Transcripts
1. Introduction: Have you ever been moved by a series of images like that of a film, but with static imagery, they say an image is worth 1000 words and a series of images with a central theme. Well, they tell a full story and that's why I love narrative photography. Hi everyone. My name is Andrew Kang and I'm a photographer based in Brooklyn, New York. I found success and fulfillment early on by shooting campaigns for Beats by Dre, glossy a, an HBO for quickly realizing that I wanted to say more with my images as I completed my first few bodies of personal work, the Mississippi Delta Chinese and the all American. I quickly realized that my goal was to normalize Asian American beauty, belonging and individuality. My visual language works cross genres to visualize the Asian American experience. It has been featured on RT, the ID, The New York Times, and CNN. Many photographers strives to create a singular iconic image. But with a narrative series, he can craft a compelling narrative and take us on a journey. In this class, I'll show you how to create a narrative series of photographs. Everything from concepting, pre-production, planning, executing the series, and even distributing your photographs. Whether you've never created a body of work before or redundancy. The times you'll learn different approaches and get exposed to helpful resources that will elevate your photography and storytelling practice. I'll show you how to build a theme or narrative around any topic or any genre of photography from start to finish. So if you're ready to tell a great story through your photos, Let's get started.
2. Class Orientation: The class project is to create a photo series of five images that visually and narratively explorer who or what you live with. Before we get to the prompt further, all you need access to in this class is a laptop, the Internets, and a camera, and yes, your mobile phone is okay. And just a reminder that this class is for everyone, could be for beginners who just picked up a camera to someone who takes photos every day. Before we get started. Just want to note that some photo projects take years to complete in, some can be completed in a day. The purpose of this class isn't necessarily to create an immaculate photo series, but it's to give you a framework to think about how you can start your own long-form projects. I'm excited to start this journey with you. So let's get started with the first lesson where we demystify what narrative photography means.
3. What is Narrative Photography?: Let's start by defining narrative photography and how it's been used by other photographers. Narrative photography is using a series of images to tell a story around a central theme. And the thing that I like about narrative photography is that it could be applied to any genre of photography, whether you're a landscape photographer, a portrait photographer, or a fashion photographer. So this lesson, we'll analyze the works of four different photographers, including myself. And the goal is for you to walk away, understanding how to analyze and understanding the intentionality behind making each image and how it flows into your series. So Larry Sultan is one of the first narrative photographers that I was exposed to. What really stood out to me about his work is how the sequences as images, as I flip through his book, pictures from home, the story starts to unfold about his relationship with his parents and how his parents kind of interact with each other. And so the way he shot it, in the way he told the story really captivated me. This image is from that book. And clearly you can see the relationship between mother and father and also the relationship between photographer and parents. So I highly encourage you to delve into this book and turn each page and see how you interpret the story of pictures from home. So Lu Wang is the second photographer that we've been looking at. And his work often explores themes of social and environmental issues that are happening in China. And I think what really captivates me about his work is that he blends portraiture with landscape photography to really create thought-provoking images. And in this image, what really captured me as the use of color and the use of the blackness of the ashes, of the clothing to the environment really paints a picture of the working conditions and that this factory worker goes through. And so this is a great reminder for you when you think about your own photo series sitting about your relationship to your space, the people you inhabit it, width, or the things you inhabited with. So Tyler Mitchell is the third photographer that we'll be looking at today. And his work blends different genres together to envision a new aesthetic of blackness and what blacks way looks like. So in this photo you can see in all American black family with a flag in the background, but also a very intimate and kind of romantic and tender image. And that's what captivates me about his work, is that he's able to bring this type of imagery to institutions and industries that have typically rejected work centered around race or identity. So I highly encourage you to check that work out and see if that can apply to how you think about your own work. In my own work, I often explore what Asian-American beauty, belonging and individuality looks like. Here are two images from my all-American series where I explore both the decentralization of the Asian American man and the fetishization of Asian-American women from the context of a drag artist who harbors both identities. You can see with these photographers, they all find different ways to revolve around the same theme. And so hopefully after looking at these images, you're starting to see how thoughtful and intentional each images and how important they play a role into the larger series. So the project for this lesson, I want you to pull three images from three photographers who you either know or don't know. And right, one to two bullet points about a central theme that they're trying to explore in their work. And I'd love to encourage you to think about what the intentionality behind the photographer series is and how you can apply that to your work. So don't worry about being right or wrong. The point of this exercise is to begin to understand how to analyze how other photographers incorporate themes into their own work and hopefully can serve as an inspiration for you to think about how you can start exploring your own themes for this class project. In the next class will be figuring out what story you want to tell.
