit everything in there about marketing and start going through all of those steps. And hopefully they will be very, very helpful to you and getting your name out there more in getting to know vendors in getting to know the community that you're working with. That is absolutely what I would recommend that you do. Next question. Hi, Susan. I tried the indoor flash that after you stated with the road better, I'm further back except your eyes don't got a really bad back shadow behind one family member. Do any of your flash setups for family portrait ever end up with bad shadows behind them? Still, no, they don't. If you are getting a bad shadow behind someone, it's because the angle of the flash is either too extreme or your subjects were too close to the background. If your subjects are very close to the background, there will be flash fall off that will create, you know, a shadow on the wall behind them. And I found myself in scenarios where I literally had eight square feet to do family formal that had to shoot them with the 24 to 70 and all I could do in that situation is, have my assistant stand directly behind me with the light because any angle that I put it out, we put a huge shadow on the wall behind them. However, if you're in a church and you're getting full up behind them, you know you might have the opportunity to bring them closer to you or whatever scenario you find yourself in if you can back them off of the background as far as possible. If there's no wall directly behind them, there won't be a wolf or a shadow to fall onto. So try that and see. Hopefully that will help you out with that scenario a little bit. Next question. When I tried to do the bridal portrait, using my wife is a model with the 85 millimeter. I had to get on a chair and make her sit on the ground to get her in the frame. Is that how you take the bridal portrait? Yes, that's that's exactly how I've described exactly how I do those pictures. Yes, I have been sitting on the ground, and I either get up on a chair or in a window cell or on an Ottoman or something that gets me higher up because just standing up above your subject isn't going to get you high enough. And I didn't see a lot of people when they were sitting in the homework saying, Oh, I had to shoot this with a 50 millimeter. You know, it would be better if I had an 85. You know, Theo image isn't that great. It would be better if I had the compression of a longer lens and the compression of the longer lenses. Just a look. You know, a long lens compression or shooting at 14 isn't going to make up for, you know, incorrect posing or bad lighting or lack of focus. You know, you can't You can't look at the lenses that I use for a scenario and think, Oh, if I only had that lens or oh, if I only were in that room, I could be doing what she's doing. You have to bear in mind that I'm doing what I'm doing in all different kinds of rays. I just you know, a bridal portrait isn't going to be great just because you have an 85. So, yes, I've told you the lenses that I used but worry less about. Oh, you know, it has to be done with this, Linds, for it to be perfect, because that's absolutely not. That's not the case at all. You know, you can absolutely shoot a beautiful portrait with a 50 millimeters lens. I prefer the 85 for a portrait of a bride sitting down. I prefer a 72 200 at 200 for a couple standing outside. But that's not to say that you can't make beautiful images with different focal waits. As long as you understand the final look at that focal length will produce for you. So you know, I would have out of love to talk to you guys longer, you know, is ready to be here for an hour. But what's really going to drive these weekly videos and what's really going to make them continually better for you guys and allow me to improve them for you and get more in depth with information is you've got to ask questions. You know, we've got that that document for questions. You know, at any point in time during the week, hit me up with anything that you're thinking about because that gives me the information that I need to make these videos for you guys. And the point of these videos is to answer the questions that you're having on a weekly basis. And, you know, if you don't ask me questions on Hana Weekly basis, I'm not going to know what you're struggling with, right? So please feel free to send in anything. If you want the question to the anonymous, I'll never say your name online unless you directly want me to, um, we have a couple more questions coming in so good before we stop. This is great. Um, Question 10. You briefly touched on how you gently encouraged a wedding recently in which the timeline was wildly off schedule. Do you have any best practices when you had built a timeline with your client to do certain portrait before the ceremony? But now they either don't have the time or don't want to do them. Do you ever have to create time out of thin air to cram things in? Well, you can't create time out of thin air, right? Like this past Saturday, I was supposed to have 2. hours with the bride and the groom and the bridal party. And I ended up with 45 minutes. And I kept saying, Hey, guys, you know, we're supposed to leave at noon. Is at 12. 15. Now we really need to get out the door. You don't? Totally. We're about ready to leave 12. 30. Hey, guys, you know, I don't know if you noticed. It's 12. 