FULL TRANSCRIPT: Please note this transcript was generated by AI and may contain errors.

00:00:00:21 – 00:00:37:09

Welcome to the Portrait System podcast. I’m your host, Nikki Closser, and this show is here to help you succeed in the world of photography and business, to help you learn to become financially free, doing what you love and so much more. With over 1 million downloads, countless photographers have taken what they’ve learned from both our episodes and from the portrait system dot com. And they have grown their businesses, quit their day jobs and are designing a life of their dreams. We keep it real and share stories about the ups and downs that come with running a photography business. You’ll hear real life stories of how other photographers run their business, and you’ll learn actionable steps that you can take to reach your own goals.

00:00:37:18 – 00:00:40:06

Thank you so much for being here. And let’s get started.

00:00:41:01 – 00:01:20:03

Hey, everyone, it’s Ashleigh Taylor, and I’m excited to bring you one last Clubhouse Edition episode of the podcast. You may have heard we are discontinuing the weekly clubhouse chats and we couldn’t have asked for a better final guest for our episode then Alana Lee. Alana is an award winning photographer and master of fine art composite imagery. Kevin and I got to chat with Alana about her compositing techniques and Photoshop tricks, how she prices and sells fine art, composite work to her clients, and the best way to get started in compositing for beginners.

00:01:20:11 – 00:01:31:06

Alana was a real joy to talk to and I know you will all learn so much from this episode. On how to up level your work with compositing. So let’s get started.

00:01:32:09 – 00:02:03:09

Welcome everyone to the Portrait System Podcast Clubhouse Edition. My name is Kevin Conde and I’m here with my co-host, Ashleigh Taylor. If you are not familiar with the portraits system, we are a portrait photography podcast that is powered by Sue Bryce. Nikki Closser hosts our Monday episodes and Ashleigh and I co-host our Clubhouse Edition, which is live here on the Clubhouse app every Friday and in Pacific. And then our episodes are released on Thursdays. You can tune in on your favorite podcast app by searching for the portrait system.

00:02:03:26 – 00:02:05:29

Ashleigh How are you doing today?

00:02:06:24 – 00:02:09:19

I’m good, Kevin. How are you doing?

00:02:10:02 – 00:02:11:05

Fantastic.

00:02:11:07 – 00:02:16:14

And I’m really excited to have Alana Lee on as our guest, so welcome, Alana.

00:02:17:06 – 00:02:21:09

Thank you guys. I’m so excited to be invited to participate here.

00:02:21:21 – 00:02:33:22

Well, you were the one who, like, taught me how to use Clubhouse back in the day, so I’m so. Yeah, it feels like a full circle moment. Having you on as our guest now.

00:02:34:08 – 00:03:01:28

It really does, doesn’t it? I remember I remember that clearly when I think I was one of the first creators here on Clubhouse. And I went around and I was like, Everybody, you’ve got to join Clubhouse. And of course, it was also during the beginning of of the pandemic. Yeah, we were all searching for fun, things to do and ways to connect in, and it was just amazing to be able to connect with other creators here.

00:03:02:00 – 00:03:25:26

So yeah, well we are really excited to have you on and to chat all about your amazing compositing work, your creative work. I know you just posted in the Portrait System members. I think I was in the Members Only group. Maybe I’m wrong somewhere on the Facebook with that photo that you collaborated with Leon Johnson with. That was so magic.

00:03:26:14 – 00:03:58:00

Yes. Thank you so much. I was so excited. We are today have been friends for some time. And and he was like, hey, Alana would you ever be interested in I’ve got this image and I’d love to put some wings on it. And would you be interested in collaborating? I’m like, Send it over. I’d love to collaborate. So I was super, super excited on how it turned out. And I mean, we can talk about this later, but the final image was completely different than the original direction and inspiration that Leon and I talked about.

00:03:58:11 – 00:04:04:10

But that’s sometimes what happens when we’re creating art, right? You just kind of have to follow.. Wing it. Follow your instincts.

00:04:04:18 – 00:04:06:27

With Kevin and with the fans.

00:04:09:28 – 00:04:14:25

Don’t don’t mind him. And he just does that sometimes and we ignore it.

00:04:16:17 – 00:04:28:09

Well, we all know if anybody follows me and my work, they know how much I love wings, right, with many images with digital wings, so I am often caught winging it. Yeah.

00:04:30:23 – 00:04:44:22

Does that, like, have, like, any, like, significance to you in like a symbolism way or metaphor way? Or do you just like the way the wings look? Or like, what is it about wings that you love incorporating in your work?

00:04:44:29 – 00:05:16:01

You know what? That’s so interesting because I hadn’t thought about that until the other day when I was pulling some images together from my in my portfolio. And I realized, oh, I’m creating with wings and many people don’t know this, but I, I didn’t start my career as a photographer. I started out studying zoology and natural history. And one of my very first jobs was working for the Royal Ontario Museum and in the Ornithology department.

00:05:16:03 – 00:05:59:21

So I developed a really keen interest in birds and all things to do with wings. And I mean, I parked that away for the longest time and only recently did that kind of come back and surface in my art. And it wasn’t a conscious thing that I did, but I think it is so interesting that it’s it’s really been there and kind of percolating all along. And that’s often how I find it is, is when we create, we pull inspiration and ideas from all different aspects of our lives or maybe from our clients lives if we’re creating a portrait for a client.

00:06:00:05 – 00:06:09:12

And that’s the beautiful thing about it. So so yes, it’s I guess it is founded in in my past career.

00:06:09:23 – 00:06:33:27

That’s that’s really cool. I love that because I never really knew what you know. When you look at someone’s work, you don’t always know the reason or what’s behind it, you know what I mean? And then like hearing that, I think that’s just really cool and but it just reminds me like how we can always draw from our past and sometimes like a subconscious level as well.

