8 Tips for paying attention to detail

1) Watch the hands

Don't show a flat hand - whether palm out or back facing the camera - it makes the hand look big, turn the hand edge on. Don't have hands together, especially not fingers knotted together.

2) Turn the legs.

With a sitting figure, don't shoot with the knees facing the camera, turn the legs to one side for a better look.

3) Watch out for bra straps.

Bane of my life, bra straps are always creeping into pictures and they are suprisingly fiddly to remove in photoshop.

4) Watch out for bra, knicker and sock lines on skin

If your sitter has been wearing a tight fitting piece of clothing then it will leave marks on their skin when they remove it. In general much better if they can do without before they come to the shoot. Sock marks can also be very bad and easy to forget.

5) Do the flower pot check

Make sure nothing is growing out of your sitters head!

6) Spacing in groups is vital

You can almost never be too close in a group photo, check for even the smallest gaps, otherwise individuals can look very separated and not part of the group.

7) Don't delete in camera

Firstly your LCD isn't good enough to see clearly, secondly it's fiddly and slow - much better to carry on shooting and do the edit on the computer afterwards.

8) Wait for the right moment in candids.

For example I like to shoot the guests during wedding speeches. I know there is a punchline coming (or tears) and I wait until the smile lights up before shooting. But this applies in lots of other circumstances too - be ready, be focussed, and gently squeeze the trigger at the right moment.

camera bra straps sock skin Simon Q. Walden, FilmPhotoAcademy.com, sqw, FilmPhoto, photography

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