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Archive 2017 · What would you say your style is?

  
 
Nathan Padgett
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · What would you say your style is?


style
stīl/Submit
noun
1.
a manner of doing something.
"different styles of management"
synonyms: manner, way, technique, method, methodology, approach, system, mode, form, modus operandi; More
2.
a distinctive appearance, typically determined by the principles according to which something is designed.
"the pillars are no exception to the general style"




It's a question that drives me crazy. I always struggle to give a good answer. I feel like couples want you to spew out buzzwords once they ask it. Shouldn't our photos be worth a thousand words in these cases? If they've seen your photos, it should be up to them to define your style. But let's say they have never seen one of my photos....what then? I often tell couples my style is versatile and depends on the mood and situation. But it just doesn't come off as a "sexy" answer.

So I'm wondering how some of you guys answer this one. I'm asking you... what's your photography style?



Jan 19, 2017 at 07:04 PM
azmerm
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · What would you say your style is?


I realize that I'm not the most creative photographer. But my wife calls me a relationship artist. So that's my style!


Jan 19, 2017 at 07:47 PM
Depth of Feel
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · What would you say your style is?


Its a stupid question. If you need words to sell the work then the work isnt strong enough. Its song and dance. Thats what I tell couples but I substitute a different word for stupid.




Jan 19, 2017 at 08:47 PM
nolaguy
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · What would you say your style is?


Depth of Feel wrote:
Its a stupid question. If you need words to sell the work then the work isnt strong enough. Its song and dance. Thats what I tell couples but I substitute a different word for stupid.


Point taken, but it's not necessarily about selling. Often people don't know how to articulate what they're drawn to. They are sometimes simply trying to better understand what they like and don't have the training or vocabulary to describe, define, internalize it.

If we can't describe it, maybe we don't either.

Words sort of exist for the purposes of understanding, communication and repeatability.



Jan 19, 2017 at 09:51 PM
Depth of Feel
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p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · What would you say your style is?


If they are sitting front of you asking the question they hopefully like the work well enough that you can steer them to a more productive thought process and close a sale. If not then they are probably price shopping.

I frankly seed the idea to couples that a photographer's quality of work is inversely proportional to how much they talk about their style.



Jan 19, 2017 at 09:59 PM
trashschollie
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p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · What would you say your style is?


Reduced, clear, not overloaded.
No landscapes with a hidden couple. ;-)



Jan 21, 2017 at 09:57 AM
heikoM
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p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · What would you say your style is?


no necessarily for a wedding client, but for myself.
Just making this up right now:

"Unstaged reportage where moments and emotions are most important, this in an artistic style and mostly in b&w."


Yeah, that feels good to me.


heiko



Jan 21, 2017 at 02:12 PM
mitch91175
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p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · What would you say your style is?


Just be yourself and show your emotional attachment to your photography and try to see what the client likes and then tell them that is your style, lol. A lot of your style really comes down to your editing if you ask me. Specially for weddings, you won't have a ton of time to compose the shots like you would in a studio, so your editing style will likely be your style (just my $0.02).


Jan 22, 2017 at 03:58 PM
glort
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p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · What would you say your style is?


Nathan Padgett wrote:
So I'm wondering how some of you guys answer this one. I'm asking you... what's your photography style?


Interesting.

I don't ever remember being asked!

I tell people what it is which is I don't have a specific style. I try to tailor the pictures to what the clients want and use a whole mix from very traditional to more modern. The many years of experience I have allows me to create pretty much any look they are wanting and a range thereof.

It IS important to be able to articulate and answer the question though but it seems this is not what it seems on face value.

I wonder why you are being asked?
I can understand if it's when you are in a social or other situation where they find out what you do and can't see your pics but if it's when they are looking at pics and sitting in front of you during an interview or in an email from your site, I'd have to wonder what is on their mind to cause them to ask a seemingly obvious and apparent question?

The thing that makes sales easy is people are sheeple and tend to all ask the same questions. Just as in this case, you can then think them through beforehand and instead of dreading the question, you are hoping they ask because you know you can notch up more brownie points with your killer answer.

In this case however I'd be trying to get more to the root of why they are asking in the first place.
That could be for the short term your very Answer is: " Why do you ask?"
After you get a few replys and work out why they want to know, you are going to be in a lot better place to PRE EMPT the question all together and answer it before they ask which is brownie points with a heap of credits thrown in.

I'm thinking that perhaps the question isn't what it seems.
People ring and always ask me " How much do you charge" even when they may already know. The reason they ask has far less to do with price than the fact they can't think of any other way to start the conversation. What else are they going to say? They generally won't start with "are you free on XX date?" because it's a commitment question if you say yes.

Perhaps they are not asking what your style is, they somehow just don't know what else to ask?
Maybe it's something some bridal BS rag has put in an article telling them they have to ask this in order to find a good shooter. They have so many pages of editorial they have to fill in order to pad the ads out a bit they will often print or publish any old crap at all to fill the white space and keep their editor happy.

Rather than rush to find the golden nugget answer ( unless others are getting the same thing and can tell you why) I'd be tending to try and fully understand the question first.
I suspect it is not what it seems and if that is the case, trying to answer it on face value may even be shooting yourself in the foot.

I'd be using the old sales technique of " Put the shoe on the other foot" and turning it back to them"
" Whats your style?"
What style are you looking for? OR....... Why do you ask? ( is there something confusing you in what you are seeing?)

Make sure you are understanding the REAL question before you try to answer it, preferably BEFORE they ask.