00:06:34:26 – 00:06:35:15

For sure.

00:06:36:10 – 00:06:48:03

Let’s take a step back, because originally we were going to open by talking about your journey and how you kind of got into this compositing and fine art work. So can you tell us a little bit about that?

00:06:49:00 – 00:07:26:21

Well, I mean, as we just said, I didn’t really start out as a photographer. And it’s only something that I’ve picked up in the last year, I don’t know, seven years or so. But I started doing photography as often, many people do. You know, I was taking photos of friends and family, and I started out as what we call a shoot and burn photographer. You know, I’d go and I’d do a session for $75 and you could have all of the digital images, you know, on a USB or I think back then it was actually on a CD.

00:07:27:13 – 00:07:28:11

And yeah.

00:07:28:22 – 00:08:03:06

Yeah, I hear that I had a lot of fun, but to be honest, I wasn’t making any money and it was really more of a hobby. Or when I looked at the bottom line, it was it was not a moneymaking venture at all. And then I shifted gears. I heard about this amazing photographer, Peter Hurley, and I started learning how to do headshot photography. And I worked my way through Peter’s programs and I became a headshot and branding photographer.

00:08:03:16 – 00:08:23:05

And I, through Peter is actually how I found Sue. And then from Sue Bryce, I learned all about pricing and setting my value and and building confidence and charging my worth so that my business actually became profitable.

00:08:24:03 – 00:08:27:26

So usually when people do that jump

00:08:29:16 – 00:08:56:00

from shoot and burn pricing, it goes up. But what were your initial pricings, would you say? Currently we are in pricing in product week for the 90 Day Challenge and this is something that people are really going through and kind of struggling with like, Oh, where do I start? I know there’s that professional high end level, but what do I initially start off if I’m not doing shoot and burn pricing?

00:08:56:26 – 00:09:28:09

You know what? That’s a good question. And I’m thinking back and as I went through it and I went through the pricing modules and I don’t even think the 90 Day Challenge was a thing at that time, but Sue of course taught us pricing at a professional level. And I was I remember feeling so scared to change my prices from, you know, the shoot and burn model to much higher price rates.

00:09:28:15 – 00:10:03:00

Because I knew that everybody around me in my town and everybody that I knew, you know, were down at that lower level of pricing. And and so I just decided to, you know, people say dip a toe in and I just kind of, you know, plugged my nose and jumped in the fall. And so I think my I just started at a $200 I think it was $195 session fee. And then it was about the same amount per image. And that then I also included folio box collections in that.

00:10:03:12 – 00:10:33:23

And I started at… Basically Sue provides in her educational platform on the portrait system. She goes through kind of starter pricing and you know, there’s a there’s a flow that you can follow. So I just jumped right in full on cannonball and I remember being so scared. And then the next inquiry I got, you know, I, I said my prices out loud. And they booked me and they, you know, I asked, how would you like to pay for that? And they paid me.

00:10:33:25 – 00:10:36:21

And and then it was full speed ahead from there.

00:10:37:14 – 00:11:10:04

That’s amazing, because I’ve interviewed some people and like sometimes, you know, they raise their prices and maybe it goes well and then something happens with them and it’s like they get scared and then they back off. You know what I mean? So I think it’s really amazing that you able to just take the full leap of faith and then just really own that energy and that value and see it through and not kind of back off of it. Not that there’s anything wrong for if anyone’s listening and they’re like, Wait, I was the person who backed off of it.

00:11:10:12 – 00:11:17:16

That’s okay. But it’s just so important to, like, get back on and keep trying because. Because it’s really just a matter of believing in yourself.

00:11:18:10 – 00:11:52:01

And I think that was the huge difference is that when I really, really seriously dug into the self-confidence work and the self-value work and I really started believing it, you know, I could tell, tell myself all along, you know, you’re valuable and you’re, you’re good enough and all of those self affirmations. But it wasn’t until I really started believing it and then it just opened up a whole new world. And now it’s like, you know, I keep raising my prices and it’s okay and.

00:11:53:06 – 00:11:54:13

And people keep paying it.

00:11:55:18 – 00:12:10:13

How do you mentally get to that state, though, that you start believing that you are worth that? Was there an exercise in the exercise that you did? Was it just like over time after doing it, it just, you know, clicks or how did that work for you?

00:12:11:06 – 00:12:47:29

You know, I started I listened to there’re many talks on on the portrait system. That’s who walks us through about self value and self-confidence. And, you know, the self-confidence series was huge. You know, I would listen to them at first. I’m like, Yeah, yeah, okay. Yeah, you know, rah, rah, rah, rah. That’s really good. And then, you know, about a third time listening through them, I started noticing when what the words, when, when the words would make me super uncomfortable.

00:12:48:25 – 00:13:30:02

And I actually used the bookmark feature on the education platform and I bookmarked those, those spots and I kept going back to them and I kept listening and kind of assessing like, why does this make me feel uncomfortable? Why why do these words really resonate with me? And when I really dug in there, you know, there was a lot of tears and a lot of cake batter later. That I worked through it and and I kind of was able to just re-evaluate everything and and truly believe in my self-value.

00:13:30:25 – 00:14:03:23

So. So, yeah, it was just a process, you know? And it’s like with anything you mean there are few things in life worth doing that we don’t get on the first try? Often those things at least I find that are the most valuable and the most profound. They take a lot of work, right? And you have to repeat and practice and repeat and practice and keep going back and even keep going back. I still go back to those videos to this day because as our journey progresses, we walk through these spaces and new challenges present themselves.

00:14:04:27 – 00:14:27:00

And I still get scared. And I you know, there are times when I feel, you know, am I good enough? And, you know, do I deserve to be here? So I just pop right back to those videos. And I am particularly into those bookmarks because I know those were my trigger points and I just kind of go through them again and and it helps. So I highly recommend that.

