Winter Planning

Unless it's a winter wonderland out there I have noticed many photographers (who have yet to get a studio set up) struggles to keep the business motivated and running during the winter offseason. Today we'll talk about how to survive this low time in business and what you can do to pass the time!

Planning is Key! 

The best thing you can do during the downtime is plan out your next photography year. This includes many time-consuming tasks that you might not have the time to update during the busy times. Here are 5 ideas to pass the time! 

1. Make sure you are up to date on bills, expenses, and quarterlies: Any expenses that might pop up for the next year (ex: domain costs, equipment costs, upgrades, etc.) This is the time to plan out your money and put dates in your calendar so that you don't miss out on renewal times. This is very important because you don't want to rush around or be without during your busiest sessions.
2.  Update your Social Media Sites: We try and try to keep our websites and facebook updated but after awhile they become outdated. This is the time to update any blogs, photo sites, websites, and all social media sites. This will help with client input, and keep everything looking professional. For our website, we use Ehost.com for those of you looking for a good site to host your website through. They give you the freedom to completely customize your site.
3. Create Advertisements: When working towards the upcoming year it is beneficial to consider your advertisements for the year. Creating these and your templates will drastically reduce the time you spend on them and if something pops up you'll be prepared. We found this very amazing site called Canva.com that saves all your templates to the cloud and you are able to completely customize the flyers/advertisements you are working on. 
4. Take Lessons or Give Lessons: Many times we don't think about it, but there might be others in your area that would like to become a photographer themselves. Taking the time out to help them would really benefit your business and you may even get some collaboration experience. You could also take classes from other professional photographers and work on your own skills. Winter season is the best time to focus on advancing your skills as a photographer. 
5. Do Pro Bono Work: Many photographers are hesitant to do Pro Bono work because they are basically giving their skill, time, and art away for free. Doing this type of work, however, is very beneficial to your business. Consider working with your local nursing homes to set up a "Generation Day" where families can drive in and take pictures with their relatives that couldn't normally travel or leave the home, or work with your local animal shelters to take pictures of animals in need of adoption, 

To Sum It Up: The 12 Steps to Photography

In previous posts which you can find: here, we discussed the first three elements to great photography. Impact, Technical excellence, and Creativity.
There are many more categories that we have yet to cover so let's jump in!

• Style: This category describes how you make your images uniquely yours. It may be that you enjoy a particular technique such as vintage, black and white, or technicolor. The way you apply all the aspects into your images creates your style. 
• Composition: This category is how the image is made up as a whole. By putting all the elements together into one image you have created something that guides the viewer's eyes. 
• Presentation: Is the way you can give your images an extra something at the end of the process. Be it textures like a glossy finish, or a matte, or by framing your image on a canvas. 
• Color Balance: The balance of color within your photography is extremely important. It can make an image warmer or colder. It can also complement each other, by using primary and secondary colors to make things pop. It can also bring a sense of emotion to an image. 
• Center of Interest: Is the point(s) in the image that the photographer wants the audience to focus on. Similar to how the composition allows the viewer's eyes to flow through an image, the center of interest is a point where we want the viewer to stop and contemplate. There is no rule here, there could be one overall point, many points within one image, or the entire image could be the center of interest. 
• Lighting: The use and control of lighting for any photographer is a key aspect, but how a photography can change the lighting around them, be it natural or manmade, is hard. If you can master this skill it creates a new dimension and shape within the image.  
• Subject Matter: Any portrait photographer understands the main focus is the subject you are capturing, but all photographers must keep in mind the story being told. If you are capturing a wedding shot, you must try and tell the story of love within your image. 
• Technique: Similar to presentation, technique is HOW you made your image. Posing, lighting, what media you used, how large you captured your image, using RAW vs JPEG, and more can all be explained with your technique. 
• Story Telling: To me the most important aspect of photography is the Story. Story telling defines someone with a camera and a photographer. As photographers we can capture a hidden emotion, meaning, or story to express in a stilled image. It invokes imagination, creativity, and inspiration. I will forever be working on the story and evolving who I am as a photographer. 

These 12 elements are a TON to keep in mind when capturing any image. To be honest, they are all very important to creating the perfect image, but we are still human behind the camera. The last step and one of the best things to keep in mind: HAVE FUN! No matter how skilled you are in photography, you must always have fun with what you do. 

Creativity

Hey Photo-bloggers, 

We've been diving into the amazing 12 elements of a photograph based on The Photographic Exhibitions Committee's standards. We have gone over impact and technical excellence and today we will discuss one of my favorites and in my opinion, the most important, creativity!

Creativity to me is taking a form of medium mixing it together to express an idea, message, or emotion. When we talked about impact we mentioned something similar, where we intended to create a piece that gave the viewer a strong impression of emotion. Creativity is similar to that and can work hand in hand with impact because we use creativity to express impact. I have found that many of the 12 elements of a photograph can play hand and hand with each other and in fact, a photograph is only truly strong when it has all the pieces.

Here are some examples of my creativity this week:

Sometimes for me, my muse is gone on vacation but I was able find some interesting shots this week that anyone can manage in their backyard. The top is of our cat. I love this because I played with the lighting and illuminated her whiskers. In the bottom picture, I laid in the grass and angled the camera to get an almost mystical view of the yard.

The one thing I love the most about being creative is that anyone and everyone has a creative flare and each person brings something different to their art. You can not go wrong with your creativity and no matter how young or how old you may be you can always be creative.

************ 

Hey guy,
For those of you that check in every week I apologize for this week's post being pushed back a week, I was actually dealing with some health issues and could not get to the computer in time to upload these amazing pictures.
Next week we will be diving into Style and how it can affect your photo!
I have decided to switch my uploading days from Fridays to Saturdays. I hope this works out for everyone so no one misses out!
Hope to see you next week!
~Amanda

How to Photograph in Direct Light

Sometimes we have to pick our battles. As photographers some locations and shoots end up with direct, harsh light. Knowing how to work around such conditions is easy, so I will show you the different ways to capture a subject and work around the sun.

When you start out at your location, observe your surroundings. If the sun is above you or mostly above you, you and your subject will be under direct light. My subject for this blog: My unwilling, annoying, prince charming of a fiance. All the images I took are completely unedited with the exception of the watermark.

I started out with my subject facing the sun. In the image to the right, his eyes became more squinty and harsh shadows crossed his face in unpleasant ways. I had to adjust the aperture a lot to overcompensate and it still came out extremely bright.

So I moved my subject to the side where the sun was to the right of us. The image to the left was just a little better with aperture, but cast very unpleasant shadows.


The last  photo I took, the image to the right, I moved my subject to where I was facing the sun. Although it was hard to see for me, my subject was angled properly. The sun wrapped around his shoulders just enough but did not disfigure his face and make the colors funky.


IF you have the option of capturing your subjects in the shade, I highly recommend it. Even then, be aware of the sun's location. In the image to the left, my subject is shaded, but the sun is so bright it comes through the leaves in spots and still casts a shadow.

As a rule when shooting in direct sunlight, always face your subject with the sun behind them, like in the image to the right.