May 26, 2024

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Portrait, PPS Photography Tips, special effects, tips, Wedding Tip Wens, Weddings, workshop

How to charge for photos? The a great question most photographers get wrong at some point.

Yes, it’s a basic question. How to charge for photos? How many should I give, how many outfits, hours, etc. New photographers and sometimes veterans love to colocate their lives because they don’t understand customer service.

So here’s how to charge for photos the right way!

I edited all my broll here with Filmist LUTS, it’s not just for Lightroom and C1. Also make sure you start listeb to Pro Photography podcast for more topics like this.

Most people don’t think they need a photographer.

That’s what you need to understand in this crazy competitive world. The truth is that unless you are experienced, confident and know how to serve. They don’t need you. They might as well use their phone.

I don’t mean this to make you feel bad. Only to be real. We have to have high standards. People don’t need McDonald’s style photographers anymore. And if you don’t make them feel good, they won’t come back.

So in general charging for an image screams amateur. Now selling stock photos, fine art prints, etc is a bit different. But if your client feels like you are holding back, you lose credibility instantly.

Be a purple cow.

Here’s that book I mentioned. You can read it in data but all these years later it’s still a great reminder when you run a photo business, make workshops, or are in charge of a cafe in Mexico.

To be great in a craft business. You have to understand how to be a servant. How to make people feel good. How to give them experience and quality. How many photos in a session and how many you give the client can vary. Your skill and confidence should be a constant, however.

Price matter. But the value you create matters more.

So the topic today is whether you should charge per photo and how to charge for photos. The real answer is that you you charge in a way that is the simple simple and makes the client feel loved regardless of whether you price high or low compared to the market.

That says. The lower your price, the lower the quality of clients you get.

Let me know what you think… Gavin Seim

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May 16, 2024

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art study, Fine Art, master photography class, photoshop, special effects

Fake photos are everywhere. You need to re-wire your process with Cinematic Technique.

Most viral photos you see now are Ai AI-generated FAKES. And the more you comment and say it’s fake, the more the algorithm rewards them. There’s no point in pretending. So how does Cinematic Technique help us win?

Use cinematic technique naturally while editing and WOW!

Get more cinematic faster with my Pictorialist action kit or tools like Alchemist.

Cinematic photography techniques beat out Ai fakery…

Studying pictorialism helped me see that all this fake Ai photography has no emotion. We win when we stop thinking sterile and boring. If we to discover cinematic techniques with true feeling.

AI is here. You need to re-wire your photography process if you want to survive.

Cinematic photography. Feeling and emotions. Think about when you watch a great movie or see a show. You don’t want perfect sterile blandness. You want to feel emotion and life!

The feeds are full of Ai fakery because compared to plain boring photos they seem incredible and people don’t know. How do we complete impossible scenes that blow people’s minds? But creating more emotional photos in camera and in post.

You need to Re-Wire your process for Cinematic photography

I would love to say. hey use my Pictrialist actions, my Filmist presets, Emulsion etc and you will always have amazing cinematic photography.

But I don’t make these tools to fake it. As I showed you in the video by re-wiring your editing process you will discover the emotion you already felt taking a photo. And you should feel something.

This starts in the camera. You can go back and edit with pictorialism and cinematic photography in mind and vastly improve past photos. But when you start planning for it in Camera, everything goes to 110%

Detail VS Atmosphere in Cinematic Technique

A dramatic photo means in the camera and in the edit. Cinematic Technique give you that.

Even if you have a strong style, it will get stronger as you edit for cinematic photography and emotion. You still need to experiment and feel what’s inside each photo.

I’m a photographer who makes large prints. So details matter. But it’s not always about the max megapixels or sharpest lens. Pictalism has taught me that emotion is first. yes, I maintain detail, but the blur is not always what it seems, and mixing detail with less detail creates atmosphere, emotion, and focus.

Pictorialism gives you a Cinematic Technique and is the essence of conveying real feelings in your photos. Because of that, it’s the opposite of what fake Ai based images create. You may not approach every photo as a pictorial. But once you know how, you see everything in a new way.

Gavin Seim

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May 12, 2024

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Fine Art, pictorialism, special effects

Creating Emotional real Photography Pictorialism in a sterile Ai age

Pictorialism is about emotion over perfection and famous pictorialists like Stegliz, Coburn, Hamilton and many more helped create the fine art world of photography we know today!

We’re in the roaring 20s again. But this time Ai and soulless photos are everywhere. Photography pictorialism may be the cure.

That’s why I dig in to create Pictorialist Actions. A PS editing add-on focused on making amazing pictorialist edits. There are lots more samples, info, and videos on the pictorialist page.

You can get Pictorialist here as well as see more samples and video.

A while back I started studying pictorialism. These photos are from early-era to iconic portrait photographers like David Hamilton. I had wanted something like this for years on digital.

So we made it and it was not easy. Today I made you a hands-on training workshop on how to create photography pictorialism in Photoshop using these new actions and why it’s so good.

photography pictorailism and editing in photoshop

Can you do pictorialism photography in Lightroom or Capture One.

At this level. The answer is a definitive no. Sure we can use clarity and shoot like pictorialists in camera. But deep edits like this are not what RAW editors do.

Of course, don’t need my actions to create these high-depth photography pictorialism edits on your photos. You do need layers, a deep understanding of blurs and blending modes, and tools that are well outside of Lightroom or C1.

Yes, you can do amazing things in raw editors. if you’ve used my Filmist presets or my Elegance Ai Speed-masks you have seen just so far we can fo in modern RAW editors. It’s amazing.

Creating pictorialism in photography is more. Yes, it starts with a camera and you can shoot in a pictorialist style for sure. But getting this kind of control needs layers and nuance.

