Transcripts
1. Introduction: People often ask me how I get my portrait so
intimate and personal. My answer is the art
of critical listening. My name is Eva Wooldridge, and I am a photographer
and social activist, and this is my assistant cava. [LAUGHTER] You may
have seen my work in Teen Vogue or Rolling Stone or my award-winning series
Size of a Grapefruit. My first series, Embrace
Your Essence that I made in 2015 went viral. The whole point of
the portraits were to embrace what young women found beautiful
about themselves, not influenced by other people. What was important is
as a photographer, I was supposed to listen and assist them in cherishing
those moments. Fortunately, the
series was able to be picked up by Huffington Post, Fisher Magazine, Metro Plus, Cosmopolitan, and a few other publications
internationally. Clients and supporters often
ask how I'm able to create such relatable
portraits without using complex set design
or a lot of props. My answer, I listen
to my clients, as they share their experiences, I empathize with them, and then use that to amplify
in a visual narrative. That answer may be simple, but listening is an
essential tool in order to relate and build connection
and trust with your client. By listening, you'll
take what you learned, apply that information
and help them build a visual narrative that they feel related and connected to, that will also be relatable
for your audience. You'll learn the importance
of building trust, creating a collaborative space, and building on that
balance without sacrificing your
artistic integrity. At the end of each lesson, I'll be providing you with a
reflective writing prompt. Yes, we love self-reflection. These exercises will help
you build trust with yourself and then understand how to build trust
with your client. Learning the skills to bring
empathetic listening into your portrait sessions will
help you create beautiful, relatable, and engaging
art for your viewers. Now that you've learned what this class is all about,
let's dive in. [MUSIC]
2. Class Project Overview: [MUSIC] Welcome to perfecting self-love
portraiture class. With me, your host
Eva Woolridge. As of my other class, this class is less about technique and more
about how to build thought-provoking
concepts and apply exercises that will assist
you in self-reflection. What you're going to
get out of this class is a start to finish process on how I create a self-love portrait
with my client. The first lesson is discussing how to build
trust with your clients. We want to create a safe space
for them to communicate. This is through consultations. Lesson 2 is learning how to apply what you learn
in the consultations. Then from start to finish, building the prep
for your photoshoot, developing what lights and
props you are going to use, and having little foresight on what kind of poses you
want your clients to do. Lesson 3 is about
post-production. We're going to be discussing
how involved you get your clients during
the editing process, making sure they feel
collaborative still, but ensuring that you're not sacrificing your
artistic integrity. At the end of each lesson, you'll be provided
a writing prompt. I encourage you to use
a laptop or a journal, anything that will
give you the space to free write for about 10 minutes. This freewriting
allows you to have non-judgmental thoughts and able to see where your mind is going. Throwing all your thoughts on the page and not judging
yourself for it, you'll be surprised about what information comes out of that
without judging yourself. In addition to the
writing tools, this is a list of equipment
that I recommend you use. Something to photograph with, such as a DSLR camera, but also an iPhone works too. We just want anything that
has good photo quality. A backdrop, or a space for your client to move
around and add props. It doesn't necessarily
have to be a studio, but we just want to make
sure the client can walk around and be able to
pose the way you want. Lastly, software for you
to edit your photos. Personally, I use Photoshop, but if you have an alternative
way of editing, go for it. Using these materials,
you're going to go through the process on how to create a self love portrait
for your client. I need you to understand that this
can be very vulnerable. Some clients, especially
if they're [inaudible] you are used to being
in front of the camera. They're relying on
you to guide them and also make them feel safe. Build trust with them
and feel like they can be their most authentic
and vulnerable self. By doing so, you'll
be able to capture gorgeous images
that make them feel seen and relatable
and connected. The good news is
you'll be able to add your creative flair to it. I don't want you to feel like you only have to listen
to your clients. There is artistic freedom
within this process. You want to make sure
that the client feels involved enough so that they feel like they had some
say within this creation. After you're finished editing, you're going to write
an artistic statement that goes along with
your photographs. This way you're able
to create more meaning behind the visual
narrative that you created in the self
love portraits. This project I care
so much about. I've seen the value of a
client loving who they are, by how they're seen
in a photograph. I've seen how empathizing
with their life experiences, applying what you've heard and making a building
connection with them, makes them feel seen,
identified, noticed. This is a very powerful way that a photographer can help bring
love into a client's life. Photography is a visual
form of communication. The words of philosopher
Paul Tillich, we cannot learn to communicate deeply until we learn to
listen to each other, but also to ourselves. Some tips to remember
before taking this class. Be patient with yourself
and with your client. It takes a lot to build
trust with one another. Building trust takes time, so have good intentions and prepare to have
your mind wander. Use your imagination to
help express a feeling. If you're ready to learn
how to connect with your subject and share their
stories authentically, see me in the next video.