00:14:27:18 – 00:14:37:06

That’s I think that’s yeah, that’s really good actionable advice for people listening because yeah, it can be it can be this ethereal concept like how do I raise my value?

00:14:39:05 – 00:14:57:12

I was going to say, You know what? I’ve done a lot of viewing on the Zoom Rice education platform. I was unaware of that bookmark feature. That is actually pretty, pretty darn cool. Where if you click Save Bookmark, it actually saves it to your account.

00:14:57:24 – 00:15:34:27

It’s so it’s super valuable. And, and like I said, I still use it to this day. It’s a great way because there’s so much content on the portrait system. Often I find now it’s hard to remember. You remember? Oh, that was in a video somewhere. And you can’t quite remember. Yeah, it was. And you have to go hunting down through all of the different, you know, verticals to find it. So I’m a, I’m a heavy user of the bookmark feature and, and I keep going back. Sometimes it’s fun to go back to just when you’re looking back on your journey and you can remember and you can, you can see places and things that you bookmarked in the past.

00:15:34:29 – 00:15:38:19

And it’s it’s a nice little step back through through time as well.

00:15:40:00 – 00:16:01:20

I love that. Well, okay. So you’ve said that you’ve only really been a photographer for seven years, and yet you’ve had some amazing award winning work. You’re so incredible at fine art and composite photography. Like, how did you get into that? How did you get so far in such a short period of time?

00:16:03:09 – 00:16:33:17

A again, I think it was, you know, we learned by doing an experiential learning. And when you’re you’re passionate about something. I mean, I can composite and edit until three in the morning and not even realize how late it is. Right. So it’s like when you’re doing anything, when you find what really sparks you and and speaks to your heart, it it’s not even work at all. I’m like, you know, this is just fun for me and in playing and then as a bonus, I get paid for it.

00:16:33:19 – 00:16:48:10

And that’s just the most wonderful, wonderful thing, isn’t it? So, I mean, how did I get into doing that? I saw some images that I was super inspired by. And you know, they make when you when they.

00:16:50:03 – 00:17:14:01

When you see something and it says, I want to make that right and it just inspires you. So I just again, I jump in, cannonball. I’m going to learn that. So I’m 100% self-taught. You know, I’ve learnt through some amazing tutorials. There’s some great tutorials on The Portrait Masters. There’s other, there’s a wealth of information on YouTube

00:17:15:21 – 00:17:48:09

everywhere too. You can learn about compositing and doing fine art photography, but my biggest tip is to just start doing, you know, I. I often am an experiential learner. And so it it I think most of my skills are built by trying to figure out solutions to problems. So I would be like, Oh, I want to create this, but how am I going to do that? Or This doesn’t look quite right, so I would just figure it out. So I didn’t get bogged down by thinking, Oh, I don’t know how to do that.

00:17:48:14 – 00:18:26:10

I just kind of shift that to let’s figure out how to do that. Mm hmm. And then through that, I just I just loved the process because, you know, a few simple steps. You can turn an ordinary image into a work of art. A lot of people think that it’s, you know, maybe super difficult or, you know, it’s something that you have to, you know, go and get a degree in fine art or things like that. But really, it’s just, you know, there’s an artist in all of us and and if we just kind of follow our heart and and kind of picture in our mind what we want to do, we can figure it out.

00:18:26:12 – 00:18:38:18

There’s always a solution in a way. And so just and then by, you know, doing this over and over again, practice makes perfect. And before you know it, you’re creating amazing award winning pieces of art.

00:18:41:16 – 00:19:05:27

So with compositing, a lot of people will look at you have the wings that you have, and so very beautiful. But they might people might think, I’m not really interested in adding wings into my own images. So maybe compositing isn’t for me. What else can other people potentially composite into their images that they might not even thought of before?

00:19:06:17 – 00:19:52:05

Well, you know, it’s it’s kind of interesting when you think about it. I mean, compositing isn’t a new thing. People were doing compositing back in the darkroom on, you know, by combining negatives in in the darkroom. And if you think about it, a lot of photographers are probably you’re probably doing compositing already, even though you don’t really put it into that category. You know, how many of us have done a head swap or a face swap when you when you have, you know, a group image and you want to just grab an expression from a different image and pop it in, maybe you’ve extended the background to remove a light or, you know, maker changed the dimensions on an image by extending the background.

00:19:52:27 – 00:20:08:06

So we often we do compositing in. It can be very practical to the portrait photographer as well. It doesn’t always have to be in the sense of creating a fine art or a painterly or a fantasy type image.

00:20:09:14 – 00:20:21:12

Yeah, that’s a good point because I definitely don’t really put a face swap or a backdrop fixed in the composite. But yeah, but you’re right that it like technically is in that bucket for sure.

00:20:21:15 – 00:20:39:10

It totally is. And you’re using those skills. So those same skills that you’re using to do a head swap are the exact same skills that you would use if you’re going to do a composite in in the sense of a a fine art type image. You know, you’re using layers, you’re using

00:20:41:25 – 00:21:11:11

layer masks, you’re using adjustment, all the different adjustment features. Maybe you’re using hue and saturation and color and contrast. All of those different skills that we use everyday in what I would call regular Photoshop editing are completely transferable over to compositing. And if you know how to do all of that basic editing, you’ve got a super head start into the world of doing fine art compositing.

00:21:13:06 – 00:21:25:23

So what are the essential skill sets then that you think people need to get started in compositing? Is it just that basic Photoshop 101, a one type stuff, or are there other skill sets that you think are essential?

00:21:26:14 – 00:22:18:08

100%. I mean, you do need to know your basic way around Photoshop, but quite honestly, there are many tools in Photoshop that we don’t we don’t use, and there’s often different ways to go about doing something as well in Photoshop. So there’s no right or wrong way to do anything. If you get the right, the result you’re looking for at the end, then that’s perfectly fine. So I always encourage people like, don’t worry about if you’re doing it right or wrong, if you get the final result, then that’s okay. So I would say to anyone who wants to really dig into compositing, you need to understand how to work with layers for sure, because we bring out different elements into Photoshop using layers, and then we can use what’s called the blend mode feature, which is just located, you know, in the Layers panel.

