People Skills?

Does anyone know of a book or any advice that helps you work on your people skills related to photography or just business people skills in general, as this is an important part of shooting people and is an area I need help in. I need to learn to put peole I dont know or just met at ease in front of my camera.

This may sound stupid but it worked for me. I needed to be able to talk with people to put them at ease but was not a people person. I do not know where you are with your "people skills" so I hope this helps:

Start working on casual conversation with people (begin in normal social situations, and then work into opening conversations with strangers in public places).

Start by learning to ask a leading question based upon something you hear them say. e.g. "you said you are interested in photography, what kind of pictures do you like to take?" Then work on being interested and listening to the reply, rather than planning your next statement. There are other leading questions you can ask like "So you like taking pictures of your kids, what do you find most challenging about getting good pictures of them?"

If you have real difficulty talking to people as yourself, try what I did - Act. Create a public persona that you can slip into for those uncomfortable situations. I watched people who interacted with others like I wanted to, and then melded the traits I liked into my public personality. This helped me overcome self consciousness and worry about what others might think of me.

As you become more comfortable interacting with people in general, you will find that people are more comfortable with you.

Good luck with your quest – it is a valuable skill. Don’t worry too much about blunders, we all make them, keep trying and you will find methods that work for you!

-John

Thankyou I will try that, sounds like good advice.

I find that people relax and look good when you make them feel good. In front of a camera, most people become unsure of how they look and that makes them stiff and nervous.

That's why learning to pose people is not a hinderance, it's a great help. If you say, "Just pose naturally," heck they don't know what that is. They've never thought about it, and once you make them try to think about it, they stiffen up.

So you need to have observed human behavior closely enough to know what looks natural and good to the camera and put them into it. That does two things: It assures them that at least one of them (you, the expert) knows what he's doing, and that assurance allows them to relax and achieve a truly natural pose.

Second, if you're going to photograph people as portraits to please the subject, you have to learn to see what looks good about them and emphasize those features--that's your job. Then, when they look good, tell them they look good while you're shooting. Never give them the impression they're screwing up. This isn't baseless flattery--you should be complimenting them on the good aspects that you're focusing on.

If she has nice eyes, tell her she has nice eyes...don't mutter about her big nose, you're working around that without telling her. She'll then give you more out of those eyes. And if she ever gives you an especially nice expression or pose, be sure to whoop it up: "Whoa, what you did right then was great! Do that again!"

You'll find in short order that when you know what looks good, make them look good, and tell them they look good, they'll give you what you want.

Look up Norman Vincent Peale. I had to study his writing and advice when I was a military instructor. It basically teaches you people skills in communicating. How to have people listen and pay attention to what you say. Social skills are needed as well.

Definitely a big part of getting good shots with people is getting them to relax and open up. When you're in a room with another person for the purpose of taking photos, you become photographer AND director, and if you there isn't energy or feeling in the shoot, there won't be any in the pictures. It definitely helps to be an outgoing person when you're trying to coax someone to show their own personality.

Always listen more than you talk. So much to learn by keeping ones mouth closed and listening to others.

dave

Thanks again for the advice you guys, time to practice putting the advice to work.

snyderman wrote in post #12068353
Always listen more than you talk. So much to learn by keeping ones mouth closed and listening to others.

dave

In most situations, that's great advice, but I don't think it applies here. When you're the photographer, the model/subject expects you to be in charge and know what you're doing. They're likely to stand there quietly unless you tell them what to do. If you say nothing, the whole shoot will be uncomfortable silence.

I'm no pro, but last time I shot people, I kept talking the whole time - mostly just small talk, banter, and mild jokes - SOMEthing to break the ice and keep it that way. One that worked well for me was, "If I keep telling bad jokes, will you keep pretending to think they're funny?" Be ready to hit the shutter, because you might get a genuine laugh out of something like this.

This is true. What you should do in the consultation session, right up until you start taking pictures, is lead the subject in a guided revelation of herself in order to find out how to later direct the photography session.

You can't just sit quietly and expect her to tell you all you need to know...you'll have to ask leading questions, sometimes as bluntly as "What's you favorite physical attribute?" or "What do you hate most about your appearance?" Then, indeed, listen to the answers she gives you.

In the photography session, the subject expects you to be the expert. You're supposed to know what looks good, and using what you learned about her and your technical and artistic expertise to emphasize the positive and de-emphasize the negative.

Being photographed is a discomforting situation for most people. When told to "pose naturally," they'll suddenly realize they don't know what that is...and wind up posing unnaturally.

As a photographer, you should have already been observant enough of human nature to know what "natural" looks like, and place the subject into that posture. If you haven't learned yet, there is instruction on posing on the Web...those are merely lessons that painters and photographers have learned over the centuries of how people naturally posture themselves, as well as how 3-dimension figures look when flattened to two dimensions.

Some great advice in this thread.

Obviously this depends on the setting and location you're shooting in but here's a bit of advice I picked up speaking to Gregory Heisler recently:
He will set up and frame his shot, and then set up his tripod and shoot with a cable release. All the technical things are dialed in at that point.
That way he can focus on the subject entirely and it's a lot easier to interact with your subject. Might not be for everybody, but I found it to be immensely helpful.

Lichtwerk wrote in post #12181150
Some great advice in this thread.

Obviously this depends on the setting and location you're shooting in but here's a bit of advice I picked up speaking to Gregory Heisler recently:
He will set up and frame his shot, and then set up his tripod and shoot with a cable release. All the technical things are dialed in at that point.
That way he can focus on the subject entirely and it's a lot easier to interact with your subject. Might not be for everybody, but I found it to be immensely helpful.

That's my common practice, although I use a radio remote release to gain more mobility. I will, for instance, move completely away from the camera, all the way to the side, and tell the subject "Look at me" in order to get a profile shot. I like the expressions I get when I have the subject always looking at me and directly engaged with me, so I move myself to where I want her gaze directed.