Managing Emotions before a Photo Shoot

I've been writing about my battle with camera shyness despite working in TV and dealing with emotions before a shoot. Then, almost as if it were timed, I get a call that a celebrity photographer wants to fit me into a last-minute opening. 

I knew I had to jump on the opportunity even though I was waiting to hear if a family member would make it through surgery 2,000 miles away. Here's how I managed the day in case it helps anyone else.
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9:00 am:  Shower. Wash/blow dry hair (yogurt facial mask applied day before).

10:00 am:  Photographer had suggested wearing black dress. I only wear LBD's at red carpet events and funerals. Picked one I wear to funerals. Pack:

• fuschia tank top and blouse, purple business top, black skirt
• skinny jeans, denim jacket, silver belt, black booties (oops, forgot pumps)
• necklace, diamond stud earrings 

10:30 am: Practice poses while waiting for call from hospital to take my mind off things (it may feel stupid but the mirror really helps!).

11:30 am:  Walk to mall to look for dress. Shopping fail.

2:15 pm:  Shower again. Style hair. Apply makeup in natural shades. Lancome Teint Idole foundation, blush, MAC Blotting Powder, YSL Golden Gloss, liner, mascara.

3:20 pm:  Finish packing (remember blotting cloths, lint remover, charger, etc.).  Get a call that my relative made it through surgery! 

4:00 pm:  Traffic, grrrr. Rush hour + construction + Dodgers game = tortuous crawl. Running late. Feeling tense.

5:10 pm:  Meet photographer.  Perfect light, known as 'magic hour' just before sunset when light is soft and casts few shadows.

6:30 pm:  Wrap! Photographer works fast.

1:30 am:   Night owls - photographer sends raw shots to review.

2:30 am: Winner!

Something that helped me focus despite the emotional challenges was to view things like an artist.  Artists often name their work and use it to channel their emotions so that's what I did.  I called the shoot, 'Surrender,"  as a statement of trusting God even when facing the possible loss of a loved one.

On the practical side, packing a day or two before the shoot helps reduce stress; so does avoiding sugar and caffeine.  For expert advice from the photographer on rocking your shoot, check out my article, 'Camera Shy?  Tips to Photograph Like a Celebrity.' 
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Model Jen Brook as some fantastic posing tips in her blog: http://jenbrookmodel.tumblr.com.  

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Hollywood Love/Hate

In case you missed it, here's my article Camera Shy?  Tips to Photograph Like a Celebrity that appears in a Dartmouth alumni publication. Read it by clicking here.

I'm writing more articles, including Five Reasons to Stop Hating Hollywood so tell me what you love or hate about it and you may be featured in my next piece!

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Camera Shy? Tips to Photograph Like a Celebrity

This article appears this month in a Dartmouth alumni publication

We all get the urge to smack someone who sticks a camera in our face:  Your old roommate who posts Facebook photos from hell.  Aunt Lucy who stalks you at family reunions. Your boss who bear hugs you in company photos.  Your local police officer who…scratch that, you don’t want to smack a cop taking your mug shot. 

Many of us are camera shy.  For me, it was rooted in a family history of shyness - so acute in some relatives, we don't have pictures of them - and in being a chubby kid.  Anyone who was bullied or teased about their looks understands.

As an adult, the problem got worse after gaining the freshman 15 (er, 30).  I perfected tricks to dodge even candid snaps - from ducking behind furniture to wearing sunglasses indoors.

Despite my career in TV, I learned to "hide" behind the camera by showcasing other people's stories.  I avoided headshots even though mine looked like relics from our frat row days.  When photos were inescapable, my smile was as fake as Lindsay Lohan trying to look innocent in court.

Camera shyness was sabotaging my career.

I finally called photographer Maria Peterson, whose clients range from celebrities to brides. I've known Maria forever so I could trust her for nonjudgmental advice.

"Even models struggle with self-consciousness," she said, "but they learn to embrace the awkwardness."

If you have a photo shoot on the horizon for graduation or a new job, read on for tips on how to photograph like a celebrity.

Prepare

"Preparation is the key to dealing with inhibition,” says Maria, who suggests starting a week before a photo session.  Some of her clients change how they eat; others get more sleep or do yoga to help relax.

Make that hair appointment, get a manicure, pack a tote with items you'll need the day of the shoot - basic advice but Maria finds too many people wait until the last minute and then are disappointed with their shots.  Taking control early was helpful for an Ivy League overachiever; I already felt more confident.

  

Plan

What should I wear, exactly?  Images of Helen Mirren in Calendar Girls flashed through my mind. 

I planned a trip to the mall.

Not so fast, says Maria.  "It's best not to go out and buy something you've never worn that may make you feel inhibited or may not be you.  It's better to wear simple clothes that accentuate the face."

So that just left the question of what colors to wear. In TV, we avoid green, brown and blue (they don't work well for 'green screen'), red, white and black.

I was surprised Maria said any colors would work. While she thinks most people photograph well in jewel tones, "It's more important to wear what makes you feel really confident, really hot. Keep it simple." 

Practice

In TV there's a term called 'cheating to camera' where we stand slightly angled. It feels silly but practicing flattering (i.e. slimming) poses in front of a mirror helps build confidence as you learn to play up your assets and accept how you look - Dumbo ears, double chin and all.

Confession: friends and I practice our red carpet pose. You know the one: chin down/shoulders back/hand on hip.  Forget copying Angelina Jolie’s thigh-baring Oscars pose but we pull off sexy ok.