00:22:18:10 – 00:22:51:21

And there’s a whole bunch of different adjustment layer adjustments in the blend modes and that will help you blend those layers together depending on the properties of the different assets you have in that layer stack. Another thing that people usually get bogged down or overwhelmed by are making selections and extracting their subjects and objects in Photoshop. But Photoshop’s become such a long way. I mean, back in the day, it used to be that you would have to use the pen tool and, you know, laboriously go through and make your selections all by hand.

00:22:51:23 – 00:23:23:18

But Photoshop, the newer versions of Photoshop have these amazing new masking and selecting tools that use artificial intelligence that really help us out as creators. And so once you kind of dive into the different masking and selection tools and you can master how to do those properly, you’re well on your way. But then finally, you know what? Really, the human brain, it picks up on things, right? It’s going to notice if things are off.

00:23:23:20 – 00:23:54:23

And most often what I see people getting tripped up on when they first start compositing is by either not matching up their lighting in shadows so that you’ve got your side lit in your subject. But then the other objects you’re bringing in are lit from the other side or from above. Or maybe they’re flat lit, so the lighting in the shadows are going to be off and our brains will be able to, even though we might not know why it’s off, our brains pick up on that and it kind of knows that something’s not quite right.

00:23:54:29 – 00:24:27:10

Same thing with perspective and scale. If those aren’t aren’t on and all matched up amongst your different assets that you bring into the image, then, then again our brains will well register that something is a little bit off and people will be able to tell. And then finally, I would say probably, you know, you have to match up the color and the contrast and the luminosity and your different assets as well. And this might sound completely overwhelming.

00:24:27:16 – 00:24:29:25

Everyone who’s listening might be like, Oh my gosh.

00:24:30:22 – 00:24:31:12

So much.

00:24:31:19 – 00:25:05:16

You said this was easy and this is just so much you just, you know, but it’s really not. You take it one thing at a time and there are tools out there that make this so much easier for you guys. Okay, so here, I’ll give you an example. I’ve been doing my contrast and luminosity and color by hand, which is great because, you know, when you learn to do it yourself and by hand edits, then you can really understand what’s going on and what’s happening. But I just picked up this new tool by Pratik Naik and it’s called Infinite Radiance.

00:25:05:18 – 00:25:43:05

He’s got this whole host of tools and they, they basically are like little mini actions and tools that you can use. And I don’t want to call them shortcuts because but he’s basically built it all in there. So you don’t necessarily have to understand or you don’t have to go through all of the little tiny steps. You can just use his tools and it’s like dragging a little wheel around and and it really helps. So I just used it to match up a whole bunch of different layers in that image that we talked about when we first started our conversation today.

00:25:43:07 – 00:26:06:25

That image that I did with the Wings with Leon and I just use the Infinite Radiance tool to match up the luminosity and the colors and all of the different layers that I was using. And it was, you know, what would have normally probably taken me about half an hour or 45 minutes by hand. It was literally 30 seconds using that.

00:26:06:27 – 00:26:07:20

Oh, yeah.

00:26:07:22 – 00:26:08:28

Wow, that’s mind blowing.

00:26:10:19 – 00:26:30:29

I know. I know. Pratik has. A lot of those his infinite panels in The Portrait Master’s Store. He has one in there called Infinite Skin, which I’ve seen people use. And, you know, it’s it does a really, really good job for skin clean up blemishes and everything else.

00:26:31:15 – 00:27:03:14

It’s so true, right? I mean, all of these tools, we can do it ourselves. We can figure it out or we can learn it or you know, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with using tools. It helps speed up our workflow, then it still gets us to that end point. And so unless unless you’re entering images into awards that maybe don’t allow the use of certain tools or digital assets in them, you know, there’s no reason not to use them for portrait work or for, you know, your personal projects and whatnot.

00:27:04:24 – 00:27:17:10

Do you know, do those tools come with tutorials that show how to use the tool like? Or is it just so intuitive that it’s just, yep, you do it, you open it up and you understand how to use it.

00:27:17:24 – 00:27:58:21

You know what? They’re super intuitive but I do recommend I think it’s InfiniteTools.com and Pratik has a whole bunch of tutorials there’s a whole library of tutorials there and it will show you even. It’ll show you how to use the tool in the traditional sense. But there’s often little snippets of videos too, on other ways that you can use the tools. And that’s actually how I learned about using Infinite Radiant Radiance, you know? And Pratik said, use a black and white helper layer and it helps you to take away the distraction of color, and that in conjunction with the tool itself, helps you match up the different luminosity.

00:27:58:23 – 00:28:01:01

So. So, yes, definitely

00:28:02:25 – 00:28:35:03

there are you know, some of them are more intuitive than others, Infinite Color, literally. You just press a button, you press the button, and it will help you explore all this all different color grading options for your images. And so what would take you hours to create by hand? You can cycle through them, you know, in minutes and explore all different directions to take your color grading of an image. So that’s another one I would highly recommend, especially if you’re into doing more creative edits and find out it’s.

00:28:36:04 – 00:28:52:21

It’s awesome that there’s just so many tools out there that we’re all able to find just to make things go a little bit faster. You had pointed out that for the more recent versions of Photoshop are using use AI to kind of help

00:28:54:17 – 00:29:32:07

cut things out. And yeah, I remember I purchased my own tutorials before. I’m like, okay, I really need to learn how to be able to cut people out potentially for branding sessions. They’ll be people they want to create their own plates where they can put themselves into whatever area they want. A real estate agent might want to put themselves in front of a house that they’re selling it, something like that. And it was just such a pain before to be able to cut yourself out in Photoshop, whereas now they’re, you know, select a subject feature there is just so awesome, so amazing to be able to just do that super quickly.