4. Define Your Story: Now that you've been exposed to some narrative photography, let's focus on the story that you want to tell. So in this lesson, we're going to first choose a topic and then craft a story around that topic. You can tell a meaningful story almost about anything. So the prompt for this class is tell a story about someone or something that you live with. There were a series of five images. These next exercises are designed to get your mind thinking about the intentionality and the detail around what it takes to craft the story around your series. Let's start by finding the topic or subject of our narrative series. For this will be creating two lists and taking 30 seconds for each lists because we don't want to overthink what topic or subject that we want to explore. We just want to put everything down pen to paper. So first, make a list of things in your home that captivate your attention. This is an opportunity for you to maybe examine objects that you overlook on a day-to-day basis. For example, they could be the shape and form of flowers or how they look like when they will, or how they looked like when they bloom. Or it could even be the items on your nightstand or next year kitchen sink. It's a chance for you to explore the beauty in the different items in your household. For the second task, make a list of who you live with. This is a great opportunity for you to explore your relationship with your partner, your family, your pet, or your plants. And for you to really think about what is the story that you want to tell about them? Or what does this story that you want to tell about your relationship with them? Now, take a moment and sit with your list and pick a topic that you want to explore for your class projects. So if you're having a hard time choosing a topic, follow your instinct and intuition in thinking about what is a project that really excites you the most and what can you actually visually create with five images? So you have your topic. Let's focus on the story that you want to tell. The more specific, the better, because it gives you a more specific point of view and parameters to work within. Oftentimes, if our project is too broad, the images don't come across as being narrative or telling a story with the topic you chose. Now write down three to five words that come to your mind when you think about that topic. And with those 35 words, start thinking about the pattern or maybe theme that is emerging that you can maybe tell or explore visually. Don't think of this as writing a book, but think about it as a short story where we're keeping it concise and keeping it focused. So I'll be doing this class projects alongside with you guys. And as I looked around the things in my apartment, what really caught my attention, where the flower arrangements that my girlfriend makes. And I think I can tell an interesting story both visually and narratively. So the three kind of things that come to my mind when I think about her flowers are one, new life and joy to transformation. And three, the season of spring to the story that I want to tell is inspired by spring flowers and how they represent new life and joy and hope to return to the New York City energy and vibrancy. Don't worry if you don't know exactly how you're going to photograph this series yet. It'll come. So for me when Alice making the All-American and also my Mississippi Delta Chinese project, I had no idea that it was going to center around the kind of Asian American narrative. Until I went down to Mississippi and started realizing that as Asian Americans were invisible and the community is yearning for a more representation. But for me that process took a couple of years, really refined and figure out my voice. So don't worry too much if you don't know exactly what that is for you, this class will give you an idea of where to start. Artistic voices aren't developed in a linear line. Sometimes it takes time and experience to really figure out what it is that we want to say outside of our class project, these exercises really help us look at the world with a new lens. We can look at ordinary objects and finds new meaning in them, and hopefully crafts new compelling visual stories with our images. So now that you have your topic and story, Let's figure out ways to visually tell that story. So I'll see you in the next lesson.
