I once had a photographer tell me that she had been in business a year and didn’t need to learn anything else.  I thought, “wow!  I wish I knew everything there was to know about photography in only a year!”  I’ve been in business for 7 years and I still think there is a lot to learn.  I learn everywhere I go.  I learn from people in all different types of photography and at all different levels.  I don’t think I could ever stop learning.  That’s not to say I don’t know a lot about photography but it just proves that no matter where you are in this business there are always different ways of doing things, new ways to improve upon what you are doing and ways to evolve as an artist.

So this past week I teamed up with Geni Bean of Pink Owl Photography for a shoot out in North Carolina.  We spent the day sharing what we know with other photographers and shooting an awesome back to school themed shoot.  But the night before the big shoot out, Geni and I spent a few hours photographing a model together!  I think it is so awesome to have friends in this industry, hang out and shoot with them!  Not only do you get to be with your friend and capture amazing images but you can see how someone else does things and learn from them.

Geni likes to incorporate a bit of lifestyle into her portrait sessions and she demonstrated how she does that while we were shooting together.  I got to try out “the lifestyle lens” as she calls it, the 35 mm.  I don’t have that lens so getting to use it was definitely a chance to learn something new.  She showed me how she moves around a lot when photographing her seniors instead of just moving them.  As a portrait photographer, I tend to stay in one place and move my subject where I want them to be, telling them how to pose and more.  But Geni pointed out that by moving myself I would get lots of different angles and a more lifestyle effect to add to my portraits.

Now I have always heard different things that help photographers remember what type of shots to get.  Horizontal, Vertical, Close-Up, Three Quarters, Full Length, etc.  But after shooting with Geni, I thought let’s come up with our own acronym for the type of shots to remember to get when we are photographing our seniors.

After the shoot was over, and after about 1 million mosquito bites!, we went back to the hotel and started brainstorming.  What words would we use to remind us what type of shots we wanted to get??  We wrote down words like close-up, high, low, etc.  And then Geni said….”DANCE!”  Perfect!  A dance you do with your subject to get the best angles is perfect.  Not only are you moving to get all different types of angles but your subject is moving too and therefore it is a DANCE that you do with your subject to produce the best possible images!

D – down low – shoot from a lower angle but be careful not to point the camera up your subjects nose! 🙂  Make sure the face is at the right angle to be flattering.

A – Above – stand on your toes, a ladder or higher ground to get a shot from above.

N – Near and Far – get close up photos as well as far away.  Make sure to get some with the subject filling the frame and others with a lot of the background.

C – Composition – remember composition rules and also don’t be afraid to break them!

E – Editorial – add a little editorial flare to your images.  Look at fashion magazines and ads to get inspiration.

This acronym stays in my head as I go into my senior season with the Class of 2016 Seniors.  I want to add a little editorial and lifestyle flare to my images so to create the perfect combination of portraiture, editorial, fashion and lifestyle images.  As I said earlier, I feel like I can always grow as an artist and learning new tricks from other photographers can help my photography business continue to evolve.  I hope that my images produce not only great portraits but also a bit of movement to help tell the story of each of my senior clients.

What do you do to make sure you get all the right angles and shots from your senior sessions?  Do you have your own acronym?  Share with us below in the comment section or let us know on our Facebook page!  We love hearing from our readers!!

xoxo,

Leslie