[LAUGHTER] [MUSIC]
3. Client Consultation: When you're working
with a subject, you're most likely
working with a stranger. It's hard enough to really be open about
your vulnerabilities and insecurities with your family or friends let alone a complete stranger you've
never met before. You have to have a
little bit of patients and create a safe space
with your client. Before a shoot is scheduled, I have a one-on-one consultation with my prospective clients. The call typically lasts
for about 15-20 minutes. It covers everything from the details of the
shoot including the location, price, date, and time, my expectations
for the shoot, and it provides a space for the client to share
their expectations. Now, as photographers, we need to build trust
authentically and quickly in order to create photographs that are relatable and genuine. We do this by providing empathy. This is very different
from sympathy. It is important to understand the difference between the two. Sympathy involves
understanding from your own perspective
while empathy involves putting yourself in
another person's shoes and understanding why they may have these particular feelings. Becoming aware of the root cause of why a person feels
the way they do, we can better understand and relay that reasoning
in a photograph. With that understanding,
we're now faced with our second question. How do you create a safe
space for a client to feel comfortable enough to share their vulnerabilities
and life experiences. You want to let your
client know that they have permission to
feel the feelings. This is what I
expect when I want a safe space to share my life
experiences and feelings. What is the credibility of
the person I'm speaking with? Do I feel like
they're listening to me by relaying back
when I'm saying? What is their ability to relate while I'm
speaking to them, and having the
confidence knowing that personal stories I
share are confidential. Overall staying affirm
that the person I'm speaking with has my
best interests at heart. Once I start my call
with my client, I first always thank
them for trusting me. By thanking them. It shows that you are sincerely
thankful that they're trusting you with making
sure they feel seen. I follow up with questions to get to know them
a little bit more. Now, I'm not going to give you all my little secret
secrets. This is for me. But I do encourage you
to look into the who, what, when, where,
why, how template. Now a question I always
start off asking is, what is a physical attribute
that you love about yourself that's not
influenced by other people. Typically, I start with
my own examples such as, I love my entire backside. I think it's strong and
beautiful and flexible, and by photographing that, that's where I feel the most comfortable and showcasing it. By giving your own example, you're helping guide them
to be a little bit more comfortable sharing about their own opinions and
physical attributes. When they do share a
physical attribute, then follow up by asking what experience is
associated with that. This can be a memory, something positive,
a laughable moment. It also could be
an insecurity too. But you want to make
sure that you're always giving a
positive spin on it. If they are sharing
it, insecurity, help them come to terms with why they want
to celebrate it now. Now I encourage you to
just take notes during this call or even record it, and when doing so, it's important for you to repeat back the information
that they share. This just shows that
you're listening to them. It's especially
important for you to remember the reasoning
why they want to share this information
because you'll be able to use it and highlight it
during your photo shoot. After some trust is built
and I've shared some of my vulnerabilities and
they share some of theirs, then we can go on
to the next step. How do they want
the shoot to look based on the information
they provided? I typically do this by sharing examples of past
work that I've done. This gives them a range of the different aesthetics
and they may feel connected to and how