30. You know I love you Want you will make these great pictures for you. But if we don't get out the door, you were really burning time here. I can't physically restrain these people and put them on a trolley and make them leave the hotel. All I can do is gently say, Hey, guys, you know? Come on. Hey, guys, let's you know, let's get going. And if they don't go, then then I hate to say it, but the lack of portrait's is not There is not my fault. It's their fault. And I've had clients come back later and said, you know, we didn't get near the amount of portrait that we wanted, And I had to say, Well, you guys ran three hours late. I'm really sorry but I can't invent time. You know, when the time is, is Ah, you know when the time is eaten up by something else. So and this is partly why I hate first looks right, Like at least after a ceremony. If a client is not seeing each other until the ceremony, at least then I know how much time I'm working with, right? Like if they're gonna have their ceremony and then we have all of cocktail hours, your family formals in the portrait of the bridegroom together. At least then I know all I have is 45 minutes. They know I have 45 minutes. I know. I have 45 minutes. We all know exactly how long we've got to work, and it's a give it. At some point in time, the ceremony has to end cocktail or have to happen. I know I'm going to get that window of time now if they're gonna do a first look and they run really, really late, who suffers? I suffer. And so I don't like it. Like I would rather have 15 fantastic minutes with the bride and groom during cocktail hour or 10 minutes with them. than an hour with them before the ceremony that gets shown back to 15 minutes and then they don't understand where the time went. Well, I can tell you where. The time it you know, you you went to the bathroom and then you made a cell phone call and then you decided you need to the snack, and then you wanted to have your luxury done. And it's really easy to lose, like an hour to 90 minutes on the wedding day. So, you know, there's only so much that you can do to get people moving, and you just have to continually reinforced. Hey, guys, listen, you know, if we don't get out on time, you really want to make a lot of really great pictures for you. But if we don't get out on time, I can't physically force you out the door. So, you know, first looks, I honestly think, are the worst thing to happen to the wedding industry in a really long time, and I wish they'd stop. I understand that a lot of photographers love having that amount of time to do Portrait's bridegroom before the ceremony. But nine times out of 10 things don't happen on time. And you know my work in my time with them is, is what's uppers? I have more questions, all right, at receptions. Do you ever use a flash behind your subject? I did that at a wedding this weekend, and the front of the bride looked to tungsten orange. What do you suggest? Well, you have two options. You can either color balance differently. Change the color balance in post, which is very, very easy. Or and in a flash coming from the front to illuminate your bride states, you could use a slide on camera flash like in 96th power or eight power just to pop in a little light on their face while still allowing that back light to be your main light. And that would take care of the tungsten problem that you just mentioned. Alright, expression. I've had a few questions. Hang on Syria. I've had a few weddings that are strongly, naturally backlit, and I get a bit of a hazy, washed out look when I'm photographing down the aisle. Any tips on how to combat this? Well, if you're getting a hazy, washed out look with a bat with a backlit situation is because you're getting too much son into your actual lens. So you either need to find some way to shade yourself a shader lens. Maybe it's crouching down next to somebody in the aisle and blocking the sun with their head. Or, you know, doing whatever you can to get yourself into a bit of a shaded position, which I understand is not always something that you can dio during a ceremony. When you have a really limited number of places that you can either stand or crouch to get the processional, you can always bump up the contrast a little bit imposed. But in a scenario like that, where you're stuck in a spot, you can't do anything about where you are. You are getting a little Hayes. All you can do is do your best to sorting even it out a little bit imposed. There really is no trick to make that better. It is a very tough situation. All right, Next question. Have you ever had to deal with the bride was a hard time getting over creative control to you in a recent wedding I shot the bride's brother told me he was in college studying photography. She kept telling me that she was afraid that my backlit images would be silhouette. I had to be form with her to tell her that a new leader, my camera properly. But I had a feeling her brother was feeding her misinformation. Well, this happens to me all the time, all the time. You know, clients all tell them Hey, guys, you know, you'll know you're in the right place when you got your backs to the sun and they'll say, Why would you put our backs to design your not been able to see our faces? And I have to establish a trust with my clients from the very beginning