Jeffery Salter speaks to ASMP Atlanta/SE. Jeffery an editorial and advertising photographer from Miami. Jeffery has created insightful portraits of celebrities, athletes, and CEOs for publications worldwide, and his work has been exhibited widely. [Fuji X-E3, 18-55mm, ISO 25600, Ä/4, 1/35]

How do some photographers get so successful? I think this is one of the reasons many came to see Jeffery Salter.

Capture Integration sponsored the event. Jeffery is one of their clients using their Phase One backs.

It didn’t take long, and someone in the audience asked, “How did you get hired to be on staff with Sports Illustrated?”

Jeffery said while working on newspaper staffs like The Miami Herald; he would look for opportunities to shoot medium format. While most staff photographers would continue to hit all assignments on 35mm SLR film cameras, he was shooting on a Hasselblad or Mamiya 6×7.

He shared how he was shooting for where he wanted to work, not for where he was shooting. He worked hard to have a style that stood out. His photos are surreal and often need much more space to be appreciated than in a newspaper.

He got an assignment to shoot some athletes in their homes from Sports Illustrated. They liked his style and work and, after so many tasks, brought him on staff not to shoot sports action but to shoot the behind-the-scenes of the lives of famous athletes.

A little while into the presentation, Jeffery showed his work in Haiti. He shot it all in medium format with Phase One back. “Why are you shooting with medium format? Who is your client?” was asked.

The person asking the question knew that the magazines cannot show a difference between today’s DSLR and Medium format. Jeffery then said he often doesn’t pick the camera for the client but himself. He wants to be able to have his photos later displayed in the Museum of Modern Art as large as they can be displayed.

He is shooting for the next venue and client.

A couple of tips which are not new but Jeffery also subscribes:

• Do self assignments
• Learn how light works in nature [he shoots a lot of nature]
• Build a photo one morning at a time [use strobes to enhance natural light]
• Shoot on the very best camera for the situation
• Use the histogram to be sure you have it in the camera.

Now one last thing Jeffery shared that I do, but it was good to hear as he often shoots tethered and can open images in PhotoShop or Lightroom and put the curser on highlights and shadows to see the numbers that the computer sees.

Now on the grayscale, you go from 0% to 100% with the amount of light in a scene. The computer records this as 0 to 255.

Jeffery likes his blacks to be around 35 and his highlights around 235. He gets the photo in the camera as he always has from his film days shooting transparencies.

Jeffery also answered some business questions as well. To have experiences like this, I recommend joining ASMP and coming to our meetings. You will be inspired and hopefully become a more successful photographer from what you learn.