00:29:32:13 – 00:30:03:10

So oh, you’re totally right, Kevin. It’s, it’s, it’s amazing what the A.I. technology can do. And you often will have to go in and just kind of refine things a little bit. They actually have a new button in there called Refine Hair, and I encourage everybody to go and play with it. And there are also in the properties panel, panel, when you’re doing this locked mask, you have the option to refine the mask. And when when you’re in there, you can toggle the refining mode now between color and object aware.

00:30:03:18 – 00:30:38:16

That really helps in making your selections and playing around with the refine brush on the hair is super helpful. And then of course, Kevin, as you know, you can take those images especially useful for people like if you have real estate clients, provide that as a service to them that in addition for an additional fee, of course, I could give you your images on a transparent background so you can just drag and drop them into all of your marketing materials. And that’s something that my clients really enjoy having, having that as a service.

00:30:39:13 – 00:30:46:05

Now, are you still working with like branding clients as well or do you just fully do fine art now?

00:30:46:16 – 00:31:18:17

I do. I still do some headshots and branding, particularly for some of my VIP clients who have been with me for a long time. I’ll also do some fine art portrait work for them, and I do do a little bit of commercial work as well as some editorial photography for for various magazines and whatnot. But most often I’m I’m doing the compositing and fine art these days and creating the digital backgrounds and things like that.

00:31:19:15 – 00:31:33:15

Yeah, it really shows that that’s where your passion is in your work. Like again, going back to that image with Leon, you can just see the passion that you have for, for that and that eye for creating that art. And it’s so beautiful to see.

00:31:33:27 – 00:32:05:02

And you know, I was just talking with someone else yesterday about how important it is to also you know, what I’ve started doing is scheduling time on my schedule for creative play. Because we get so busy, you know, with business, business, business, of course, as small business owners and solopreneurs as there are, there are a mountain of tasks we need to do when, you know, not just photographers, but we’re we’re marketers. We’re business people.

00:32:05:04 – 00:32:21:04

You know, there’s taxes and bookkeeping and we either have to outsource this or put the hat on ourselves. And we often get wrapped up in all of that and we forget to just allow time to create. And I think, you know, our heart and our soul needs that. So.

00:32:22:22 – 00:32:44:19

Yeah, I agree. We did get a question earlier in the episode from someone who was asking if you use constant lights when you shoot still, because she had heard you on another clubhouse episode back in the pandemic days where you were talking about your lighting process.

00:32:45:05 – 00:33:19:28

Yes. Okay. So I 100% am a constant light photographer. I have actually there’s a very practical reason for that. And it’s a health reason for me. I have MS and I can be prone to having seizures. So for me, strobes and flashing lights are really not a safe option. So I work 100% with constant lights, and I’m actually an ambassador for Stella Pro Lights, which are an amazing, constant light source that that I use in the studio.

00:33:20:06 – 00:34:00:09

I love them. They’re super rugged. They’re light as a feather, they’re weather resistant, if not weather waterproof, depending on the model. So you can even take them outside. I’ve taken my some of my stella lights under water. Super versatile. And I love it because with constant lights, what you see is what you get. So often when you’re working with strobes, you use the modeling light and you can kind of see the effect you’re going to get, but you never you know, you often have to I see people playing with the the strength of their light and turning it up and turning it down with constant lights.

00:34:00:23 – 00:34:27:24

You know, you just kind of set it and forget it. And I find that helpful to me as a photographer because it’s easier to see the light and the effect we’re going to get. And it’s also nicer for your clients. You know, you don’t have that flash going off in your face and often they’ll forget that they’re being photographed. And also, it’s really good if you also shoot video, you know, these these days Ashleigh you you know.

00:34:28:03 – 00:34:28:18

Yeah.

00:34:29:05 – 00:35:02:27

Content is so important and having all of that content for to make our reels and our TikToks and to shoot our behind the scene client video so people can see what the experience is like. We often want to capture video and so if you’re using constant lights, you can either set up, you know, a cell phone or a camera too on a on a still tripod. And just take video of your behind the scenes or you can have an assistant or maybe your hair and makeup artist shoot some behind the scene video for you while you’re actually shooting your clients.

00:35:03:14 – 00:35:18:26

And when you’re using constant lights, you don’t have to worry about is there enough light to light the video and how it’s going to look? You just go, you don’t or you don’t have to. Also, I’ve seen people who shoot with strobes and then like, okay, now let’s redo that with the video lights on so we can capture our video.

00:35:18:28 – 00:35:19:14

Yeah.

00:35:20:29 – 00:35:30:26

So yeah, constant lights are so, so much nicer, at least for me. I have a very practical reason that I started using them and then I just fell in love with them.

00:35:31:21 – 00:36:06:08

No, they’re. They’re really fun. Like at my booth at the TPM Shootout last October, I got a booth with constant light. And let me tell you, it was so wonderful not to have to deal with taking the remotes from people and distributing them. And then also everyone could just see what was like the best not going to like I was like, oh, my gosh, not having to like track these remotes is amazing. But also like just being able to see like the light on the subject and not having to. Because a lot of times when I would have a booth and you have the strobe, just like you said, you can’t really see what it’s going to look like.

00:36:06:10 – 00:36:38:02

So people would spend a lot of time at my booth just trying to figure out like what kind of lighting setup it was going to be and then how that’s going to affect the mood of their image and the pose and all that, you know. And then for them to just be able to walk up and see it and see how the light will change if you move the model in different ways and everything, it was just super cool and it’s a lot like shooting natural light, which is the primary way actually that I still shoot in the studio. So I, I feel like constant lights are a comfort zone for me as well.