5. 5 Elements of Visual Storytelling: So now that you have your topic and story, we'll explore how you can construct your visual language to best express your story. Let's explore the five main elements of visual storytelling. One, mood and atmosphere that can be described as the energy or the vibe of the photo. Is its cinematic, or is it editorial? Is it joyful, or does it have more melancholy? So here are two examples. The first image is a more cinematic image with three boys in the water. The second image is a playful free image of a woman running in the open roads. Both images have very different energies and very different moves in atmospheres to lighting. Lighting can be harsh or soft. It could be directional or even, or it could be artificial or natural. The type of lighting really affects the mood and atmosphere of the image. So here are two other examples. The first image is a evenly lit Soft image of two people. Their hair intertwines. The second image is a more harsh, directional, natural light that's being used. So three is composition. Composition is how you frame the subjects. Are you shooting a wide angle shot? Are you shooting a close-up shot? Are you shooting a bottom-up shot or are you shooting a top-down shot? The first image that we see here is a bottom-up shot of a group of boys. And the second image is a close up of an eye and of lips. For is environment and setting. This is the location of the shoot. Is it at the beach? Is it in your living room or is it in the studio? The first shot that we see here is a set design in Studio. And the second shot that we see here is an image taken into public space. The fifth is pose and gesture. And this mainly applies if your subject is a person or an animal. And this is essentially how your subject interacts with the environment within your frame. The first image is of a woman laying down and using her arms to kind of frame her body and framed her face. The second image is of two women jump roping. Your taste and style is refines by what you study, what you see and what you're exposed to. So the more films that you watch, the more images that you see are, the more art pieces that you study, the more you're giving your brain to process and synthesize to then help you really develop and refine your style. So it's not about what's better or what's worse in each of these visual elements. But it's about the intentionality that you have that really caters to the theme or the message that you're trying to really across in your images. So pores are really helpful for reference and inspiration when we're planning our shoot. So now go back to the topic and story that you want to tell. Because we're going to look at all the visual elements of storytelling specifically for your project. So for this exercise, we'll be making four to five boards depending on if your subject is a person or if it's an object. So the first board will be mood and atmosphere. The second board will be lighting. Third will be composition. Fourth will be environments in setting. And last will be pose and gesture. Here are the four boards for my projects about spring flowers. The program that I'm using is figma. It's really easy to drag and drop the images onto each board so I can view everything at one time. The kind of overall theme with the four boards, I'll start with mood and atmosphere. It feels a bit more cinematic, romantic and kind of intimate. That's kind of the BYD that I want to give off with my images. For the lighting. It's going to be relatively soft and even lighting. And there also be a few silhouetted shots. For a composition. There'll be a lot of straight on shots, but also a few kind of bottom up shots to the flowers as well. And lastly, for environments and setting, I'll mainly be shooting in studio at my home apartment. So it'll be a white backdrop or a black backdrop. Now that you've seen my floorboards and my inspiration, it's time to build your own. And remember that when you're building your board, you can use any software from figma to Keynote, but it's anything that you're essentially comfortable with. So now it's time for you to pull inspiration and references for your 45 moodboards. I'd encourage you to look at photographers that you already know, and also to venture out and search photo blogs and websites and platforms for additional inspiration. A few photo blogs and websites that I recommend our lens culture, lens scratch, ignorance. It's nice that British Journal of photography, these are a few places to get started, but I definitely would venture out and check out any other platforms that give you different types of genres that you can explore. In the next lesson, we'll be taking our story and our reference boards to build our shortlist and plan our shoot. I'll see you in the next lesson.
