2017 High School Seniors are approaching graduation, so for the next two months I'll be featuring senior sessions on my blog. My senior branded website can be found at http://www.astoriaseniorphotography.com
Ron, a great senior at Astoria High School, picked Young’s River Falls as the location for his senior photos. We had a great time working around the awesome falls, moss-covered rocks and trees to create a variety of images.
As the end of the school year quickly approaches, I’d like to wish Ron the best of luck on his senior year and his future ahead.
Chris here, just letting you know today I have an awesome guest blog from Cari Knapp that she wrote for my senior website Astoria Senior Photography on makeup. I’m posting it here as well because it offers many great makeup tips to consider when getting photographed. Enjoy.
Hey friends! What is up? Today I have a super exciting post for you. I have teamed up with Chris Kryzanek of Astoria Senior Photography to show you guys how to achieve perfect makeup for professional photos! I have gathered up all of my tips I have learned so you too can have that flawless face in your photos!
For starters, let's acknowledge the elephant in the room: "I don't wear make up, why would I wear them for professional photos?
Harsh light - no makeup
This is why. Professional lighting is harsher. This lighting shows everything - things the naked eye can't see. As you can tell in these photos, one is without any makeup, with no editing of the photo vs no makeup with edited/retouched skin. The two bottom photos are the same, one with editing and one without. As you can tell in these photos makeup makes a HUGE difference. Now that that's cleared up, let's get into this post. Shall we? 😉
Harsh light - no makeup - un-retouched and retouched
Harsh light - makeup - un-retouched and retouched
Tip 1: Starts with skin care: It's kind of self explanatory, but for your makeup to look flawless, it starts with good skin. I recommend getting on a skin care regimen that you can stick with and be consistent with every day to avoid blemishes, dry skin and dull skin. Your makeup only looks as good as your skin, so take care of it. Trust me. (I learned this the hard way)
Tip 2: Use A Hydrating Mask the Night Before: When it comes to professional photography it's important that your skin is properly moisturized. I recommend using a hydrating mask the night before your shoot. Camera lighting shows everything the natural eye can't see so make sure your face doesn't look like the Sahara Desert. A hydrating mask will balance out the pigment in your skin, brighten it, and make it look healthy plump and hydrated. It will be your skin's best friend, trust me. Ladies who have oily skin, I know this might scare you, but I have oily skin and using a hydrating mask has actually balanced out the oil in my skin.
Tip 3: Use A Full Coverage Foundation. Ladies trust me when I say this. I don't care if you want the "natural look." Full coverage is the only way you will get that flawless face in your photos. Using a full coverage matte foundation will keep any oil on your face at bay, which is VERY important when using flash photography. Flash photography will show ANY shine on your face, which can kind of make you look like an oily mess. No one wants that.
Tip 4: Use Powder to Set Your Makeup. Now, full coverage foundation is only the first step. You want to make sure you use a TRANSLUCENT setting powder. preferably one without SPF to avoid looking ghostly with a lovely white film over your face that only shows up in flash photography.
Prom makeup mistake
A GREAT powder I recommend is Laura Mercier Translucent powder. Now this is a little expensive, so if you're in need of a good dupe, I've heard Revlon Photo Ready Powder is okay. *Hint Hint* Go to Sephora and ask for a sample of the Laura Mercier and save it till your photos. It's worth the splurge, but if you are only doing it for photos, just get a sample, it's the free way to go.
Tip 5: Don't Forget To Contour. Okay I know it seems like everything is a must (pshh it kind of is) but contouring will SERIOUSLY transform your face in photos. Remember, the camera adds 10 lbs and it will be very noticeable in the face. So, to make sure you don't look like humpty dumpty use a cool-tone taupe eye shadow or a contour shade to "enhance" your already beautiful bone structure. Than add bronzer to put some life and warmth back into your casper face 🙂 You don't want to look back on your pictures realizing your face looked like Mrs. potato head. Trust me, I learned this the hard way hah!
