johnthirdeye:
Hi Guys
Thanks for all the great advice i am taking it all on board.

Chris
As I am new to this arena, i am not sure how to post my message as a stand alone topic, but i will keep searching. Thanks for the words of encouragement and i look forward more words of wisdom. Yes The Seniors style is not practiced as such here in "Aussie". Ijust have to figure how to get the parents to think that they can not afford to miss this special time in thier childrens lives and that they must have this special form of portraiture. and so starts my mission.

Hi Stan
Thanks for the link to your web site, you have some really beautiful images on show. You have helped me to get some very valuable insight into this side of your industry. and as i type i am formulating a plan to try to turn our portrait service into an experience that our local High School Graduates will (hopefully) want and demand (OK want and demand may be a bit too strong at this stage) but hear about and tell thier friends and create inquiries at least for now. I am placing a link to my web site (i hope it works) www.athirdeyephotoservices.com and i would appreciate it if you would give me an appraisal of my images, i realise that the seniors style is not as edgey as some of my portrait work is at the moment. But i am excited about this new avenue to persue and i would appreciate any thoughts you can offer.
Thanks again for your help
Your new Aussie Mate
John

Noellez
Greetings form Aussie. Thanks for your advice, Yes i have also done some work at various times for the pure love of shooting and hoping that the work i have produced for people will return via "Karma". The ambassador ploy is a great tool it does not generally have instant results but the seeds have been planted. Could you please give me some more info on the publicatin about the seniors concept.
Thanking you for your thoughts
John

A Big thanks to you guys for answering my call for help. Hope to stay in touch

Keep Shooting

John Robinson

This info is right in the members discount section right here on this forum.

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This comes from their website www.rangefinder.com

"August: Annual high school senior issue: Working the Senior Market. "

StanCox:
Aloha!

Hey, "crazy" George! Good to hear from you again...been a while! Unfortunately when I clicked the links to the images posted here, both returned a "not found", so I can't comment on the images...

Aussie John, welcome aboard! Yeah breaking into the senior market is a tough one, but it may just be an easy plum for you there where the market is unexplored! Go in with a positive attitude! I would suggest putting together some sample portraits and meeting with the high school admins and junior and senior class committees to present your proposals. If you can land a contract with a school to do their junior & senior proms, it'll be easier to get the senior portrait biz. The school being your referral source.

Offer to provide a headshot of every senior to the yearbook if the school will direct all the seniors to go to your studio for their senior portrait. Then you can offer packages to them. Check out my website www.paramountphotography.com and take a look at my Seniors page, and Pricing page. I have no school contracts so the seniors I get are coming to me from having been family portrait clients, or as destination senior portraits via my website.

Hope this helps.
Aloha,SPC II
Hey Stan,

For some reason I now just seeing this reply. I have had a couple of unexpected deaths in the family and have been busy preparing for the Madison Ribberfest State BBQ contest which took place August 17, 18, 19. Me my three sons and a newphew, hmmm haven't heard that somewhere before, have entered the contest for the past three years. The first two years my youngest was in Irag so this is the first year he has actually been able to physically join us. I hear you asking; how did we do? Suffice to say we didn't finish as well as we have the past two years. We made some changes to our process that didn't work out as well we thought it would so it's back to the drawing board. Oh, well do it because we love it, for the familia bonding and the camaraderie with the other BBQ teams.

Ok, enough of that. I am sorry about the link to the picture. I'll attempt to reload the image. I visited your website and very, very impressed with the look of you images. They have a certain "finished" look without looking like they were overly edited. I really wish I knew how to do what ever it is you do to your images. Unfortunately I don't own PS because I can't justify the cost so I use Corel PaintShopPro. I used to use Adobe Elements but back in the beginning of Elements I wasn't really trying to turn pro and I didn't think it was as intuitive as PSP and I didn't want to spend time learning to use a complicated program. Especially since most of my images were still beiing shot with film.

Stan, here is the image I originally posted. This image was shot back in 11/2002 when I was working for a national portrait chain as a traveling photographer (I won't say who). I barely new what a lighting setup was then and we were resticted on how we could place lights. In fact they really didn't want us moving them at all and if you got caught you were in trouble.