6. Make A Shot List & Execute Your Series: By now you have your topic, your story, and an idea of how you visually want to express this story. Now let's get task coal and map out each one of the five shots. This is called building your shot list. The shirtless has all of the essential information that you need to execute your shoot. It's the who, what, when, and how before creating the shot list will be looking at the four or five moodboards that you built. In the last lesson, we'll be thinking about each visual elements of storytelling and how it flows into each one of your five shots. When planning each shot, we want to consider all of the elements we discussed in the last lesson. As you're building your shot list, here's some questions to ask yourself. One, what is the mood and atmosphere isn't more cinematic, Is it more editorial? Similar fashion to lighting? Is a lighting harsh or even are directional? How are you liking this image to better portrayed the mood and atmosphere of the series? Three composition. Are you going to be taking all wide-angle shots, are all close-ups, a mixture of both? Or are you going to be shooting bottom-up, top-down or fairly high level for environment and setting or Udemy shooting this in your living room or on a blank white wall in your apartment. In five, pose and gesture. How's this subject and interact in this environment? So are they going to be sitting, standing, or leaning on something? Or is it just an object where you don't have to consider this? And so once you've taken all these five elements into account, Yes, I think about what equipment do you need? Do you need artificial lights? Are you going to use natural light? Do you need certain modifiers or a tripod to take a self portrait? Or you can be handling the camera yourself. So these are all questions that will be great to start thinking about when you're thinking about each shot. Now when you have all five shots kind of planned out, it's really important to think about how these shots cohesively fit together. Does the, do the five images pair well to really tell the story that you want to convey or do they feel like it's kind of all over the place? So I'd encourage you to really think about how they all weave in and out together and how they can best expressed your story. Let's take a look at an example of a shortlist template that I use. Obviously you can use something different, but it's just something that works for me. So essentially I have the four categories kinda broken out into one page. It's the moon atmosphere, it's the lighting composition and it's the environment in setting. So this is a template that I use when I plan out each of my shots. And I'd encourage you to create a similar structure or similar system that works for you. So let's take a look at one of the shot list that I created for an image that I'm planning. The mood and atmosphere again, is very cinematic and intimates. The lighting is going to be barely even and soft, non-directional. The composition is going to be really straightforward in that it's kind of straight on an up-close. And lastly, the environment and setting is going to be in my home studio on a blank white backdrop. Once you have your shots mapped out, it's time to move on to the fun part. Taking your images. Remember to take your shot list with you as you execute your shoot. And remember to be nimble and be open to pivoting from your shortlist as well. Sometimes things come up or don't look as good in camera when you're actually executing your shoe. So don't feel like to stick to a kind of rigid structure or a platform in executing your shoot. So remember to definitely be nimble and adapt because as great photographers, you're always going to be presented with new challenges or things that you might not have expected. And lastly, remember that the boards are only for reference. We don't want to be copying the images, but rather we want to be taking inspiration in crafting something in our own unique style, in our own voice. Now that you've taken all your photos, let's look at how the images all come together. So in the next lesson, let's sequence our images and complete your series.
7. Sequence Your Images & Complete Your Series: So now that you've photographed your series, Let's see how all the images fits together. The way that you sequence your images can really dramatically impact the narrative or the story that you're trying to tell. And sometimes if an image doesn't fit for some reason, that's totally okay. I've had many different photo shoots and photo series where I've taken many images and for some reason, no matter how great they are, they just don't fit with the rest of the series. And that may be because of lighting or pose or gesture that doesn't flow, but that's totally fine. So for this last activity, you'll need to print out your five images and lay them out in front of you. I know that a lot of people don't have home printers these days, but I'd encourage you to find your local print shop and make a cheap prints of your five images. For my five images, I just printed them at home. So don't worry too much about the print quality, but there isn't magic around physically touching and sequencing your images to see how they come together. There are many ways you can parent sequence images, and there isn't necessarily a right way. But here are a few that really stand out to me. One, by color to buy, meaning three by subject matter and for by a sequential timeline. Let's look at my images as an example. As I'll play around with my five images and see how they can pair well together. So after sitting on these images for awhile and looking at them over and over, I've decided that they all work well with each other in telling my narrative. So as