Tip 6: Use Matte Eyeshadows. Science lesson folks! Shimmer shadows or skin reflect light, while matte absorbs light. That being said, when you add shimmer to your eyes in flash photography, it's going to flash back at you, all you are going to see is shimmer, which, yes, is gorgeous for instagram photos. Professional photography is a different game than glorified selfies. You want to look like yourself, and the focus of the photo be you, not that beaming highlight or new glitter eye shadow you've been dying to try out.
Tip 7: Use Lip Scrub to Avoid Crusty Lips. This one is kind of a no brainer. Like we talked about earlier, flash photography will show everything - that includes your super-chapped crusty lips. You won't be able to hide it under all that chapstick; everyone will know, hah! I recommend using a nice sugar scrub. I use Lush Cosmetics lip scrub, and they are my absolute favorite. Another tip: the night before your photos, rub coconut oil all over your lips and sleep overnight like that allowing all that coconutty goodness to soak into your lips so when you wake up they are properly nourished and moisturized.
Tip 8: Matte Lipstick Will Be Your BFF. This goes along with the matte eye shadows; any shimmer will reflect the light and be the first thing people's eyes gravitate towards. Using a neutral matte lipstick will look beautiful but will also focus on all the other gorgeous details on your face. Side note* Matte lipsticks also show no mercy and will emphasize everything on your lips. That's why I made it a point to use a lip scrub.
Tip 9: Only Highlight High Points On Face. Now, personally I can't live without highlight. Its almost a problem. But there comes a time and place for THAT GLOW DOE or just a subtle shimmer that helps emphasize the certian features on your face (cheekbones, nose, cupid's bow, browbone, and above the brow). For photos I suggest leaning more towards the glow from within look. Now obviously if you're a highlighter whore, you can find a happy medium. I get it, the glow is life, just try to not blind your photographer. 😉
Tip 10: Invest In Makeup Setting Spray. Setting spray is seriously underestimated. It was just this last year I finally tried it out and it was a game changer. Setting spray helps all the products you put on your face melt into your skin, creating an armor to prevent the dreaded cake face and helps to make it bullet proof so it will stay put all day. I know from experience if I use setting spray my makeup is good to go all day, but when I forget to use it my face is melting off 4 hours into my day, and everyone knows how much of this crap I put on my face. Ha, it makes a difference. Well there you have it folks! My tips and tricks to achieve perfect make up for professional photos! I hope you all enjoyed this post and learned something new! As always I had a blast writing this post and I will see you in my next one! Let me know what your tips and tricks are for photos or if I forgot anything. I would love to hear what you guys have to say! Until next time, stay BeYOUTiful! muah!
2017 High School Seniors are approaching graduation, so for the next two months I'll be featuring senior sessions on my blog. My senior branded website can be found at http://www.astoriaseniorphotography.com
Becca, a 2017 senior at Astoria High School, had her photo session along the Riverwalk. This is a great location with a nice variety of interesting backgrounds, textures and the Megler Bridge. We moved at a nice pace and still had time to do some fun photos with my vintage chair by the bridge and water. Becca was great to work with and her mom was very proud of her daughter in her senior year. Congratulations and best wishes Becca on your future!
2017 High School Seniors are approaching graduation, so for the next two months I'll be featuring senior sessions on my blog. My senior branded website can be found at http://www.astoriaseniorphotography.com
Young's River Falls is an amazing location. Besides the waterfall, there are a lot of interesting rocks, moss and trees to work around that have amazing colors and texture (always a bonus for backgrounds). With it still being Winter, the waterfall was quite strong and made getting close very misty for Abi, who is a senior at Astoria High School. So, after creating some fun photos around the base of the falls, we moved back to drier conditions.
Abi, who plays on the AHS softball team, brought her glove and fierce game face as well as her fun attitude and great smile. We created a great variety of photos using different lighting and poses in her one-hour session, and had a comfortable pace which was is a benefit of using a compact location. Overall, Abi was great to work with. Congratulations on reaching your senior year.