that they know that whatever I'm going to do is going to result in a beautiful photograph. So if you find yourself in a situation where they're like, Oh, you know, your backlit images is going to be it's gonna be a silhouette. You can just really easily diffuse it by saying, Yeah, you know, it's really easy to create a silhouettes backlit, and it it could be a really beautiful thing, But trust me, I'm not doing that with you guys. were very well eliminated. You look fantastic. Now, don't worry about the photography. Get back to interacting with each other. Just blow it off. You know, don't spend a lot of time making excuses. You know what you're doing. I know that it sounds like you're educating the client, but it can also come across sounding like an excuse. So you know when when this happens all the time when clients are like, Well, we've got our backs to this on our faces. There gonna be completely dark. You know, it's just a common misconception. You're totally fine. I promise. I can see you and I just keep on working. Next question between the time you got your studio in the future, when your boudoir businesses fully launched What business and marketing things are you working on it Any that are different to your wedding business? How are you preparing to best serve future clients? What advice would you have for other wedding photographers considering starting a beautiful our side business? I mean, I'm not doing anything all that different. I'm currently on my shot, a bunch of models in the studio that were real clients. And now I'm getting in another round of models because it just really didn't have enough samples. And then I'm gonna market exactly the same as I have been marketing money business, reaching out to people of the email. I'm going to create a special for my current clients so that they can you get a little bit. I don't want to say a discount, but they'll have access to a special product that's only available for wedding clients. But I'm not going to Facebook any differently. Europe interesting you differently, or do anything at all in any way differently than marketing my wedding business. I'm just gonna do the exact same things, trying to target a portrait business instead. But you know what? I'm very new at this, and I'm in the first year of having a studio, and I have a lot of people say, You know, you got your studio in May. What do you mean you don't have a boudoir business yet? Well, it's taking time. I don't know. I'm gonna throw it out there until I'm completely and totally ready. You know, wedding season took up most of my summer and I was able to shoot a bunch of models. And now that I'm back and fall wedding season is starting to slow down, I'll be able to shoot even more models and even more samples. Then I'll be able to get that portrait section of my website up there, and then I'll be able to really actively market it. You know, one thing that I would definitely recommend is never jumped into any new, then, sure, never, never jump into any new marketing opportunity until you are completely ready. And I can tell you right now I don't have enough samples to be completely ready. But I'm not far off, so all right. Next question. Hi, apologised. This has been asked before. Here's a ceremony question. Do you discuss with your clients before the wedding about where you will be standing when the body starts to walk down the aisle? At my first wedding, I stood off to one side. It's not the intrusive, and I'm not in love with my images. I would love to be front and center without being intrusive. No, I never talk to my clients about where I'm going to stand for anything ever. That's just a level of detail that they don't really need to know. I always shoot my professionals crouched down next to the mother of the bride's side. The reason why I do that is if I crouched down on the mother of the groom side of the ceremony space. I will be able to turn and get a picture of the groom. Is the bride consulting? I'll not standing up but indefinitely crouched down right in the isle off to decide, you know, front and center while still being unobtrusive, but as far as disgusting. You know, I'm gonna stand here and I'm gonna stand here. That's not really a level of detail that I get into my appliance. Um, next question, how do you handle clients with family numbers? Or in my case, a bridesmaid who keeps running around with cameras in hand, photographing things? You set up by contract said that in Seoul Photographer, my setups or coffee, right? Etcetera. However, family will sneak up while we're doing group formals, etcetera, and he takes on being firm. But handling it I mean, first of all, respectfully, you're set up. Can't be coffee, right in your images can be copyrighted air. You know, poppy productive, but you can't copyright a grouping of a family formal right, and people who run around and take pictures of everything that goes on during the wedding is just part of being at a wedding. You know, I have people who will shoot the ring and memorize Made will lean over and take a picture over my shoulder. I have to be careful to make sure that the picture that I'm going to take is going to be better than the picture that she's going to say. And I don't mind about guests being there. You know, during the family formals are cocktail hour or the reception or anything like that. There