00:36:38:11 – 00:37:09:29

100%. I also know a lot of photographers who shoot natural light in their studio and then they’ll use the constant light just for a little boost. I think Nikki Closser does that is sometimes, you know, like if there’s a gray day, you’ve got a client coming in and you just you don’t have, you know, as much natural light as you would like. You can use your constant light is just a little bit of fill just to kind of give it a little bit of a boost. Yeah. And so it’s so nice. And the only thing with constant light, I mean, they’ve come a long way since they first came out.

00:37:10:01 – 00:37:47:26

When they first came out. The power of a constant light wouldn’t be enough to, you know, light a full group photo or to freeze action. But the technology is improving. At rocket speed. And there are some new lights that are out now and they call them a constant strobe hybrid. And they’re actually a constant light, but they also work as as a rapid flashing strobe. So it’s one little light you can take on location with you and you’ve got either constant or strobe power and, and they’re super cool and amazing.

00:37:47:28 – 00:38:25:26

So yeah, I think Leon had those at the shoot out back to his homework. Yeah, they were. They were super cool. And, you know, my hesitation prior to going to the shoot, I was like, well, it’s not going to be bright enough. It’s, you know, you’re going to have to pump dry air. So but then they had to shoot. I was like, Oh, I’m 200, 400 ISO. It’s like, this is this is nice, you know, and doing my own self portrait work when I’ve been, you know, here, I’m in my space, I’m like sitting in front and just a constant pop of light from, from strobe is like, ow, my eyes hurt.

00:38:26:05 – 00:38:34:15

So the idea of a constant light is a, you know, super enticing direction to potentially go.

00:38:35:18 – 00:39:09:23

Perfect. And I see Katura. I don’t know if I’m saying your name right. I’m sorry if I’m not Katura. Bishop was the one who was originally asking about the constant or the stella lights. She. She just said yes in the chat. Yeah. You can always hit me up for in a private message for any questions or if you guys want to reach out, if you’re members of The Portrait System, you can reach out in the members only group with any questions. Just tag me and I’m happy to answer any of your questions about constant lights there.

00:39:10:22 – 00:39:13:09

Do we have anybody else who has questions?

00:39:13:11 – 00:39:40:13

Yeah, if anyone else has questions again, I think there’s still should for you guys. You should see a little hand icon and you could raise your hand and be brave and come up and ask a question or you can just drop it in the chat. Otherwise, Kevin and I can return to our regularly scheduled questions that we have queued up. Oh wait Michael Fidea. Our friend of the show, friend of the pod is got a question and he’s brave enough to come on stage.

00:39:40:15 – 00:40:08:14

So hey everyone, I figured nobody else is going to ask a question. So I will now, sorry if you answered this earlier because I was kind of doing some video for my social media and stuff earlier while listening, but do you price your portrait work and like your composite work differently? And if so, how do you entice clients to go more towards your composite work or something like that?

00:40:09:05 – 00:40:10:09

Great question, Michael.

00:40:11:29 – 00:40:43:12

So here, here’s how my pricing works. My headshot and branding and regular portrait pricing are all the same. I know some people will have separate prices for their headshots and branding, but then I found there’s always that weird, awkward moment when a headshot client comes in and it’s one price, but then maybe you shoot a couple of portraits and how do you distinguish what’s a headshot and what’s a branding photo versus what’s a portrait? So all of that is one price.

00:40:44:08 – 00:41:33:01

Currently, I’m $395 for the session fee and I charge $225 per image for those. I’ll say those are regular studio images. My compositing is always for at a on a project based scale. So it often involves you know, it always involves a client consultation, figuring out the scope of the project, you know, is there going to be makeup, are there going to be costuming? Are there specific props we’ll need? Are there digital assets that will need to purchase licensing for that? I don’t have in my own catalog, all of those different things go into the pricing of a composite image, including the time that I’m going to be

00:41:34:16 – 00:42:05:04

working on the image itself. And that can be, you know, as you can imagine, it can vary wildly from an hour to days of work. So so there’s a really big range of of pricing for that. Most people come to me through the headshots and branding and or a portrait and they see my images. I have my images and my fine art images displayed as wall art in my studio. And they see those and they say, I want that.

00:42:05:17 – 00:42:38:21

And they’ll often come back and we book a particular shoot for that. A lot of people do find my work online, of course, as well. I enter a lot of awards and competitions where I’m featured in publications and they’ll see an image and I’ll get an inquiry and do a consultation and people will come forward just a fine image. And those are of course at a higher price point. I would say most of them usually end up starting around $2500.

00:42:38:23 – 00:42:48:04

It really depends on the image, though, and go up from there. So. I don’t know if that answers your question. No.

00:42:48:29 – 00:43:22:02

Actually, there’s really well, because I kind of I was trying to do the same thing. I won’t be successful in getting anyone to bite. But like I and I didn’t really think taken to concept of buying costuming or anything like that, but I set my anything like fantasy composite work at just $2000 and you would get like a large print with it, but I haven’t had anyone to buy it on that just because I know and I would try to explain to people like this takes a lot longer, you know, not a lot of hours and things like that, especially days, especially because for me I like to maybe sleep on it and then come back and look at it and be like, okay, that’s looking wonky or whatever.

00:43:22:10 – 00:43:32:19

So yeah, absolutely. So I was kind of wondering how you went about set, not only setting the price, but maybe getting people to… 100%.

00:43:32:21 – 00:43:45:20

My goal and one of my tips for you and this change to because a lot of people don’t realize the amount of work that goes into a composite. They can kind of imagine. But sometimes, you know, they think, oh, it’s, you know, quick and it’ll be $100 for the image.

00:43:47:16 – 00:44:17:21

So I’ve started showing my work, creating little behind the scenes, you know, speed edits, different things like that. Because when people see all of the work that goes in behind it and you do a really thorough consultation with them, they do realize the the value of what they’re getting. A lot of people will say, Oh, that’s not the right, you know, that’s not in my budget. And thank you very much. Other people will. Who truly value it.