creative the shoot can go. Ultimately, it's like your own mood board that
you're providing them. In the end, you're
going to be preparing your client with the logistical
details of your shoot. This includes the
price of the shoot, when and where it's
going to take place, what they should bring, what they should expect, how they'll receive
the deliverables, and what the editing process
is going to look like. Once a consultation
call is done, the date and time is discussed, as well as pricing. Now you're able to
review your notes. There are few methods
you can do in order to digest the information
after the call, you can review the recording you recorded with the client, you can look back
at the notes that you took or you can create a reflection and write down the information that pops
back out at you the best. Based off of the information
that the client shared, I'll then do a 10 minute
free write to let my mind wander a little bit and see what creative thoughts
come to mind. This will be able to apply it to the photo shoot and to see
how imaginative it can get. A few takeaways for
the consultation call. Thank them for their
curiosities in the shoot, start with your intentions, your goal is to help them celebrate what they find
beautiful about themselves, ask them why they wanted to do a self-love shoot to begin with. Listen, listen, listen. Relate to their story by sharing a small experience of yourself. But remember, this
isn't about you. Now it's time for the
after lesson free write. I encourage you to write
out what you need or expect in order to feel like
you're in a safe space. This will help you feel
comfortable about sharing your own experiences
and ensure that you're creating a genuine connection
with your client. [MUSIC]
4. Demonstration Consultation: [MUSIC] Tell me a little
bit about why you wanted to have in embrace
your essence shoot. You already know this, but
I'm getting tough surgery next week [LAUGHTER]
on Tuesday, five days. I'm really excited about
that, but obviously, it's going to be big
changes to my body. I just want to capture this time of my identity and my body because I do actually
love the way I look now. I'm going to enhance
that feeling. But I would say, 98% of the time I have
no use for my ****. But 2% of the time, I really love them. I like that I can be both
feminine and masculine. I guess I'd maybe
want to capture a little femininity before I
just slice them right off. I want to thank you so
much for trusting me in this journey and
to know that you are in a very safe
place to express yourself and highlight these different body
parts of yours. The whole goal about
embrace your essence is to embrace what you find
beautiful about yourself. Even if in the past you
may have struggled with identity or may have struggled with different
parts of your body, it is not a circumstance where you can't later on
in your life come into a full circle moment and
finally celebrate it or embrace the things that make you special or how you define
yourself as special. I always like to also
make clear that this is not what you consider
beautiful about yourself. Is not through the
influence of other people. I want to ensure that you've come into this
experience knowing that clearly you've reflected
on it and knowing that however you define as beautiful is
absolutely correct. I'm very excited to help
you on this journey to celebrate this next
chapter in your life. I'm very nervous. [LAUGHTER] Well, being
nervous is completely fine. I know that. Personally, I struggled a
lot with my body image. Not in the same way of identity, but in a way of not finding
myself desirable enough. There are elements
honestly skin tone growing up trying to navigate the world in very whitespaces and coming full circle
and understanding what beauty standards
look like to me and how I define it and not how the
world currently defines it. I hope you know that
I feel connected in some capacity of what
you're experiencing. Have you ever done a
photo shoot before? No. Great. What is your