we talked about earlier, there are many different ways to sequence and there isn't an exhaustive way to do it. But let's run through the different examples that I mentioned earlier. The first is color palette. As you can see here, we all have whites, grayish backdrops, and one kind of black backdrop. But even within that, there are color palettes that are a bit more pink purplish tones, um, and a few more that are yellow and more tropical tones. So if we're grouping by color, we could almost group these two and these suits each other and maybe have this at the beginning or end if you want to group by color. We want our group by subject matter. In this case, the subject matter is all kind of flowers. So I don't think it necessarily makes sense given my narrative. Or we can group by sequential timeline. So I think in this case, if my series was about the lifecycle of flowers and wilting and blooming. You can really see the different stages. So maybe that could be a sequential timeline, but in this case, most of these flowers are almost in full bloom. So I don't think that necessarily make sense for this project. I think how I envisioned it was sequencing it by meaning. I think when revisiting the theme of spring flowers and kind of new life and hope in transformation. I think for me what comes to mind is like, like almost like a bud kind of forming, um, or, uh, kind of growing. And so I think for me what makes the most sense is starting off for an image of like one flower, super close up, super macro. And then slowly you see it start growing and changing and evolving. And now you almost have a family of these type of flower. So you're starting to zoom out a little bit. And so after you start zooming out, I think when you look at the rest of the photos, you start seeing an almost evolution in kind of color and combination of flowers. So I think what would make the most sense next is if we started going into more brights, poppy color like yellow. So we're starting to kind of see the bud, the evolution, and we're starting to see more color and energy and different types of flowers into the arrangement. And then I would go probably this image where you're starting to see many different colors. In one image, you scientists see some yellow, some green, some purple. And then I would probably put this image last as almost a kind of final evolution of really this kind of new hope, this transformation, this joy is almost see it represented through the explosion of colors from the orange to the purple, to the red, to the yellow to the green. Especially with like all the different shapes and directions that these flowers take shape and form. And this last photo, I think it's very fitting for the end of this mini series. So as you look from left to right, you kind of see a little small narrative of starting close in a macro shot of one flower to a kind of growing and evolving into different types of flowers, different type of colors. And really culminating in this kind of explosion of kind of joy and new life and vibrancy. Now it's your turn to put your images together, play around with the order and see what sequence makes sense for your story and for your topic. Remember that there are many ways to sequence your images. The list that I mentioned earlier is finite lists, but play around and see what works for you and works for your projects. And remember that it's okay as well that your meaning and your narrative may change or shift as you organize the images. And that's totally fine. I think the important part of being a great photographer is adapting and understanding that things may change and that things are fluid. Ultimately, the importance is that you have intentionality behind the process. So if things don't come to you immediately, feel free to take a break or take a quick walk. So you can gather your thoughts and synthesized and process different ways that you can organize your images. So in the next class, we'll put everything together and we'll wrap up the class. See you there.
8. Closing Thoughts: We did it. Congratulations. You are now the creator of a narrative photo series. We started from examining what narrative photography meant to studying narrative photographers, to understanding your narrative voice and the story that you wanted to tell. And then how to tell that story visually through the visual elements of storytelling. To then building your shot list, executing your shortlist, and then sequencing your images. You've now experienced the full lifecycle of what it means to create a narrative series from start to finish. And now instead of being a viewer of just consuming images, you now understand the amount of intentionality and thoughtfulness that it goes into planning and understanding each shot and then how they all fit together. If there's one thing that I want you to take away from this class, it's sin grace, the journey of narrative photography and every step along the way. And to create systems and structures for yourself that allow you to succeed in building your own narrative series. Push yourself outside of your comfort zone and see the magic that follows. And remember that you're only going to get better the more you create. Make sure to upload the photos from your series in the project section below so I can take and give you guys some feedback and really excited to see the wide array of projects that you guys feel going to see more of my work. You can check out my Instagram, Andrew underscore it comes or visit my website at APK you ING.com. I'm excited for your growth and for your journey. Remember that it's a marathon and not a sprint. Be kind to yourself and be patient with your growth as an artist. There's a pleasure to be with you every step of the way. Best of luck.