Jan 25, 2017 at 08:47 AM
Nathan Padgett
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p.1 #10 · p.1 #10 · What would you say your style is?


glort wrote:
Interesting.

I don't ever remember being asked!

I tell people what it is which is I don't have a specific style. I try to tailor the pictures to what the clients want and use a whole mix from very traditional to more modern. The many years of experience I have allows me to create pretty much any look they are wanting and a range thereof.

It IS important to be able to articulate and answer the question though but it seems this is not what it seems on face value.

I wonder why you are being asked?
I can understand if
...Show more


Great great stuff Glort. You really nailed it on several points. Gives me a lot to think about.


I often try to give an answer similar to yours, such as my style is variable and often depends on the couple or the "feel" of their wedding. I just don't know if that's what a lot of couple want to hear. It's not as sexy to some brides as saying your a "artistic, natural light photographer, with an emphasis on emotion". I almost bet if just started saying stuff like that, I'd book a few extra weddings. Lol.

Love your thoughts on the "golden nugget answer" which I was struggling with. I love the idea of asking them, "what style are you looking for" or "why do you ask?" I've always found, if I let the couples do most of the talking, they will talk themselves into booking.









Jan 25, 2017 at 11:21 AM
Nathan Padgett
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p.1 #11 · p.1 #11 · What would you say your style is?


mitch91175 wrote:
Just be yourself and show your emotional attachment to your photography and try to see what the client likes and then tell them that is your style, lol. A lot of your style really comes down to your editing if you ask me. Specially for weddings, you won't have a ton of time to compose the shots like you would in a studio, so your editing style will likely be your style (just my $0.02).


You know, that's kind of why I put the definition of style in the first post. I think people can mean different things by it. Glort said above it's important to understand the real question. I rarely know what they are referring to when the ask about style... is it a certain editing look, is it shooting technique, how we interact with couples, how we dress? Kind of silly, but it's kind of vague.



Jan 25, 2017 at 11:26 AM
LeeSimms
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p.1 #12 · p.1 #12 · What would you say your style is?


For some customers, the tab for wedding photographer is a lot of money and they like definitions like style to ease the sting of spending that kind of dough. How cool does it sound for a bride to tell friends/family "we hired a wedding photojournalist"? Sounds like its worth more money than a wedding photographer. Style branding helps financial investment justification.

If you've never bothered to verbally frame your style, past and potential customers will do it for you when you talk to them. They'll tell you why they like your work.

Booking two high-end destination wedding this week had telling comments during the meetings. One bride, "all of your photos have a sense of moment, like it's a movie." Another couple drawn all the big scene/little people images on my site remarked, "we've looked at a lot of mountain wedding photos and in most of them you have no idea where the couple is — you can't make out features in the background because it's all blurry. Everything is sharp and clear in yours" After two conversations, I've got two distinct ways of telling people of defining my style.

Of course, this is precluded on actually showing a style which is where many emerging photographers get it wrong - they're all over the map. You have to focus when picking portfolio images — the more you focus and limit what you show, the more of a style potential clients will sense. Art divides the room, and not everyone will like the style you're showing but at least your presentation will be distinctive.



Jan 25, 2017 at 11:46 AM
flash
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p.1 #13 · p.1 #13 · What would you say your style is?


"Top Ten Questions You NEED To Ask Your Wedding Photographer...."

That's why they ask. Same reasons the the couple who ask what camera you use or whether they get the raw files. Like Glort said. They don't know how to start the conversation. They're not photographers. Most aren't artists.

But there's another reason. Maybe you're afraid they won't like the answer.

"What if I answer wrong? What if I lose a client because my style isn't what they wanted? What if I'm an inarticulate shit and I sound stupid or like I don't know what I'm doing?"

But I think you should have an answer. Don't you guys/gals know what it is that you're trying to capture when you shoot a wedding? And no, the answer isn't photos of people at a wedding.

I do have an answer to that question. "We're happiness photographers. We specialise in capturing you celebrating the best day of your lives. We love taking photos of you and your guests laughing, crying, dancing, celebrating, kissing and holding hands for no good reason. We take photos for your wall at home not a magazine. We'll capture having a wonderful day surrounded by the people who you care about most in the world. We process our photos simply so they don't look stupid in a decade."

That's our style because it's what we're good at. It's what couple after couple has commented to us about why they loved their pictures.

Gordon



Jan 25, 2017 at 03:53 PM
canerino
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p.1 #14 · p.1 #14 · What would you say your style is?


One way that I went about determining how others would define my style was to pick certain adjectives that I wanted people to think of when they saw my images. That's how I selected my portfolio. Then I asked others (here on FM, friends, former brides) for "impressions" by asking them to define my work with three adjectives. If their adjectives matched mine, I was on the right track.

I often see a disconnect between what photographers think their style is and what their images actually are. An example of this would be when a photographer says that they are photojournalists but then strongly feature posed portraits in their portfolio.



Jan 25, 2017 at 04:46 PM
rw11
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p.1 #15 · p.1 #15 · What would you say your style is?


point & shoot ??

be there and f/8 ??

Grope f/64 ??



Jan 25, 2017 at 05:04 PM
zalmyb
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p.1 #16 · p.1 #16 · What would you say your style is?


"Shoot it as I see it, nothing fancy, no frills, straight shooter. I'm there to document moments, not create them. No forced replays or anything of the sort..." something like that.

Though I've only once had someone ask me to describe my photography, and it was my photography she was asking about, not my style (ie the outcome, not the attitude that gets there, which is what I assume most mean by style).



Jan 25, 2017 at 05:41 PM





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