Sit Back, Admire, and Then Keep Going

This is some of my best work and I knew that right away.  Not only did I take shots that I felt were amazing while on location, but I used my time on location wisely in the 3 hours I had my customer available to me with good sunlight/cloudiness.  I was also impressed with my speedy editing of these shots, although it may not have been that fast.  I will explain. 

When you get your lighting, positioning, exposure, and any other settings the way you intended them to be, your work in Lightroom and Photoshop has been cut down exponentially.  You must also take into consideration the subject's appearance as far as hair and shadows on the face since those are time consuming to fix as well.  I had a saint with me as far as equipment goes, a $13 collapsable 5-in-1 reflector and diffuser disk.  THIS IS A MUST BUY FOR ANY PHOTOGRAPHER!  I used the gold because of its warmth it gives off on the subject's face, and I also used the diffuser to get a little bit of the harsh sun out too.  I had the mother of the subject hold the reflector for about 3/4th of all the pictures taken and she really picked it up quick, as should anyone else if you invest in this must buy.  Your assistant for that day will become a reflector master and actually grab it and knock out the shadows on the subject's face quicker than you can take a test shot.

I got all my shots up and a preview album for my client within the same day the shots were taken. It's nice to be able to pick your pictures up within days of the shoot.  If you are going to be a photographer you must overshoot (no pun intented) your estimated time of completion and then impress your clients with how fast you get everything done.  It took me 4-5 hours to edit, but a good amount of that was just experimenting with different looks on the images.  You also want to take a break halfway through to ensure that you do not get your eyes used to an over-edited, or under-edited look.  You want it somewhere in the middle, but coming back to your pictures after a break should get you on the right track.

The customers are very happy with the outcome and I knew I had to make these look my best to get my spring season on a roll.  I will take my time with admiring my work on this shoot, critique anything I might see or could have done better, and then get back to making my work even more professional on the next shoot.  Thanks go out to the Diamond Family for hiring me for these senior portraits, and being active to get my name out there for future jobs.