are only two points in time that I'll ever say anything to an overzealous guest. If there are a lot of people shooting at the same time that I'm shooting for family formals, I will always always say something like, you know, Hey, guys, I need to get the picture parts and that there are a lot of other people who wanna get pictures to. If you guys could look at the first, you know, guys over here back off just a little bit. Let me get my shot and then you guys can get your shot. And I guarantee what's gonna happen is that you're going to look like a hero to those family and friends with cameras who want to get a picture. And within about three setups, the bride is going to become incredibly irritated and tell her guest is off, right? Like, OK, I had a picture of you and your mom. Okay, Uncle Bob, You know, go right ahead. Eventually the prize gonna be like, Oh, my God! Uncle Bob, just stop and he'll stop. And then you managed to get those things shut down without you being the bad guy at all. So I am all about passive aggressive client care in that situation. The only time I will actually stop things and tell someone to leave is when photographing the bride and groom together. When it's our time together, it's just us. No, you can't come with me respectfully. No, you can't come with me And I will employ the bride and groom and said he listened Like your uncle really wants to come with us. I really need time with you guys together. I don't want you to feel awkward having multiple shooters around. Do you mind telling your uncle he can't come? And then the brides like, Oh, my God. Uncle Bob like, No, you can't come go to cocktail hour. Enjoy yourself. So, you know, I've only had a few instances where a jerky guest would not leave me alone And the bride and groom didn't you know, we're unable to stand up for themselves and tell them to leave. And he shot over my shoulder the entire time, and I just, you know, I just rolled with it. You know, you rolling with it is a large part of being a wedding photographer, which is unfortunate. Um, all right. Next. Hi, Susan. Thank you for these chats. You're welcome. I was doing a broad Oprah recently in a dark church room with only lance and ceiling light. I used them on camera bounce flash to salvage the pictures. What would you do with this situation? As faras lighting, I would either use and off camera flash in exactly the same way that I use an off camera flash for reception. Or I would use a video light, but also from the same angle that I would use an off camera flash out of reception. It's always going to be coming from a bit of an angle, whether it is a flash of low power or whether it's an animal video light. Next question. With your on camera and off camera flash, would you recommend color filters to correct for reception lining? Or do you just six imposed for just some other way? I don't use any filters. I don't use any job. I guess I would say we fix in post. But I shoot on flash white balance every time I'm using a flash, and that usually helps us get honestly about 99% of the way there as far as the final color in the image. You know, I am a big fan of getting everything as right as possible in the camera, but there's nothing we're home with fixing your color balance in post at all. All right, next question. When you're coming up with gifts to give, your client is booking gifts or the like. Do you find something a certain price point based under a packet of choice? I know some photographers choose gifts that value a certain percentage of the couples package you know I stopped sending gifts. I don't do it anymore. I found absolutely no correlation between sending gifts to my clients and their level of happiness with me. I found that just consistent, excellent customer service and actually caring about them and caring about their day mattered a lot more than anything that I sent them. So I actually haven't done gifts in years at all. Um, next question, I have three weddings booked for next year and no leads coming in, and I'm starting to worry. What should I do at this point? You gotta keep keeping on. You know, go back and look at your marketing spreadsheets. Go back and look at your gender spreadsheets. Go back and look at your marketing endeavors. See where you can tighten up, See where you can put more effort. You know, go back to that section of month one homework and see what you can dio to really double down on. These things keep going like there is absolutely no fast. You know, there's no fast track to be able to suddenly get bookings like my husband and I are constantly talking about, you know, how many do you have for next year. Oh, yeah? Okay. How many do you have for next year? Okay. Oh, yeah, Yeah, me too. Oh, God. You're ahead of me. Oh, no. I'm one behind you. Like we're always worried, right? Like I'm doing well and then doing well, I'm on track to have a good year next year. But that doesn't mean that next year I'm gonna be on track to have a good year as well. So we were all always out there hustling, and you can't ever stop hustling ever. Like the second, I think. Okay, I got this social media thing down. I don't need to work as hard. Somebody else is gonna come along and work twice as hard as I am to take all of my wedding. So you just have to keep doubling down and then tripling down and continuing to work every single