You may not walk the red carpet but with practice posing for the PTA newsletter won't leave you a nervous, sweaty wreck either.

Play

Finally, your photo shoot should be fun; it's your chance to show what makes you unique inside. "The more you can drop your guard," says Maria, "the easier it is to capture the real you and have fun."

TV coach Marki Costello gave me the push I needed to finally confront camera shyness. Marki, who coaches stars from Stacy Keibler to Cee Lo in her Become A Host program, says the key is to think about your audience more than yourself.

"Think about what you want to convey to the person looking at the shot," says Marki.  "Are you witty, funny, devious, clever?  Have it come out in your face."

Getting a photo that 'pops' is about showing your personality most of all.  "People are so worried about being glamorous and dolled up," says Marki, "but I want to see something in their eyes and face that tells me who they are."

Even if paparazzi aren't hiding in your bushes, these tips should help combat the urge to act like Alec Baldwin and punch the next photographer who shoves a camera in your face. 

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She Still Stands

The LA Times is running this photo I shot outside a West Hollywood antiques store.  The owners display collectibles and old movie props  but weeks have passed without a buyer for the 8' statue.  

Just before the 10-year anniversary of 9/11, Lady Liberty reminded me...

As journalists, we make a living reporting other peoples' tragedies.  Lost lives usually mean bigger ratings; 9/11 was no exception.  Except it was our tragedy, too.  There's a saying, "History always leaves a witness."  We were all witnesses.

I lived near the Golden Gate Bridge at the time.  The area around the monument went into lockdown.  The F-14 military fighter jets flying overhead made a threat to our lives seem imminent.

Tears are of no use in the newsroom; mine would not stop.  Only one other story had hit me so hard: the crash of TWA Flight 800.  

I'd instantly felt the explosion that killed 380 people was not an accident...even before I learned that my friend, detective Sue Hill, was on board; we'd met years earlier working the same crime scenes.

No tributes mark the crash site of Flight 800.  No monuments honor the victims.  No one can prove whether a missile or mechanical failure brought down Sue's plane but I'm convinced  these tragedies five years apart - on 7/17 and 9/11 - were somehow linked. 

These lost lives remind us of the price we pay to live in a free country - by no means perfect, her leaders are often wrongly motivated; her people often selfish and arrogant.  Yet, despite terrorism, catastrophe and war, her Light still shines.  She still stands.

*"The Mysterious Death of Detective Sue Hill," The Rap Sheet, Nov 2005
http://www.portlandpoliceassociation.com/rsissues/Nov05Rap.pdf

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The Tunnel's End

Another one of my photos is running in the LA Times! I recently shot this picture under the Santa Monica pier.

I was trying to get a photo of the pier's iconic ferris wheel at sunset but the angle wasn't working so I decided to take a shortcut to the other side before the sun slipped away. There's a path that runs under the dock but I've always avoided going that way; it's dark, wet and smells like urine.

I was determined to get a photo for a photography project though so I entered the tunnel. Near the end, I saw light streaming through the pillars. At first I kept walking toward the beach but I was drawn to turn back and take in the message: Though shadows linger, there is light at the end of the tunnel.

In that moment, the light piercing the dark passage, it didn't seem like a cliché.

The photo above, "Where the sun never shines," can be seen in the LA Times Southern California Moments photo gallery

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The Storyteller's Calling

I was walking along the beach when I ran into a man in an orange prison jumpsuit. I was a little afraid since the shoreline was deserted except for us and a few seagulls.

Should I keep walking? Run like mad? Call 911?

You'd think living near Hollywood I'd know by now things often aren't what they seem. Turns out the "escaped convict" was an actor waiting for a camera crew.

Watching the actor, photographer and ocean move with each other was like turning the pages of a book. Storytellers - crafting lines with images instead of words.

In my mind the beach melted away and I was back in Haiti where I'd write sitting under the mango tree. This is where I finally got it: for some of us storytelling is a calling, not merely a job.

"The times when I got to uncover someone's story," said Kezia, "when I got to ask questions and discover something I would not have known had I not hunted for it, those are the things that moved me."

Watching the story being written on the shore stirred something in me. The calling. Yes, it's still there.

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Storytellers

It's an overused but true saying that a picture is worth a thousand words. Every TV writer's heard a million times, "Write to video." 

I know when I truly got what that means.

I'd written a lead story about an illegal, multistate puppy mill ring. Our news director tore up my script. 

"See these images?" he said, cuing up shots of sad puppies whimpering behind chain link fencing. "Start here. Then go into this sound bite."

He showed me how to turn a good story into an extraordinary one; not being exploitive but using the full impact of the visual medium.  

He also gave me my first big breaks: the anchor desk, top story live shots (threatening to fire me if I screwed up), network stories.

He could be a tyrant, too. When a childhood friend's mom died, he told me not to come back if I left during a critical news time. I walked out, driving six hours in a blizzard to get to the funeral.

He called a few days later demanding to know why I wasn't at work. "You fired me," I said. "Show up," he said. It was his way of saying, "You're still on the team." 

That year we took the station to first in the ratings for the first time in 40 years.

He was fiercely competitive but taught me to use that drive to dig beyond surface facts. He denied me only one title: war correspondent. Despite the risk, I'd wanted to cover history from Iraq's frontlines.

Eventually I'd go to the frontlines of war zones of a different kind - inner cities, disaster zones, Haiti...

Storytellers.  We see the risk, but we also see the chance to tell history. See those images? Start there.

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