00:44:17:24 – 00:44:45:18

They’ll come. And, you know, I’ve had clients that will save up. They’ll say, Oh, gosh, okay, I want this so much, you know, but I can’t afford it right now. But I’ll save. I had one client and she saved for a year. So we did our consultation, we did all of our planning, you know, to create the concept and everything. And then she saved up a certain amount from every paycheck for a whole year and then came back when when she was ready. And we created that amazing piece of wall art for her.

00:44:45:20 – 00:44:47:24

So awesome. Thank you very much.

00:44:48:17 – 00:44:49:05

You’re welcome.

00:44:50:02 – 00:45:02:04

Well, thank you, Michael. And yeah, we also have a question from Emily Drew. Hi, guys. I always get confused if it’s Emily Pearl, because, like, your business is Emily Pearl.

00:45:05:24 – 00:45:07:06

What do I say?

00:45:09:06 – 00:45:10:28

Emily Drew of Emily Pearl Photography.

00:45:11:06 – 00:45:13:28

Yeah, I like that, Kevin. Yeah. Yeah.

00:45:14:27 – 00:45:17:05

Sounds great in Kevin’s voice, too.

00:45:17:17 – 00:45:18:17

I know that, right?

00:45:18:29 – 00:45:20:15

You could drop an octave or two. You know.

00:45:20:28 – 00:45:27:15

Emily was one of our first interviews, so I wanted to shout her out. But what’s your question, Emily?

00:45:28:05 – 00:45:44:22

So just piggybacking on Michael’s question, Alana, do you are you really going for like one sit, one look for your fine art shoots, or are you doing multiple looks? Like, what’s the end aim? Is it just to get like one big piece of art or what’s your process there?

00:45:45:08 – 00:46:22:01

It really depends. Again, it’s all designed for the clients. Sometimes I’ve had you know, I’ve had someone come in, they’ll do this is a classic, right? They come in for a headshot or a branding session. They see the they see the fine artwork and they say, I want this either for themselves. So then it’s a one piece thing or maybe it’s for a family. So maybe it’s one family image, or maybe it’s a grouping which is really great. If you want to set up a set up that in your in your options for people, for wall art as you do a wall art grouping.

00:46:22:03 – 00:47:19:09

So you have a themed grouping. Of fine art images. So perhaps one features all of the members of the family and then they each get their own little individual portrait as well. That has a fine art edit on it that relates back to that main image. So that’s one way that you can approach that to increase your sales even more. But I do recommend build that into your price. So in your packages, most often, you know, if people are looking at that price point, I really say like you need wall art with this, so work that into your packages and in your consultation say, okay, now where you know, will you envision this artwork in your home? You know, where will you display this? And then you can tailor the portrait session around that and either create that one big featured image that’s going to be one statement, piece of wall art or maybe a creative grouping.

00:47:20:01 – 00:47:44:15

Oh, that’s great. And then I have one more question. You had mentioned in one of the threads in the main group about licensing, and I was just curious if you could expand on that. If you are buying a stock image for a client work, what does the licensing look like for that? Like, do you need to buy the commercial license or. What do you need to do?

00:47:44:29 – 00:48:20:24

It really depends on the end use of that of that image as well as the stocks that you’re buying it from. So you really have to pay attention where you’re getting your stock images from and read the details in the fine print on that licensing. There’s a big misnomer. You know, there’s a lot of free stock sites as well. And they agree to use, especially if it’s going to be for your own use, you know, on your on for educational use, perhaps on your own website or for your own personal use.

00:48:21:09 – 00:48:53:02

But you can’t often use them for commercial use or when you’re creating a product or a product to sell. So if you’re creating something for a client who might be using that for commercial use, you know, maybe you’re doing an epic scene for a construction company with, you know, crazy construction equipment flying through the air. I’m not sure. But if they’re going to be using that for commercial purposes in their own marketing, then you have to really read that fine print and make sure that’s

00:48:54:21 – 00:49:28:14

one of the approved uses. And when in doubt, send an email to the customer support of that stock website. Just to clarify, say, hey, I’ve got a client and their intended use is X, Y and Z. Which license is the correct one for this? Often a lot of the licensing is also based on the number of views that image will get. So it could be the number of copies of a book being printed. You know, if it’s a book cover, it could be the number of views of a video.

00:49:28:28 – 00:49:47:19

But how does one know how many views it’s going to get right? So when in doubt, get the extended license, it’s going to cost you more. You know, on Adobe, it’s something like $90 instead of $10. But go ahead and work that into your quote in your pricing and then you’ve kind of covered your butt

00:49:49:19 – 00:50:08:27

and made sure that everything is properly licensed so it doesn’t come back to get you or your client. Of course, that would be, you know, a nightmare if you if you accidentally slipped up on that. So always read the fine print. And when in doubt, contact that stock site to just clarify.

00:50:09:19 – 00:50:10:26

Perfect. Thank you so much.

00:50:11:04 – 00:50:11:21

You’re welcome.

00:50:12:23 – 00:50:37:24

Well, thank you, everyone. Alana, it has been an absolute pleasure having you on with us today. We are coming up to the end of the one hour mark and Ashleigh and I have an announcement so we can call the interview a little bit early. But before we let you go, if you can go ahead and share your socials with us and where people can find you. 100%.

00:50:37:26 – 00:51:05:05

This has been so fun, guys. If you’d like to follow up or have a look at my work, you can find me at AlenaLeePhoto.com. You can look me up on all of the social channels at Alana Lee Photo and of course be sure to check out ThePortraitMasters.com, which is the portrait masters store where you can find some of my digital backgrounds, overlays and textures for sale over at the Portrait Masters.

