When photographers had to pay to develop each picture, they put a lot of thought into planning each frame so that they didn’t have to waste time or money to see what they captured. With today’s digital cameras and phones (and large capacity digital storage capabilities), it is tempting to just shoot shoot shoot and hope that you get something wonderful. And while that might work sometimes, it usually results in a giant workload for not a tremendous product. You have to sift through many of what appear to be the same image – playing with settings on your phone or computer, hoping to make one image stand out.
A little work before capturing your image and more deliberation before you push the trigger will do wonders for your work (not to mention your mood as you edit!) Just because there is no extra financial cost in shooting 600 pictures instead of 50, there is a lot of wasted time and extra frustration having to sort through 600 images…
Ask yourself before you shoot – “What is my goal?” For me, what I want to get after a two hour photo session are a few pictures that the client will want to blow up, print on metal, canvas or acrylic, hang on their wall, and look at with love for the next 30 years. That requires planning, and my time is better spent in planning the picture I want to take (background? focus? mood? expression?) rather than sifting through hundreds or thousands of pictures praying I got a good shot. Take your time and make sure your lighting is perfect by taking test shots and adjusting after each (before you take 50 worthless poorly lit pictures.) Plan in advance how you are going to get your subjects to feel relaxed and comfortable, and make sure that you know what their goals are (they might be different than you expect.) Have an idea of what you are looking for, and take your time to craft it – you will have a much higher chance of success if you take your time and plan for it.
With this engagement picture, I knew exactly what I wanted to capture. This couple have a really sweet and easy way about them - they are always laughing together - they just are so natural and sweet with each other. I wanted to capture that connection, and I wanted the final product to be as sweet and soft as the couple themselves. I wanted something old fashioned, not modern, and I knew I wanted nature to softly blur around them so that it is their connection which is the focus of the picture. Once I decided all of that in advance, it was easy to take my time and make sure that I had the posing details right and and I was able to concentrate on connecting with them as a couple.
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