avenue that you have to get your name in your work out there. Next question. During ceremonies so far, I've always used an on camera flash pointing towards the ceiling to avoid that awful flash look. However, the picture is look brighter above and darker below. Do you use a flash during ceremony? Any text on how to use it. Well, first of all, the pictures look brighter above and darker below. Because if you're balancing off of the ceiling, the light is falling off is it's trickling down. So think about it. The light hits, the ceiling comes down. It's, you know, it's like dumping a bottle of what you have. Bottled water on your head, which I'm not gonna do, is an example. You know, don't get all excited. Even though I have a couple of water, it's not gonna happen. It's gonna hit your head hard and then trickle off as it comes down. So, yes, you're going to have a brighter, above and darker below. Look if you use about squash, but I never you slash ever. I think that it's intrusive around here. It's deemed very disrespectful, and around here you also generally can't do it, so I don't use any sort of like flash during a sorry during a ceremonial that was not be waiting your question away. That was like a D. So, yeah, I do I do any special marketing during the holiday season. I don't not really. Not usually. That said, Right now I'm a bit of a bet with my friends, your villainous who swears that I can sell albums during an album sale, and I think that he's insane. So I'm actually going to do an album sale this holiday where eye contact every single client in the past couple of years who has not bought an album, and I offer them up a lovely album at a discount, you know, with a set rule of parameters. You know, you can choose from these covers. You can choose from these things for in bossing. You know, you can pick this many number of images. It's one image per page. It's normally except Alan, And now it is. Why amount? He thinks it's gonna work. I think it's crazy, so it's not something that I normally dio, but this year I am going to give it a chance for the first time ever. So we'll see him, and I have a bit of that. So hopefully in the next month, I'll be able to let you know whether Jerry is right or I'm right. We will think all right. Do you have any preferences between bounce, flash or video light versus high? I s o for getting ready or reception. Well, those air to you know, completely different scenarios. I don't use flash during a getting ready unless there is absolutely no light in the room whatsoever. But I will use about slash like, for example, and getting ready. I will use any, like if I have to, but I won't really use a flash. Not that often, but during a reception. I'm never gonna use a video like because it's just simply not powerful enough. But I will use a bounce flash. But that said just because you use bounce, flash versus video, light or high, I s so it doesn't have to be one or the other. Oftentimes I will Look, you know, use off camera flash at, like, eight power, but also be a I s o 1600 or 2500 because that's, you know, letting me get the look that I want. So it's really you have to sort of find your own preference in that I'm not saying this. Do not answer the question, but I definitely I have no problems using both bounce, flash or video like in conjunction with High I. So if I think that will help the situation. All right, Next question. What is the correlation between bookings and the number of enquiries that you get? If you found that the numbers are consistent, I think that we have to try to get more enquiries in if possible. Well, you know what? Let's take a quick little look. So if we look at my shoot key, which I'm literally doing right now, enquiries that came in, Uh um, bookings October. Let's look in September, because October is not over yet. In September, in all, in total, I had 100 and two enquiries, and I booked five ways. This year. So far, I have had 58 new leads and I have booked two weddings. You know, it's impossible to come up with some sort of formula that's going to tell you. You know, when I have X number of enquiries, I should have X number of bookings, because for me, I get an awful lot of enquiries, but not a lot of bookings. And I really don't think that one correlates to the other unless I'm getting a very large amount enquiries and absolutely no bookings. That's what I would start to worry. All right, Next question. I'm not sure if this has been asked. How do you deal with being in a church with strict rules for where you get stand in? No flash. I have a wedding tomorrow where I have to stand on the balcony and not move with no flash. How high would you go for your I s o and go as high as I have to go right? Like I would you know What the d a 10. This this poster said they were using their d A 10. I'm pretty comfortable going with my d 8 10 up to about eye s. 0 8000 I'd go to 10 if I absolutely had to. Had to had to it sort of anything over about 6400. I like to go back over to my depressed because it just really performed so beautifully at a higher I s O. But, you know, there's nothing you can do. How do you deal with being in a church with where you can stand it? No. Flash. You stand where they tell you to stand. You don't use a flash. I mean, I would never break a church rule. I would never go wandering off that we never put a flash on. When