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gegjr/1366941270/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1360/1366941270_d5b0481f7e.jpg" width="252" height="381" alt="headshot01" /></a>

johnthirdeye:
Hi Guys
I am placing a link to my web site (i hope it works) www.athirdeyephotoservices.com
John Robinson
Hi John and a belated welcome to the forum. I checked out your website. I like many of your images, especially the landscapes. I really like your website. It is uncluttered with good use of white space. I do wish your thumbnails were just a little larger so I could see a little more detail, then again maybe it's just my 56 year old eyes. I look forward to seeing more of your posts.

Good Shooting,
from G2

Aloha George!

MMmmmmm....BBQ!! Oh Yeah!

Oh, Mahalo for the compliments on my portraits! I love making portraits! Anyway, yes, the pose there of the big girl is basically what I was saying about posing 3/4 with the body turned away from the key light. And I see what you meant about the lights and not being allowed to move them... Here's what I would've done with that subject in the same pose: Increase the contrast of lighting to 4 to 1 to allow more shadow. It looks like the lights there are set to 2 to1...almost flat lighting. And I would've had her turn her face more to the key light so she wasn't broad lit on the face.

And, Oh My God! Why do big girls want to wear WHITE and SHORT SLEEVES?????!!! Man! If I had a black cloth I would've wrapped it around her like a shawl and covered her arms and as much of her body as possible!

Live n learn, eh!
Aloha,
SPC II

StanCox:
Aloha George!

MMmmmmm....BBQ!! Oh Yeah!

Oh, Mahalo for the compliments on my portraits! I love making portraits! Anyway, yes, the pose there of the big girl is basically what I was saying about posing 3/4 with the body turned away from the key light. And I see what you meant about the lights and not being allowed to move them... Here's what I would've done with that subject in the same pose: Increase the contrast of lighting to 4 to 1 to allow more shadow. It looks like the lights there are set to 2 to1...almost flat lighting. And I would've had her turn her face more to the key light so she wasn't broad lit on the face.

And, Oh My God! Why do big girls want to wear WHITE and SHORT SLEEVES?????!!! Man! If I had a black cloth I would've wrapped it around her like a shawl and covered her arms and as much of her body as possible!

Live n learn, eh!
Aloha,
SPC II
Aloha back at you and whatever Hawaiian is for You're Welcome.

Dude! You are good. I am sure you are correct about the lighting but we were not given meters. However, I would bring my own and I think the setting would be about 5.6 fill and 8 main bouncing out of big white umbrellas. Everything was setup according to tape measure measurements. We would then take a shot of a gray card (we used Kodak DCS Pro 14n) and use the cameras internal spot meter to determine if the card was in shooting specs. I don't remember what the percentage would have to be but we would then call into the lab to give them readings and get their blessings to start shooting for the day.

I know you'll think I'm crazy but besides the big nose whack (as it is called by Chris Grey) caused by the broad lighting I really didn't think the white clothing made her look that bad. In fact, I think her cute face took the emphasis off the body.

Here are a couple of more shots from the same session.

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gegjr/1366941728/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1405/1366941728_cccfa9a8df.jpg" width="252" height="380" alt="headshot02" /></a>

<<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gegjr/1366942018/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1200/1366942018_560188f3d4.jpg" width="252" height="380" alt="headshot03" /></a>

Aloha George!

Tried to remark earlier but the web server wasn't cooperating...

Now, I didn't say this girl was "all that bad looking"! My comment about why do big girls want to wear white and short sleeves was just a general comment. Believe me, here in Hawaii, we some Biguns!

Actually the pose of your model where her hair is covering the broad side of her face comes off very nice, and slimming! Even tho her face is broad lit, because the hair is covering it and framing her face.

I just think that had she worn a darker top, and long sleeves, there would be much more emphasis on her face. Especially with the black background. Had her top been darker, her face would be the only area of high contrast, and that's what draws the eye most naturally. As it is with the white top and pale skin against the black background, your eye can't help but to be a bit distracted by all that white. KnowhatImean?

Aloha!
SPC II