experience with photo shoots? Where have you
seen or witnessed? Well, I've seen
photo shoots on TV. That's the only experience I have knowing what
a photoshoot is. I watched a lot of America's
Next Top Model growing up. Same. That's where
I'm getting all of my knowledge from. Don't worry. Expect a lot of smizing. Yes. That's the plan. I've been in two very informal
photo shoots before and I just tense up a
lot and I feel very awkward. I really want to avoid that not because feeling awkward is bad, but just because I really
want to be able to tap into that pure soft femininity and that pure strong masculinity
and I think I have trouble. That's very vulnerable for me. I think a lot of
us get America's Next Top Models' influence for good and for bad. [LAUGHTER] I want
you to completely remove that idea of what
a photo shoot is because what this experience
is going to be is a one-on-one moment between us where you can feel safe to vocalize what
feels comfortable, what doesn't feel comfortable. There's no wrong answer when we're
photographing together. I do want to get more insight
on what your definition of femininity looks like and how you want it to be represented. I guess, maybe the silhouette. The outline of the body, maybe what you're saying, the curves, that kind of thing. I don't think this is
helpful maybe for you, but I know for me my personal
definition of femininity, is just an energy that I feel, where I can feel in my body
when I feel more masculine. But then there's just
sometimes where I feel very feminine and soft. I've always described
it to my friends. This is silly, but I can feel it growing through my eyes. Yes. Different parts of my body feel different masculine
and feminine energy. My hands and my
arms, I feel very masculine and very
sexy with that. But then my neck and up through my eyes I
can feel very feminine. Thank you. This is so helpful. This is helping me figure
out how to best pose you. I do see a lot of shadow work. Face lighting, mood lighting. I do want to play with some black and white
as well. I think. I would like that. Yeah. You would love
black and white? Yes, I would. I think something that trips
me up when I see photos of myself sometimes is I've got a lot of insecurity
around my skin. I have a lot of acne and
just different colorations. I actually would like
to do black and white. Beautiful. Not all of it particularly,
but just some of it. Yeah. Well, we can do
a combination of both, but there's something that for some reason in my
mind connects really well with mask and femme energy, is it so simple with
black and white? It's not influenced by a lot of other textures or
things like that. It's pretty easy to
showcase softness and femininity and then using strong lighting,
contrasts, shadows. That is very easy to play with
more masculine directness. Tau, what's your comfortability with nudity and toplessness? Are you comfortable with that? I'm totally comfortable. Yeah, I'm very comfortable. In fact, I was hoping
probably that we would do some top nudity, but also maybe some top where
I'm just wearing a binder. I've been doing
that for long time, but I don't know if that
will really [OVERLAPPING]. I love that. Can we
actually do that? Yes. What surprises a lot of people, the shoot is not exactly how we plan in the consultation call and there's some
freedom to that. Let's see what that looks like. I don't want to take away
embracing the femininity part. If you're not
wearing a binder in the beginning of the
shoot, that's fine. If the texture
thing doesn't work, that's okay, it
doesn't have to work. But I would love just in general
capture that transition. Then we'll focus on at the end, redefining what
masculinity looks like to you in a visual way and we can work through
that together as well. But I, again, see a lot harder
poses focusing on your arms, your
muscular structure. I feel like this statuesque posing where you look very tall and it taking
a lot of space. Do you have any further
questions about how or any concerns of how you
want to be presented? No, I don't think so.