they told me that I couldn't. You just have to do what you can Dio. Sometimes it's not great, but and you know that's how it goes. All right, Do you find that you find slide shows actually help you but client for do you use them at all? I don't use a little at all. When did you do things take off for you? What do you think were the stepping stones for that? Getting published print competitions? Something else? You know, a lot of people really don't want to hear this. But what really made things take off for me with time and experience, right? I started my business in 2001. I started booking wedding since 2002 and it was slow. And in the next year it was a little less loathe, less flow. Sorry, very loud, but I hope you guys still hear me. You know that There there is absolute lutely. No, wait. All of them go from nothing. Teoh taking off. So if I have to say I started my business in 2001 I would say that it really started taking off in 2008. About seven years I waas making okay, money making okay, money. I was doing OK, but it was really taking off for about 7 7.5 years at the stepping stones. I think for that were experience having happy clients, you know, getting published in front competition than speaking at conventions and all of that stuff. I mean, it sounds really great. You have to understand that clients don't really care about that. The people that care if you spoke a w guy or on CREATIVELIVE or other photographers, you know, my clients have them. Carol, I spoke for Creative. Why that doesn't really mean anything to them. So print competitions in getting published there are really nice present a line item that if you look a little more trustworthy well, really made things take off for me was having years behind me of happy clients and clients that were saying nice things about me to other people. So it it took time and it took experience and it took a C amount of work. Um, alright, X question. If you don't use flash during a ceremony. How do you handle a very dark church? The church's around her, have no windows, were very few and very poor life does your highest so called the images to be grainy. Guys, guess I'm not trying it Frustrated with you with the church questions. But you're asking what I would do when you can't use a flashing and you can't move around? We're sexually. What do you think I'm gonna tell you to do? Like, there's nothing you can dio if if the church is dark, if you can't use a flash. If you have to stand in one place, all you can do is make images with what you're given. Um, if the church is very dark, you gotta pump your I S O and pumping your I s O means that it's a little grainy or pixelated later, Will you don't deaths. Unfortunately, that's what it has to be. You know those air that is the one point in time in the day that you have rules that you really can't work around. So if you're stuck in a balcony and you can't move anywhere in the church is really dark. You're starting a balcony and you can't move anywhere in the church is really dark, so you just have to do it and move on. Next question. Have you ever had a situation where the rules of the church state that there is no photography? Ove r Have you ever had a situation where the rules of the church ceremony stayed? That there was absolutely no photography? At any point during the ceremony, I had the situation once and tried to talk to the minister, explaining, I have a very style and I use flash etcetera. He didn't budge. I had to go to my clients. Explain this. Do you have any thoughts about how I might be able to handle this better? You can't handle it better. You know, there are certain charges that have very strict rules about no photography whatsoever during the ceremony, and I have had to sit out a couple of ceremonies twiddling my thumbs in the north X of the church because I couldn't go in. And the especial beautiful, terrible part of it was that the guests are standing in the aisles with their IPhones going to town, you know? What are you gonna do like this? There's just a delicious irony that the professional photographer who is being super respectful and low key and chill can't shoot. But, you know, your Aunt Marge can stand in the aisle with her. I had to take questions all they'll take take pictures all day long. So good Lord, that's a situation that really, really bothers name. I do tell my clients into the questionnaire, and I send out to them. One of the things I ask is, Are there any rules? Pertain the photography during the church ceremony, And that's usually when they go back to their church. And they asked, Hey, are there any rules that have to do with photography? And that's when we find out, you know? Yeah, you can't shoot the church at all, and I have to talk to the client and say, Listen, you know, they say, No, no photography during their ceremony. This is a rule I'm gonna have to abide by. You know, one thing that I will not do is go into the church, opportunity a guest and try to break this rule intentionally because that I find myself getting banned from the church, and that could really affect my ability to do any other work with any other client in that church. So I will tell them, You know, if there's no photography during the ceremony and you guys know the rule and you want to get married there anyhow, I'll shoot you go in and I'll shoot you coming out and you know