9. *Bonus* Distribute Your Series Using LinkedIn: We live in a digital age now, what are the easiest way to get eyeballs on your work is through digital publications. Digital publications are a bit easier to get featured in, then say a physical publication or a gallery. But if you're interested in any of these realms, this approach will work for you. First, you want to think about some places that could potentially feature your work. You may already know a few publications, but I encourage you to do a Google search and see what other platform might be a good place for your narrative series. The key is to look for a publication that visually and narratively is a culture fit for the series that you're trying to pitch. Earlier in this class I mentioned a few platforms, insights like ignorance, it's nice that and British Journal photography that feature a wide range of genres, obviously depends on the genre of photography that you want to showcase. But there are sites and platforms that can bring your work to an entirely new audience. Once you have your list of target publications, let's find the right point of contacts for each company. Linkedin and hunter dot io will be your best friends. You can use the free versions for both platforms, but they essentially will help you find the email address template and the right point of contact for each company. So let's get started on LinkedIn. So you have your target lists of publications that you want to reach. And I'll create a example this time around. Let's just say the target publication is, it's nice that it's a popular blog with many different types of genres of photography. So I'll go ahead and type in. It's nice that's on the LinkedIn search bar. Just to reiterate, you can do this on the free LinkedIn platform. You don't have to have LinkedIn premium. So I've clicked the, it's nice that company profile. From there, I will click See All 32 employees on LinkedIn. So essentially I know all of the employees who work at the company. And now it's just a matter of figuring out who it is I want to Outreach at the company. So as I'm scrolling through the different people who work there, the titles that I'm typically looking for is editor. Because typically with editors, They're the ones approving the pitches and the pieces. So I'll typically just go to an, open up a few of the editor profiles on LinkedIn. So far I've opened this lady named Lucy and Ruby. The other people don't look as applicable because their titles are producer or a project manager. I will just open the applicable pages. And so now that I have those pages opened up, I know that these are the people that I need to Outreach at the company. So Lucy, as a deputy editor, Ruby is an associate editor and iowa is a staff writer. So these are the people who would essentially be writing my piece and writing my feature. So I have an idea that these are the three people that I want to reach. Now, I want to find the email template for the company because every company has an e-mail template, whether it be first letter of firstName and lastName at it's nice that.com. Or it could be some other type of format. So what website I'll go to for that is called hunter dot io. So this is a free platform. Anyone can use it. What I'll essentially do is type in that domain name for, it's nice that, and in this case, it's just, it's nice that.com. So once I've typed that in, I see the most common pattern for the email template. In this case, it's just the firstname at, it's nice that.com. So now I know that template. I can apply it to all three people that I found earlier, lucy, Ruby, and Iowa. So now I have their profiles and their names. I also have their e-mail addresses. So I'll pop into Gmail now and write them a customized e-mail that talks about my project and why it would be a good fit for their platform. And I'll show them the images in my series. And the one important thing that I'll note here is that it's really important to write a customized e-mail, at least in the first paragraph. Because if you don't, it almost comes off is very spammy. I would highly encourage you to look into maybe other pieces that they wrote that you really enjoyed or make some other form of like personalized comments that puts a nice touch to the email so they're more likely to respond. Now that you have your target lists, the appropriate point of contacts and their email address. Let's send them an email and send them the following one. Who are you? One sentence about your previous work, where you're from, and what kind of work you shoot to, what you're looking for. Tell them you'd love to be considered for a pitch on XYZ magazine and why your project would be a good fit. Three, describe your project and show your images. Explain your project concept in two sentences, and send over a file of your images for ask them if it makes sense to publish this piece on their platform in five. Thank them for their time. So here's an email that I sent That's concise and consider it. If you don't hear back within a week, don't be discouraged. Send a checking email and wait a couple more days. Sometimes they miss your e-mail because they're busy, or sometimes your project just may not be a fit for their platform. And that's okay. You'll have many more projects to showcase. It isn't the end of the world's, you've already taken a big step out of your comfort zone. This process requires both bravery and humility. And getting your work out there to these publications is a process unknown to many photographers. But I've just given you some of my seeker sauce, having worked at LinkedIn and practice these systems for quite some time. So best of luck, and I look forward to seeing your work online.