I feel pretty good. I don't ever do makeup
or anything like that. Or should I bring hair stuff? I just don't know those details. When you dress more feminine,
do you wear makeup at all? Every once in a while, my
partner will do my makeup, but no, I don't usually. Then let's not have makeup. Let's embrace what
feminine Danny is when they want
presented in that way. We don't have to do anything additional just for
a shoot itself. You can definitely do your hair. But don't worry in terms
of post-production stuff. You also mentioned skin
texture and stuff like that. I do, do general retouching, so any blemishes that are not more permanent blemishes like
moles and stuff like that, I can definitely remove. But it's not going to
be anything that is completely air-brushing your
face or anything like that. My whole method is, again, temporary to who you are as a person and who
you want to be. [MUSIC]
5. Pre-Shoot Preparation: [MUSIC] Welcome to
our second lesson. Today we're going
to be talking about pre-production and
the day of the shoot. Now, the client is expecting that based off of our
consultation call, you are going to be prioritizing them as a subject based off the information
they gave you. I like to prep about no later than a week
before the photoshoot. When brainstorming ideas, it's necessary for you to reflect back on the consultation call. What was said? What were
they reflecting on? What life stories and experiences do they
provide for you? This way, based off of your brainstorm that you
did for the free rate, you're able to build connections creatively and have your
imagination wander a bit. Here's an example. I didn't embrace your essence shoot with a fitness instructor. He informed me that
the reason why he got into doing fitness is
because growing up, he struggled with his weight. He didn't feel this
most confident himself and he was
trying to figure out what will give him
the most confidence and feel connected to his body. He started with opening
about his profession, but in order for a selfless
shoot to be deeper, he had to open up a little bit. I encouraged him asking more questions on why he wanted to be a
fitness instructor. He shared with me
little life experiences and memories that
connected with his weight. In order to feel more confident, he knew that he
wanted to get into a business that will prioritize
his physical health. [MUSIC] Based off of the
information I gathered, the next step is making
sure that you have props, lighting, and poses set up. Regarding props,
less is always more. The focus of your
shoot is your subject, not these props and accessories
that are around them. I would always suggest providing maybe one or two props
within a photo shoot. These props are only
used to enhance the attributes of your subject
not to be the focal point. Does it represent their
physical attribute that they want to focus on? Does it represent their
story, their memories? Is it relating to their profession or the
community that they represent? What is its value? Does it connect
with their hobby? What makes and embrace your
essence self-love portrait unique is that it's not just focusing on the physical attributes
of a subject, but instead capturing
what's within their spirit, their connections of
community, their memories, and associating that with the physical attributes
in front of you. Self-love is mostly
about who we are, not about what we look like. In the fitness
instructor example, by listening to him, I knew I wanted to work
with weights to show us profession and also emphasize
his muscle for definition. I knew that I would
be highlighting his muscles and
anatomy for the shoot so I added a little bit of
movie magic, aka coconut oil. This adds some shine
and some definition. Remember, props
aren't necessarily always involved or in
front of the camera. Poses really depend on
your creative aesthetic and the ability and
limits of your subject. Remember, most likely
your subject is not a professional model and
so they can't always do the extreme poses that you may see in editorial
or magazine. We don't want to enforce any physical intensiveness
to their body so make sure you're always
communicating with them of what they feel comfortable
with during the shoot. The poses I guide them on really focuses on their anatomy, their height, their jawlines. Respecting someone's identity,
we want to ensure that the poses are authentic to them. If you are photographing someone who's
non-binary, for example, you want to ensure that their femininity and
masculinity are fluid. There are different poses
that help give that respect. By asking how they best
want to be represented, really determine what
poses you're going to use. For example, if
you're trying to show a softness of their
subjects' bodies, then focusing on the texture and the curvaceousness
of their hips or highlighting a silhouette is a great way to show
those different angles. Now, if you're trying to
show power and strength, I find that going lower and really emphasizing
different angles from a lower vantage point
helps emphasize a strong jawline,
height, strength, power. These are all
attributes that can make someone seem a
lot stronger than they are and that can be a positive reflection
of how they identify. Is your subject an
athlete or a dancer? If so, ask them what poses they'd normally do when