I'll be out there the whole time. That's all you can dio. Next question. Um, I am shooting at a luxury hotel next month where I've never shot out before. In this situation, would you go to a venue visit? No. Yeah, I don't I don't do. Then you visits anymore, and he never like whether it's fancy or whether it's Loki or or whatever. No, the venue being a luxury has been you. I still wouldn't go do a venue visit that. That said, I do show up early on the wedding day. I look around even if I worked there before. You never know when you show up and that's gonna be scaffolding or there's gonna be bad lighting or they're gonna have redecorated something, so I will go early and I will look around. But that said, just because I don't do a venue does. It doesn't mean that you shouldn't do that, you know, doing the new visits or something that make you feel comfortable. And it makes you feel that you can shoot better on the wedding day. Then by all means, you should absolutely go dio a venue visit. Just because I do or I don't doesn't mean that you should worship meat. So you know that there's a lot of I see a lot of in the Facebook group and just in general, like taking my word is gospel. And you know what? I'm absolutely here to help you. And I am thrilled to tell you how I do things and what not Just because I don't do something doesn't mean that it couldn't be something that you do. And you do really well. And just because I do do something that doesn't mean that you have to do that at all. If you don't like shooting detail shots don't do it. You don't have to and, you know, going on a venue visiting, doing a walk through with a client is something that you really feel. Build your relationship with them and it makes them trust you a little bit more than by all means. Go ahead and do that. Then you visit with them. You know, all I can do is tell you how I do it, and then you take that information and do with it whatever you want, whether you follow it or amend it or they've got something all on your own. You know, you don't have to do what I'm telling you. Um, next question. How do you deliver your digital files? What are your thoughts of offering digital download the online gallery on Lee and dropping USB drives? I haven't used USB drive in about two years. First of all, if I'm going to deliver a USB drive on going to ship it to a client in the state of New York after charged in sales tax, it let me back that up. I have to collect sales tax for the great state of New York just because all I did was FedEx them anybody or USB or a thumb drive or whatever. You can tell that it's been a long time since I sent a deliverable because I actually said DVDs. And I don't know if anybody even does that anymore. But then I sat down and I realized when I was actually sending out USB drives, I had to pay. I was paying, like, you know, $15 for the FedEx Shipping, and then I was paying for the dry of itself, and it was $20 per wedding to get the USB out. And then things that always happen, the client wouldn't be able to figure out how to use the USB, or the client wouldn't download things, and then they would eventually lose the USB, and then they would eventually want another one. And I realized, Wait a minute. If I'm doing 50 weddings a year, I'm literally spending $1000 every single years in these deliverables out clients. I'm gonna switch over to direct download of their images and talk to them about how wonderful that will be. You can access the images any time you can download them. Any time. If you have a hard drive failure, you can download down with it again. You can download them on multiple devices. Your mom can download them at home, and the second the gallery is ready online. The files are ready for you. You don't have to wait for me to ship you anything. So once I switched over to digital downloads the second I explain it to a client like that, they get all excited. They're like, Oh my God, that's a great idea. Every once in a while, I have a client whose Internet is too slow or they have issues downloading. And then I will send them a USB. But we're talking like twice a year instead of 50 times a year. And I used in Folio really love them. They are wonderful. I've been with them for years and years. I've never had any problems with my files at all. Other customer service is really great. They don't pay me a dime to say these nice things about them on, and I'm very thrilled with them. So then folios what I used for not only my client proofing, but also the way my clients received and download their final images. So I hope that helps answer that question. Um, it looks like it looks like we basically say, Well, a couple more questions popped in. Yeah, and more questions. They have 11 more minutes. Nice. Thea. Questions are still being written into me, which is great. Do you ever shoot post bridal portrait that there was a weather issue? How do you charge for that if it's not part of the initial package? Uh, you know, I I generally charge about the same for bridal session that I would or couples Portrait session is about the same as an engagement session prize. If I'm feeling super generous, I'll either give them a little bit more time or, you know, about $100 or something like that. But it's not something that I'm going to give away just if the weather is bad. But they do know that it is an option out