2017 High School Seniors are approaching graduation, so for the next two months I'll be featuring senior sessions on my blog. My senior branded website can be found at http://www.astoriaseniorphotography.com
Morgan, a 2017 senior at Astoria High School, had a fun session at Shively Park. It was a cold morning, but that also lead to some creative photos with the low angle of the sun poking through the trees.
Shively Park has numerous awesome concrete stairs covered in moss and awesome texture from the weathering. Can't beat that for a seated photo.
Morgan was a blast to work with. She brought her great smile and some fierce looks as well. Can't beat that. Best wishes to Morgan on the rest of her senior year and so happy I could be a part of capturing it.
Lela Ann was born to proud parents Derek and Shelby, plus older brother Landon. The session took place at their home. A simple background was used to bring focus on the subjects and eliminate distractions. With studio lighting this makes it so that almost any space can work great.
For the session, Lela Ann was very restless, so patience was required. With newborns every session is unique and even if they are photographed during the ideal time-frame of 7-10 days, they don’t always cooperate. I always let parents know that this is okay and with patience it will all work out fine. There’s no reason to stress over anything else.
Landon was great with his sister. It’s always nice to include older siblings in newborn sessions.
Lela Ann did give in eventually, so things worked out great. Her parents were very pleased with the photos.
Your wedding day will probably be one of the most important days of your life. A way of thinking about the day that is helpful from a time perspective is as a production. Obviously, certain events occur in a certain order or have starting times defined. But taking a more detailed approach and laying out a timeline for the day can be essential. Not everyone has a wedding coordinator hired for the day, so often you take on this role. The timeline can help keep you accountable for making sure certain things are ready to go when they need to in order for other starting times to happen. Your wedding photographer will also be a part of the timeline creation.
Since you are most likely creating this timeline for the first time, how do you begin? Obviously certain details such as where you will be getting ready and where the locations of that is, and the ceremony location and the reception location are required. From a photography perspective you then need to think about are you being traditional or doing a first look? This will then dictate if family photos can happen before the ceremony or need to happen after. Also are creative bridal portraits of the couple being done and when and where? With this information you can then start to lay it all out and guesstimate how long each event will take. There are numerous wedding websites that can help you predict typical times.
Instead of leaving you hanging there, how about starting with a timeline template that you can fill in? Yes, nothing more than your name and email are required, so fill out the form and you can download a free wedding timeline pdf.
I’ve worked with the Goldstein family many times over the years. I’m always thrilled to photograph a family again and see the children growing up and the family dynamic changing. It’s truly a wonderful feeling knowing I am documenting their lives. In addition to those reasons, the Goldsteins are always a blast to photograph because they are always up for making a creative or funny photo.
We went to the Peter Iredale Shipwreck beach on a rather overcast day. The tide was in, so standing around the shipwreck was out. We moved to the seagrass which gave some nice color to contrast the dramatic sky. Here are a couple of my favorite photos from the session.
The Takalo family included a lot of family. With a large group, a two-hour session is helpful, even though we didn’t travel to multiple locations. The weather was very wet, so we worked around the outside spaces that were covered, and inside of an old fishing net warehouse. This was a good example of when studio lighting is required, given the interior of the warehouse was very dark with little natural light. The biggest challenge of the day was keeping light stands and tripod legs from getting tangled up in the abundant supply of fishing nets.
We created a variety of family groupings including the overall group, individual families and the cousins. I had a great time working with everyone. This session was also a good example of what you can do inside when the weather outside isn’t great.
Kara & Todd's family put on their baseball gear for this photo. Both sons are pitchers on the Knappa High School baseball team.
The Pierce family was a blast to photograph. We had our session around the old Astoria train station building and river walk. The weather turned out great with blue skies and no rain. That made it so much easier to put all of the focus on having fun and creating great family pictures.
This was a great location for a one-hour session. There wasn’t a lot of walking required, which was helpful for their children. I always believe that a goal of a session with younger children is to keep it fun and brief, so that the kids focus and energy doesn’t fade. When all goes to plan, it’s also much easier for the parents to relax and enjoy the session as well.