practicing their discipline. This is a good place to start, but not solely rely on that, it's just to help them get
more comfortable and then allow your imagination
to consider other poses. Now we're going to
talk about lighting. Lighting is a great
way to add a lot of drama and really affect
the mood of the shoot. To do this, I often work with studio lights and gel filters. Adding color aligns with the significance
of color theory, which can really
make an impact on what mood you're
trying to represent. While using strobe or
natural light really affect the drama or the
softness of a shoot. For drama, we can
use colors like red, blues, and greens to
really make it moody. For natural light, moods are often associated with warmth, positive, whimsical vary in the present-looking
photography. Studio lighting is a controlled
setting where you can easily create a set
or invoke a mood. There's an opportunity for a
lot more drama and contrast. Back to the fitness
instructor example, I wanted to show
lighting, poses, and colors that will
really assist him in his attributes as a physical
fitness instructor. My theory was to invoke a
lot of power and strength. I wanted to use poses that added to his
muscular structure, I wanted to use
props like a weight to really emphasize the
power that he can hold, and then I wanted to use
warm colors and playing with moodiness to really give us
elusive fantasy aspects. Remember, he said
that he struggled a little bit with body image
when he was growing up so I wanted to make sure that I was playing
with shadow that will gently tell that story without overpowering the
overall narrative. Sometimes a shoot
doesn't work out exactly how we planned so it's important to make sure that you're listening
to your intuition, following your gut, and make decisions on the top of your
head that doesn't affect the integrity of the
shoot or make sure the client isn't aware of the decisions
that you're making. When I was photographing
another client, I noticed that their
energy was really low. They weren't really giving
me the poses I planned for and I wanted to make sure
they still felt seen. Their personality generally
is very whimsical. I need to figure out on
the top of my head how to make them feel more
comfortable in the moment to bring
their energy up. After shooting for
about 10 minutes, I was running low on
ideas and poses that kept them interested
and engaged so I thought about it for a
second and made them take a five-minute break and recall that in the studio
I was photographing in, they had a whole bunch of mirrors that I can
use and play with. I decided to apply
the mirrors to make a very whimsical Alice
in Wonderland vibe. This allowed the client
to feel a little bit more interesting, charged up, and energize and
I was able to be challenged myself and engage in many different poses and formations that experimented
with reflection. I say all of that in
order to remind you too, if there's a hiccup during
the shoot, stay calm. You'll figure it out and
they trust you as an artist. Trust yourself as an artist and allow your imagination
to wander. Always ask yourself, how can we make the story a little
bit more interesting? Recall back to your
consultation call. What were they sharing? What memories were they giving? Did they want a moodier shoot or a more vivid bright shoot? Do you want to play
with black and white or really use gel filters? These are all different
questions we can ask ourselves in order to play
with in the middle of a shoot. That's where the
best ideas come out. For this freeway, I
want you to think about what your intentions
are with the client, what are you trying to achieve, and how you can do that? Let's brainstorm together on the different concepts
of props, lighting, and poses you can do in order to make this a slam dunk,
self-love photoshop. [MUSIC]
6. Demonstration Shoot: [MUSIC] What happens today is that we're going
to have a photoshoot with a client of ours. Their name is Danny
and they're amazing. In the shoot, we are
going to discuss and show examples of the
client introduction, prop and lighting setup
with explanations, the client conversation, and coverage of the shoot. [MUSIC] Throughout the shoot, I'm going to show you these
different images so you can vocalize what feels
or looks better to you. This is a very
collaborative effort, I don't want you
to feel like it's only you that's
expressing yourself, I want you to know
that I'm going to care in the best of my ability. For you to feel comfortable
to vocalize if there is one direction you'd rather
go towards versus another. This is, like I said, a collaborative
effort. Let's do this. The point of embrace your
essence is for a client to embraced what they find
beautiful about themselves, without the influence
of other people. Danny expressed during
our consultation that they didn't know how to best articulate the
emotions that they were feeling on how they
want to be represented. As a photographer,
it's my job to make sure that based off of
what they're saying, I am using my skill
set to best visually articulate the feelings
that they're having. [MUSIC] What we did was set up the studio for Danny's shoot. I wanted to use to strobe
lights in the studio in order to give me a range of different moods that