Stop being afraid of Photoshop. That’s why I made today’s video to show you that complex things like this can be easy.

Orton effect photography pictorailism.

What is pictorialism?

Do photography and pictorialism differ?

Yes because when in the darkroom or on digital, pictures-based editing is about not perfect perfect or always accurate. But it’s also not Ai fakery. You use editing and techniques in camera and post to convey a more emotionally complex image. But not always a sharper one.

It’s a delicate balance and that’s why Pictorialist actions are really mind-blowing. They create a balance that you can then adjust quickly to fit your vision.

You can edit and mix and blur and create photography that is both real but also fine art and emotion. Pisctsorism reinforces the idea the idea that artistic editing is OK. But the edits are real. They are working with a real scene from camera to print and showing your vision.

photography pictorailism alfred Stegliz style editing

Pictorialism is like a counterbalance to AI.

And I think we need that right now.

Nealy every image you see going viral online is fake. But as a pictorialist you can say, I’m creating something dramatic but it’s real. And people need real in these sterile times.

It can be deeply creative and atmospheric. But it’s all based on real-world and you as the photographer view it as a slice of time.

Go try editing like a pictorialist and see the magic that ensues. And of course, if you want to make it even better try my Pictorialist actions. They’re guaranteed!

David Hamilton style effects using pictorialist actions
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April 19, 2024

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film presets and styles, Film Presets for Lightroom, Film Styles for Capture One, fuji, special effects

New Fuji Pro 160 preset for FIlmist 2 is beautiful. But teaches us something about color.

Today I’m launching a great new emulsion in FIlmist 2.3 The Fuji Pro 160NS preset to sit alongside the legendary Fuji Pro 400H. But even if you don’t use Filmist, the lesson from today’s video is big

Most photographers no longer see color nuance.

Get Filmist 2 here or download the free sampler. If you already own V2 login and update here. I also mentioned Natural HDR 4 in the video.

We have forgotten how to see color!

I didn’t even know this. It took me years of creating this thing like this preset to understand how much we have lost. This really came to light in the latest update of my Fimist presets and Styles.

160NS is a great film. In digital terms, it seems close. Especially on some photos. But consider that Fuji did all the research and development to make this distinct film. There was reason for that.

As you watch look for the details. In a world of sledgehammer sliders, AI, supersaturation and synthesizes guitars. Everything has to be over the top. or does it?

The Fuji 160NS is not that far from the 400H. In today’s world, many might say, I don’t see the difference. But maybe something is deeply wrong with your edited photos.

Fuji Pro 400H and Fuji Pro 160NS presets for lightroom and capture one.
Side by side you can see how the color tones vary and those can make a huge difference (click for larger).

Fuji spent millions to make a film just slightly different.

Why? We don’t think with that kind of detail anymore.

In digital the work I invest to make 400H and 160NS as presets is a lot for me. But nothing compared to what Fuji spent creating and marketing them. Even with all that work it was considered worth it to make another product that was just a little varied.

That should tell us something about how much more nuance photographers thought about back then. Film was the preset of the day and those little differences mattered.

Digital needs more nuance.

It’s there. The tools are powerful enough. The courses are at our fingertips.

But it’s hard to wow people on Facebook or compare with fake Ai photos with a slight tonal variance. We have changed our mindset from subtly to a sledgehammer. It’s a really good hammer.

Once you start seeing the nuance. It comes back. You value it again and you start feeling the little variables in color and tone. Just like when you Hack Shadows you quickly connect with how magical photos are created.

It’s another reason I love to edit with film, shoot real film, and study what makes it work. because it makes me a better photographer when I shoot digitally, and it will for you also.

Gavin Seim

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April 10, 2024

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HDR Photography, special effects

The truth about the Exposure slider and how to use the Alternative to make perfect contrast.

I talk a lot here about Shadow Hacking, exposing better in camera zones and beyond. But today I was to show you something that almost no one is using in Lightroom, Raw, and Capture One. Recently I made a video about the least-known secret in Photography.

Now I’ll show you a way to edit exposure beyond the slider.

Learn more about exposure and shadow in my Shadow Hackers Live class and grab some free presets From Natural HDR and Filmist.

#1 Don’t think of Exposure as a slider.

Thinking more like you’re in the darkroom gives you a more complex view of how exposure works and relates to contrast, shadows, and lights.

The exposure slider in any app is just one way, one mix of volume and tone for those pixels. When you use curves, levels, and other methods you’re just adjusting the volume of those pixels in different ways like using EQ on your stereo.

Thinking this way keeps you from always doing the same thing and will let you easily adjust for higher or lower contrast situations like we did by pushing or pulling the film.

#2 Don’t do it all manually.

You don’t have to buy anything, you don’t have to use my presets. Or you may use mine but then make your own variants. That’s the beauty is saving things. It lets us repeat, then refine more with time. In doing so your entire process will improve.

Make these as presets, styles, and actions like I do in my mods and packs and you nyou will be glad you did.

They are simple recipes really and not like making a Film or advanced combo. Just a simple push and pull of tone and then you can turn them up and down with amount sliders or opacity layers. It’s magic.

#3 Mix it up.

In the video, I showed you different photos and how the same photo can work in more than one way. Exposure is not an absolute. Once you understand shadow hacking you know that with every photo you take.

Sometimes you want light, sometimes you want dark but those shadows are hard or soft and how they create contrast matters and the way you mix your exposure and tone boost makes a big difference.

On your stereo you have volume. But you also have EQ which is just volume targeted to specific frequencies or tones. Editing photos is the same and once you really get that there are no limits.

Go have some fun – Gavin Seim

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