there if they want to add it on and I do have a couple of times a year, someone will add it on if the weather is not exactly what they wanted on the wedding day, I'm about to, for example, do a session for somebody next month. We're gonna do a two hour posession for them because they ran four hours behind on their wedding day and we didn't get to do any portrait, so that would be an instance in which, you know, doing a post session would be a good idea, but I'm not going to give it to them because it's not my fault that they ran four hours like, um, next question as a new wedding photographer, What would you suggest as a new wedding photographer? Would you suggest starting as a shoot and burn business? I was just starting the business, however, you want to start your business. If you want to be a shooting burn photographer, be a shooting burn photographer. It doesn't matter if you're one year into business five minutes into business or 10 years into business. It you know you don't have to start in any way whatsoever. That said, I do think that Onley being a shooting burning photographer means that you're leading a lot of money on the table for clients that do want albums. Hence the reason why I have packages so that it ranges everywhere from clients who only want the digital files. Two clients who also want to receive an album as well. Um, Question 34 with regards to downloading images from their gallery, does it worry you about other guests being able to download all the images as well? Yeah, I mean they can, you know, the second you give your digital files for your clients about how you give them to your clients, they can give them to anyone they want. You know, you really can't police whether your clients give the files to their best man or their mother or their third cousin or the guy that just moved in across the hall, like the second sort of the, you know, horses out of the bar and the horse is out of the bar. So, you know, if a client wants to give their password to their best friend and let them go download images, I need to make sure that I'm being paid well enough up front that that sort of thing doesn't bother me. Next question. I am in Seattle and I have my first winter wedding in December. Ceremonies at three. Sunset is for 18 for weather likely. How would you approach this day? You know, I would approach it with a lot of flash and video light you can't control when they're going to have their ceremony. And you also can't control what time they're going to be willing to give you time to do portrait. It's all you can do is be equipped with a location that works for you, and it is an outdoor location. Having a backup indoor location in case of bad weather is going to be paramount so that you can use flash so that you can use video light to continue to create beautiful portrait's for them. And that looks good on away. Just another second. See if any final questions come in. But I just want to reiterate for those of you who are catching this just now, if you have questions that need help during the week, please, by all means access the Google documents, Um, forum that is posted in the Facebook group and get your questions to me. Sometimes it's easier to remember to send them in throughout the week instead of to just, you know, sentiment and one trunk or oh, my gosh, we forgot to watch the broadcast, and we had all of these questions. Please make sure you get in anything that you possibly need answered so that I can pre load those questions and get them done. Then, if you realize you forgot anything or you forgot the sending questions and you're watching the chat, you have the opportunity to ask them. But just know that that Google document is always there for you for whenever you need to ask something. Next question. Are you going to go over album design part and how to get the brides to make their selections? Absolutely, that is Month three. In month three, you will be doing such exciting things as calibrating your monitor and writing out your actual workflow and talking to my friend Jennifer Cody from Sidecar Post and Designing album. So we will definitely go greatly into detail in post production and client care, an album design in plus three. So it is looking like we have no more questions. Hopefully, everybody is out there watching got their question, asked an answer. And I answered everything that was sent in over to me. I talk through some of the problems that I saw you guys having with your homework, and I just want to let you know you guys are doing a great job. I know that this could be frustrating. I know that a lot of you are brand new, but please, you know two things don't get frustrated and number two. Don't think that this is going to happen overnight. You know, somebody asked me how long did it take for my business to really take off? And I said, You know, 78 years, I really meant it. So your first year in business, your second year in business, sometimes even your 3rd 4th year in business. It is all still a grind process. And I have been doing this for years, and it is still a growing process for me as well. So you guys are doing great. Please don't get down on yourselves. And we will definitely let you know next week when we're going to have another, um, live video here so that you could ask more questions and get out there and keep shooting by. I have a good week.