I'm trying to represent. In our consultation call, Danny and I discussed wanting to represent more of
the feminine energy. In my mind, I saw that
as using more natural light and soft consistently
with studio lighting system. To represent more of
their masculine energy, we are going to use
the strobe lights, which gives a little
bit more harshness and a little bit more drama. The setup here today we're
using a black backdrop and we're going to use this stool
here to have Danny seated, but also be able
to move around and provide different poses for them to feel best represented. In other embrace your
essence portraits, I do use a range of colors, but this is really based off of the consultation call that
I have with the client. Some clients like to feel yellow really brings out the warmth in
their skin tone, or red to add a lot more
passion or drama to them. In our consultation call, Danny expressed that they were a little
self-conscious regarding the sunburns that they may have or any discoloration
due to acne. I decided to use black and white so they don't
feel like that is going to emphasize
any color distortion. If you are going to use color, there are a few
elements to remember to make sure you are best
representing your client. Things to look out for are what color would work best
with their skin tone? What parts of their body
are they highlighting? If it's their eyes, are you going to use
a colored backdrop that is going to
have their eyes pop? What is their favorite color? I always like to ask this
question because it's where they feel most
comfortable or represented. What kind of mood are
they trying to express? There's an entire
color theory that determines how to best
represent a mood or an emotion. We also want to consider
that when using a backdrop or gel filters, playing with a combination
of different colors. But today we're just going
to focus on black and white. [MUSIC] If something
is inspiring you emotionally in the
moment, lean in to it. I saw the tender heart tattoo, and I wanted to make
sure that best captures the identity that they're trying to represent
in this moment. [MUSIC] Today's shoot, I personally
think it went really well. A challenge that I experienced
is that we only had about two hours in order to complete the photoshoot and
the Skillshare recording. What I had to do is to really prioritize the subject
in the last 45 minutes. This way, they
didn't feel rushed, but I wanted them to feel seen and to know that
we had to wrap it up. During the shoot, I wanted
to really emphasize the key points that
they presented during your consultation call. I wanted to focus on providing a combination of the feminine and masculine
energy that they were trying to best represent and make sure that there was
a balance of showing softness and power within
the same photoshoot. I encourage you to
write what came to mind intuitively when you were participating in
your own photoshoot. Was there any hiccups that
caused you to take a moment, take a break, and reflect what other decisions that you
can provide for the client? What did it feel like
trusting your gut? This will help you keep concepts in mind for future shoots so you know you can
always listen to your intuition whenever you need to solve a problem. [MUSIC]
7. Post Shoot: [MUSIC] Welcome to my video on post-production processing. This is where we talk about
the image review process, the creative processing,
and deliverables. Just because the shoot is over, it doesn't mean the
collaboration is. In my experience in
portrait photography, I've learned that
just because there's an image you may be
totally obsessed with, it doesn't mean that the
client's going to love it. If the client who's paying us doesn't love the photo that
you personally selected. We have to make sure that they
feel prioritize and seen. You're looking at the
photo with all of the complexity lighting,
posing, shadows. You may be very exciting connected with the image
that you selected. But what they're seeing
is just themselves and how they relate
to the image. But your client is looking at
the photo you provided and see if it relates to their
self-love of themselves. We must trust their
instincts too. Ultimately your client
knows their stories best. After a shoot, I typically
review all the raw images provided and make sure that they're ones that
I'm pretty proud of. For that, I upload them to
a site called Pixieset, which gives the client access to favor their top selected images. Now in my packages, I offer about 10 images, so my client will pick
their top 10 images. If they want more, they're more than welcome to pay for more. However, in the
package I provide 10 images for them to select. They're also able to comment on any specific details they
want edited or adjusted. The great thing about
Pixieset is that they don't provide the client the option to download the wrong images. As I mentioned in
my earlier videos, it's like asking a
painter to provide the client with the
sketches for them to keep. That's not really a
comfortable thing to provide, and so I often let them
know that unfortunately, I don't provide the raw images. By allowing our
clients to select the photos that they feel
most comfortable with. This gives us freedom as artists to be as creative
as we want to be. [MUSIC] Editing, this
is my favorite part. This is truly where you
