Old Dogs and New

“You need to turn her a little more to the left.” I say in a stage whisper to my Trainee.

“Oh. Uh, rotate to the left a little more.” The Trainee says and watches the woman rotate her body.  “That’s good.”

“The angle’s good.” I say. “Take the exposure.”

Flash! The Trainee trips the camera suddenly and the surprised Subject yells. “I wasn’t ready!”

“Ok.” I say and try to keep from laughing. “Get an expression and then take the exposure.”

I’ve been a Trainer at several Companies and it’s usually an interesting experience.  Too many times it is a wasted experience as the Trainee suddenly realizes that they don’t really want to travel that much or that they don’t like kids after all or they discover that this just isn’t for them.  A lot of them are just too young.

Older people may still have dreams of winning the lotto or opening their own restaurant or running off to Spain with some beautiful young hottie-but for the most part, these are just dreams.  Young people still think it will really happen to them, it’s just a matter of time.  And maybe they are right.

I knew one Assembly Line Portrait Photographer who was a pretty young thing in her first year of college working with us for the summer.  She did a good enough job of knocking out the poses The Company required and she was good to talk to in the usual lulls in the action.  She was pretty and she wanted to be a model, not a photographer.

There were about five Photographers working at this Studio and we took turns taking Portfolio Shots of her.  This was at a High School Senior Studio and we had all the lights and props we could want.  Last time I heard from her she was modeling and seemed to be having the time of her life.

 

I was working with a Passer who had a Trainee.  The Trainee was a young man who didn’t really seem to get the whole business of selling portraits.  He was personable and seemed to like people, but he had a hard time Optimizing the Sale.  One of the hardest things for a Trainer is letting the Trainee do the job on their own-without jumping in and pushing them out of the way.  I had the same problem myself when I first started Training.  But you have to let them do the job if they are going to learn how to do it.

The Trainee Passer was on the Sales Table when a young couple came in to have their portraits taken.  The woman was a Playboy-model style beauty with her blouse open one button too many for a Church Directory, but that really isn’t my call.  Nestled in her cleavage was a flowing art glass pendant that was at least two inches wide and drew the eye quite effectively to her chest.  As if any extra incentive was needed.

I finished taking the portraits and handed the couple off to the Trainee Passer.  He sits the couple down with the woman sitting next to him-this is the standard practice as the woman is usually the one that makes the Portrait buying decisions.  After the Trainee loads the portraits into the computer he noticed the art glass pendant in the first image.

“That’s amazing!” He says as he leans into the woman’s bosom for a closer look.  The Trainer and I nearly fall over laughing, the woman doesn’t seem to notice the strange man in her cleavage.

 

I’m in Training and it has been a long day.  I am out of practice at family portraiture, I’ve been doing school pictures for a couple of years.  So I am a bit rusty at posing groups and noticing all the little details necessary for those technically perfect portraits.  A man comes in with a Bic Pen in his pocket, and I don’t catch it.

“You cost me a sale.” The Old Timer Passer says as she reads me the riot act. “It’s your job to notice things like that and correct them.”

A few sittings later another man comes in, he also has a couple of pens in his pocket.  But these are not Bic pens, these are Mont Blanc Pens that cost about $200 apiece.  The man is wearing a nice suit and has a very serious expression.  Before I can get him fully posed, my Trainer jumps forward and asks the man to take the pens out of his pocket.

“What?” The man says. “Do you know what kind of pens these are?  I brought these pens to be in my portrait and now you want me to remove them?”

The man glares at us as he takes the pens out of his coat pocket and clutches them in his fist.

“Uh, OK.” I say and adjust the camera. “Smile.”

“I can’t smile now.” The man bellows. “You’ve ruined it.”

After the man leaves, I turn to my Trainer.

“Thanks.” I say.

 

“What lighting ratio are you using?” The retirement age Trainee says as he takes notes on the placement and height of the lights.  “It can’t be more than 2:1.  I never use lighting that flat.”

“We’re following the diagram supplied by The Company.” I say. “I don’t know what the ratio is.”

“Well, what printing density are you getting?”

“How much fall off do you want?”

“Do you know that using an extension tube like this ruins the quality of the image?”

“Is that really the kind of posing you want me to use?”

“These light stands have seen better days.”

“You know, I’ve been taking portraits for almost thirty years.  I think I know a bit more about this than you do.”

After watching me take Assembly Line Portraits for a couple of days-and noting that I am ignoring all his sage advice-the Old Dog just doesn’t show up one day.  It is no great loss.

 

“This is some of my work.” The Trainee says as he hands me a small hardbound book with his name on the cover.  The book is about twenty pages thick, the cardboard of the covers is thicker than the contents.  I flip through this bit of self promotion looking for examples of his portraiture-there are none.  The slim volume is filled with landscapes.

“You do know that we take portraits here, right?” I say as I hand the book back to him.

“Yeah.” He says. “But I’m going to be doing my own work on the side.  My plan is to travel around the country and fill out my portfolio.  We’re a nationwide company, I can work for a couple of months in Seattle, a couple of months in Miami, and a couple of months in New York.  I can find things to photograph in the morning before I go to work.”

“Hmm.” I say.  “Let me know how that works out for you.”

Last time I heard, he was still working in our District-and not too far from his home.  But if there is a chance to work in Seattle for a couple of months, I might in interested in doing it myself.  The opportunity hasn’t arisen in the last five years or so.