00:51:05:17 – 00:51:12:11

And you have like a big bundle collection where people can just get everything that you have too, right? 100%.

00:51:12:14 – 00:51:32:03

That’s the best deal there is. It’s I think it’s a over $700 value at a significantly reduced price. So that that would be my hands down recommendation is to pick that up if you’re at all interested in compositing and doing creative sort of edits.

00:51:32:24 – 00:51:34:09

Yes. Love it.

00:51:34:29 – 00:51:45:22

Perfect. Perfect. Everyone, please be sure to go follow her Instagram everywhere as well as go pick up her items over at the Portrait Masters Store. Thanks so much.

00:51:46:16 – 00:51:49:24

Thank you. I can’t wait to hear what the big announcement is going to be.

00:51:49:28 – 00:52:25:11

Everyone please be sure to also follow The Portrait System on Instagram and on Facebook as well. Also, be sure to check out the blog posts that are associated with the clubhouse interviews at SueBryceEducation.com/blog. You can follow Ashleigh on Instagram. Ashleigh Taylor Portrait that is ASHLEIGH. And you can find me there as PopLight_Photography. If you are a member of The Portraits System and you have any more questions for Alana, Ashleigh, or myself, go tag us in a post in The Portrait System Members Only Facebook group.

00:52:25:21 – 00:52:38:24

And if you are not a member of The Portraits System and you are interested in learning more about how we can help your business succeed, reach out to Ella on our support team by emailing support@SueBryceEducation.com.

00:52:40:28 – 00:52:43:11

So Ashleigh, you have a little announcement to make.

00:52:43:25 – 00:52:47:06

Yeah. I feel like you’ve overhyped it, making it seem like.

00:52:48:22 – 00:53:09:05

Well, it is. I think it is an important, you know, for us. And, you know, we’ll see. Well, what the people think, so. This is our last episode for the Clubhouse Portrait System Podcast. We are looking to bring

00:53:10:27 – 00:53:39:02

The voices to a new platform. But we will see where that goes for everyone that has ever listened, said hi, has made a compliment in person or online. Thank you. Thank you very much. Ashleigh and I are both greatly appreciative of all the time that you’ve given to us. And. Thank you very much to Ashleigh. You have been a fantastic co-host and even better friend.

00:53:40:27 – 00:53:43:00

You’re going to make me cry. And I don’t want you to do that.

00:53:44:17 – 00:53:46:24

Don’t cry. Yeah.

00:53:48:19 – 00:53:52:18

So, yeah, I wanted to say thank you to everyone. Ashleigh.

00:53:53:01 – 00:54:30:18

Yeah. I also just wanted to say how grateful I am for this past year. Ironically, this is like our one year anniversary. And it’s been, for real, like, one of the best years of my life. This has been such a fun ride and just great adventure. I’ve learned so much from all our guests. I’ve had such an amazing time connecting with all the listeners, everyone like Kevin said, who’s taken the time to, you know, write a review for the podcast or come up to us in person at one of the conferences, or comment on a Facebook post and say how much you enjoyed listening.

00:54:30:20 – 00:55:04:05

Like, I screenshot it if I can. Like I save it. It means so much to me. So. So yeah. So I just wanted to say thank you. And of course, Kevin, getting to know you over this past year, you went from being a stranger to being like my best friend. So I’m. Yeah, this is this is really a bittersweet moment, but hopefully, we will be back in another format. We don’t know exactly what the details are, what that could look like. But, you know, let’s all keep our fingers crossed and stay tuned.

00:55:04:21 – 00:55:11:04

Exactly. So, yeah, we just wanted to leave you all with that. Thank you. That’s all I can say, I guess.

00:55:11:12 – 00:55:14:00

And of course, thank you to Nikki, to you, for.

00:55:14:02 – 00:55:14:20

Oh, of course. To Nikki Closser

00:55:15:20 – 00:55:28:00

for letting us be a part of Team Portrait System podcast for the last year. You know, she is amazing and obviously her content will continue coming out. So please tune into those episodes every single week.

00:55:28:27 – 00:55:54:25

You know? Thank you to all of them for taking the the time to giving us a chance. It has been fantastic. So, Nikki, Ella, Aaron. Yeah. Everyone been behind the scenes? Exactly. Vincent, Kellen you all have been amazing helping put everything together. You know, Ashleigh and I are the voices for this, but it could never happen without the team we have behind us to bring this to everyone.

00:55:55:24 – 00:56:13:15

And on that note, I guess we probably should should officially wrap up. But but yeah. Thank you, everyone. It’s been it’s been such a joy. And I know someone just tuned in today and I think it was Amal. Amal. Yeah. And she was like, Oh, I’m addicted now. Well, I’m sorry.

00:56:14:09 – 00:56:18:25

You could always go back to your favorite podcasts on Spotify or Apple.

00:56:19:05 – 00:56:23:10

Yeah. You have a year worth of, like, of content that you could listen to.

00:56:25:13 – 00:56:26:18

All right, guys.

00:56:28:03 – 00:56:29:24

All right, everyone, have a wonderful day.

00:56:30:19 – 00:57:06:07

Thanks again for listening today. And don’t forget, you can listen to either me or our special guests every Friday on Club House at 11:00 a.m. Pacific. Thank you so much for listening to the Portrait System Podcast. Your five-star reviews really help us to continue what we do. So, if you like listening, would you mind giving us a review wherever you listen? I also encourage you to head over to SueBryceEducation.com, where you can find all of the education you need to be a successful photographer. There are over 1,000 on-demand educational videos on things like posing, lighting, styling, retouching, shooting, marketing, sales, business, and self-value. 

There’s also the 90 Day Startup Challenge, plus so many downloads showing hundreds of different poses. We have to-do checklists for your business, lighting PDFs, I mean truly everything to help make you a better photographer and to make you more money. Once again, that’s SueBryceEducation.com.