are one with the photo. This is when you add your creative signature to each image that you're editing. I do a general retouch. I never want to remove any
permanent scarring or moles because then that would be countered the
self-love ideology. You can be the artist they hired you to be and enhance who they are without taking away the permanent
parts of their body. I do remove any
blemishes that are temporary like pimples
or sun discoloration. After I have a ball with
playing with color correction, burn effects, and whatever
else I'm feeling guided to do. I personally use Adobe
Photoshop, but again, there are a whole bunch of free editing softwares
that you can use online. When I'm editing, I like to
really have fun with it. Remember, you want to make
the connection between the memories and experiences
that they shared. By doing so in Photoshop, you're able to play with color, lighting, shadow, contrast. You can even layer
different images on top of each other to really
enhance an image. It's really up to you. Just have fun with it
and trust your process. Once editing is done, I tend to send the images
through WeTransfer or Dropbox. Finally, to make this a slightly more
personal experience and that the clients getting
their money's worth. I often like to
give them an 8.5 by 11 hard-copy print for them to keep and hang up in their
home. Don't forget to sign. Remember, you're
the artist and you deserve to have your
signature on the image. You can always use
Walgreens or CVS as they have very affordable
printing services. [MUSIC] You do have the right to use and share the images
that you photograph. But I do want to remind
you that your subjects did trust you with their
experiences and vulnerabilities. I recommend being selective on which photos you use to
show on your website, Instagram, and other
social media platforms. I usually write an artist
statement that goes along with the photos I'm sharing and
I'll credit the subject. Their description can range
between a sentence or two and just provides a highlight of what
the series was about. A note on nude photography. If my client wants to explore nude photoshoot, that's
completely fine, but we want to make
sure if you're sharing any images that you're
respecting their boundaries. Definitely ask permission
before you put them on your website or
portfolio that's online. I want you to reflect on a memory and share
what you felt like following your gut when you had a pivot and make a
different decision. What did you learn
from that scenario? What worked and what would
you have done differently? This reflection will remind
you what it feels like following your gut and having to make a decision on the spot. This way in the future, when you have to make
another decision, you feel more
comfortable trusting your instincts and that
you can pivot on the spot. Congratulations, you just finished your first
self-love portrait class. Let's go over some
of the key points in the next video and then you're
free to create. [MUSIC]
8. Conclusion: [MUSIC] Congratulations,
you made it. You survived. You did it. We're all in the conclusion
video. I survived. Sorry. Congratulations.
You made it. We're at the end of the
self-love portrait photo shoot. First lesson, how to build trust with your
client and create a one consultation to create a safe space
with your client. In Lesson 2, you learnt my methods of
preshoot preparation, and the techniques to
apply during a shoot, which include using angles
and lighting to build drama, working with what you're given, and how to add
context to an image. Then we went through a
demonstration shoot where I worked with our client Danny, and really connect on a step by step basis on how a client can feel
comfortable in real-time. In Lesson 3, we discussed
what to do postshoot, how involved we keep a client
in the editing process, while honoring our
artistic integrity. Remember if you're going to activate a self-love portrait, you want to make sure
that you recognize the different methods and tools for you to really
connect with the client, and that means loving yourself. We all have parts that
we don't love about ourselves and that
we're insecure about. But we want to make sure that to build trust and connection, we acknowledge the
things we want to work on and remind ourselves
that we're human too. Your job is to make
sure that you help the client celebrate what
we do love about ourselves. Be comfortable with sharing
your vulnerabilities, your insecurities,
and some memories, if you expect them
to do the same. They hired you to be the
artist that you are, so make sure that you trust the decisions
that you're making. In order to create connection between
you and the client, for them to feel a connection
between the camera, to overall have a connection with the photograph
and the viewer, you need to listen. By listening you'll
walk away with a unique story that says so much more in an image than it would
with a written word. I can't wait to see any
photos that you create or self-reflective
writing prompts that you can share in the
Skillshare gallery. If you want to see any
more tips and tricks on how to conduct photography
or see my personal work, you can follow me @ewphotos1 on Instagram and on my website, ew.photos to sign up
for my newsletter. See you next time. [MUSIC]
Eva Woolridge, Photographer, Public Speaker, Activist
