It’s time again to register for the one event a year where I teach for a full week, Texas School. The title of my class is “High End Creativity and Speed.” With so much competition, it’s more crucial than ever to have a high-end style that blends creativity and pro techniques. Having an eye-grabbing portfolio, killer marketing images, and shooting stronger images means making more money and attracting better clients. Create images your clients can’t refuse.
Whether you shoot families, children, weddings, or high school seniors, come learn to create more variety while actually shooting fewer images, and also be ninja-fast in your workflow.
So what will we do for a full week together?
1. Lighting Women Amazingly Well – Anywhere!
First, I’ll share with you my systems for lighting women amazingly well, anywhere – while also getting perfect images in camera. We’ll shoot in studio bays with models, we’ll shoot outside with various gear, and I’ll give you specific personal assignments to test your strengths and weaknesses to help you improve and solve issues on the run. That way when you return home, you’ll be better equipped to handle lighting and gear issues anywhere.
2. Social Dynamics and Connecting with People
Second, I’ll teach you how to read and connect with people on a higher level. Everyone has some kind of wall up when you photograph them, and each personality is different. It’s your job to not just photograph someone, but to break through their wall and capture true expressions that are real and engaging. To do that, we first need to remove the “gear” and “settings” from our mind to better focus on people. From there we need to better read people, to see the tiny nuances that tell us all about them, and then use that to info to get a fantastic expression, quickly, and without wearing them out with long shoots.
3. Ninja Fast Workflow in Lightroom & Photoshop
Thirdly, we’ll focus on workflow. I don’t do anything secretly or behind the scenes. You’ll see and understand my entire process. And it’s not about filters or effects, as much as it is about speed. Most photographers spend too much time in front of the computer. We’ll change that at Texas School. I’ll speed you up, and also show you how to set up your sales appointment for success. And that starts with shooting near-perfect images during the shoot, with less quantity, more quality, more variety, and in less time.
In fact, I often tell my clients that my photographs look better before Photoshop, than other photographers’ images look after. And I often prove that by going straight from my shoot into the sales appointment while the client’s mood is still on a high.
I’m not afraid of my clients seeing my images before I “work on them,” and often I can get a better sale by having a short but awesome shoot (which means the client is happy and full of energy rather than being tired and run down), and then stepping straight into the sales appointment and closing.
4. Psychology of Pricing / Psychology of Sales
So when you add more creativity, style, and quality to your shoots, the next step is to get paid appropriately. And that means we’ll end the week on how to make more money by appealing to your client on a subconscious level to spend more – what I call the Psychology of Pricing and the Psychology of Sales.
5. My Goals for Our Week Together
Many of these goals may seem as though they work against each other, as if doing one counters another. Nevertheless they are essential to earning more money and being a better photographer: (1) Connect with people to capture a real essence, (2) while shooting more creatively, (3) with more variety, (4) in less time, (5) and with fewer images, (6) all while being more exact technically, (7) in order to price and sell in a way to make more money.
That’s what we’re going to do in our full week together at Texas school.
Image Samples from last Texas School
So how good can images look without adjustments and retouching? Well even though I’ll have you shooting the most, I still need to shoot each model for 5-10 minutes to have samples to turn in. And in those 5-10 minutes, I have to to everything I teach: build a real connection to capture a real and wonderful expression, while getting things perfect in camera.
Notice how each model has a different personality, and no matter what, we have real expressions that are true to them. And in those few minutes, all of these images are better un-retouched than most photographers’ images are after retouching. Notice how the eyes sparkle with wonderful catchlights, the face sculpted with light, and the skin tones glow.
And nothing as been done to these – no exposure, no contrast, no color correction, nothing! So imagine how awesome these would look with some digital enhancement?
And I posted before about this shoot with our model, Victoria. Check out those images too. Some of those have been retouched and are finished images. You’ll see how far we were able to push the creative limits with her personality.
You can see more of her shoot here and here. Plus, here’s a 25 second video showing some of her shoot…
A big and special thanks to my sponsor, WHCC too for making this possible.
Registration
Though the event is in April 2018, online registration begins the evening of Jan 3rd. To register, visit Texas School.
Class Description: High-End Creativity & Speed
With so much competition, it’s more crucial than ever to have a high-end style that blends creativity and pro techniques. Having an eye-grabbing portfolio, killer marketing images, and shooting stronger images means making more money and attracting better clients.
Whether you shoot families, children, weddings, or high school seniors, come learn to create more variety while actually shooting fewer images, and also be ninja-fast in your workflow.
Regardless of your current level, I’ll give you personal challenges and assignments utilizing models, advanced techniques, continually changing lights, gear, styles, and locations. Whether you’ve had my class before or whether you’re new to Texas School, you’ll grow personally and love the high-end looks we achieve.
We’ll review my systems for nailing perfect exposure and color balance (inside and out, with any gear), as well as my three secrets to making women look amazing with light. But we’ll take it all further with higher-end lighting styles and personal challenges.
You’ll learn my secrets of social dynamics so complete strangers relax on camera, while giving you new ways of thinking about posing and directing. And you’ll practice engaging people to pull out and capture their true personalities with more powerful and believable expressions.
I don’t care about the type of gear you own or your experience level or whether you’ve been to my class before or not. If you’re serious about your photography, come and I’ll make you a better, more creative, more confident photographer.