Pam Goldsmith is an emeritus winner of the ‘Most Valuable Player’ award from the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. Her viola playing has been heard on countless records, films, and television shows. 
[NIKON D4, 28.0-300.0 mm f/3.5-5.6, Mode = Aperture Priority, ISO 5600, 1/125, ƒ/4.5, (35mm = 28)]

“If you just focus on getting better, and not being the best, you have such a good time.”

James Acaster

The other day I was reminded I am working with many people at the top of the field, and when I work with those starting, I have to be patient. This post is about how to become a better you by reflecting on how I got to where I am today.

I have been so blessed to know some of the world’s best in a few fields. One of those is my sister-in-law Pam Goldsmith. I have written about her before.

She plays in the studio musicians group that plays for many of the movies, TV, records, and other places you would be surprised about. She sits in the first chair most of the time. When the studio musicians show up to play the music for a movie that has never been played, they don’t practice it–they play it for the first time, and 95% of the time, that was the last time they played it for the final recorded version you see in the movie. The 5% of the time, they do it again, it wasn’t due to their execution, but the composer realized during the recording that they made a mistake, and after a rewrite, they re-recorded it.

It takes a long time to get to that point of expertise from just learning to play the instrument.

In 1984 during my Spring Break, I was hired by Robert Reed at the Hickory Daily Record and would start working after graduating that May. While driving from Delaware to Hickory, North Carolina, I stopped by the International Mission Board to meet Don Rutledge.

My uncle, Knolan Benfield, had worked with Don for more than nine years when they were on staff for the North American Mission Board in Atlanta, Georgia.

In the 1950s, Don was shooting stories for all the top magazines. He would go on to work with and help lift the quality of photography done by the mission magazines to compete with LIFE, Look, and National Geographic Magazine.

Pam Goldsmith grew up in California near all the great musicians and became one due to being surrounded by great viola players. In some ways, I was growing up in an environment of great photographers and storytellers.

I remember my uncle Knolan Benfield talking to me about getting to the top. You go and talk to the people at the top. He told me about many of the experiences where he noticed famous photographers at conferences standing by themselves because people feared them. He just walked up and talked to them and got to know them.

Today I know that very few at the very top of the profession can help others. These are the ones that can teach and not just do. Don Rutledge happened to be one of those few.

While Don taught me a lot about composition, body language, and learning to see the light, Knolan taught me how to create using lights.

In 1993 I started to work at Georgia Tech. Georgia Tech has been named one of the most prestigious schools in the world. My role there was storytelling on research, education, athletics, and alumni for distribution through campus publications and outside media. I worked there until 2002, and during this time, I perfected lighting.

In 2008 Greg Thompson, Director of Corporate Communications for Chick-fil-A, asked me to come and help him build his team. Chick-fil-A is the third largest American fast food restaurant chain and the largest whose specialty is chicken sandwiches.

Greg was building an incredible team. He recruited Ken Willis, who had run the largest PR agencies in Atlanta. He had just sold one of them and started a new agency KWI.

Greg was scooping up talent from Coke and Porter Novelli and recruiting some of the best students to start their careers with Chick-fil-A.

Again I was surrounded by some of the best in the storytelling profession.

In 2018 Mark Johnson, Senior Lecturer, Journalism at Grady College of Journalism & Mass Communication for the University of Georgia, asked me to come and teach for the year Intro to Photojournalism to four different classes while they looked for a full-time professor with a Ph.D.

I quickly learned that I had worked my entire career with people at the top of their game. Everyone I worked with was always doing whatever it took to tell the story in the most effective way possible.

Many of these students were not desiring to be visual storytellers. Many took journalism as an undergrad degree before going to another profession like law.

In 2006 I got a call from Dennis Fahringer asking me to come to Kona, Hawaii, to teach his students lighting. He initially requested Joanna Pinneo, photographer for National Geographic Magazine, who told him to contact me. Joanna and I both worked with Don Rutledge.

Dennis’ students in YWAM had a passion for God. Most taking the class explored if photography was one of the ways they could serve the church or learn how to work their faith into running a photography business.

Again I was asked to dial back from shooting at the highest level in my profession to talking to newbies about literally “Step One” in photography.

I am often hiring photographers to help me with projects at Chick-fil-A. Two that I love to hire over and over are Michael Schwarz and Robin Rayne.

I have hired so many through the years, but only a few consistently meet the customer’s demands. When I hire either of them to do work, I know that I am sending to the customer storytellers who are not just as good as me but better than me. This is how I see them.

Be the best version of yourself!

• Show Up! – It is incredible how many people don’t show up
• Start With Baby Steps – you can’t skip the line. You have to start at the beginning
• Stop Looking For Shortcut – “Luck Is What Happens When Preparation Meets Opportunity” While it may look like a shortcut, it is often years of working hard, and you get a lucky break. If you are not prepared, then you may have just lost your one chance.
• Accept Help From Others – Most of those at the top didn’t get along. Don’t be prideful; take the help.
• Celebrate Small Accomplishments – Realize that learning at the level you are at at the moment is just as important as the finish line. Break down the “Big Goals” into bite-size pieces.
• Help Others – Pay it forward. Don’t be about taking. Be known for giving.

“Become the BEST VERSION of Yourself!” | Oprah Winfrey (@Oprah) | Top 10 Rules

Harpist plays for the VIP Reception at Marriott Marquis in Atlanta during the Islamic Speakers Bureau’s “Celebrating Women of Influence ISB Gala.”
[NIKON D5, 14.0-24.0 mm f/2.8, Mode = Aperture Priority, ISO 4000, 1/200, ƒ/3.2, (35mm = 14)]

On October 12th, I was covering the Islamic Speakers Bureau’s “Celebrating Women of Influence ISB Gala” at the Marriott Marquis in downtown Atlanta, Georgia.

If you ever have to cover an event like this, I recommend a few things.

Two or More Cameras

Anytime you shoot professionally, you need a backup camera. This is in case one stops working for any reason at all. I tend to put the Nikon 28-300mm on one camera and the Nikon 14-24mm on the other.

I can get everything I need with this range of glass.

For this event, I had a third camera on a tripod with the Sigma 120-300mm & 2X converter so that I could shoot more straight into people’s faces from across the room rather than everything shooting up at them when I was closer.

I had to be down front sometimes and shoot up at the speakers on the podium, as you see here.

After introducing a speaker to an award winner, I snapped a photo of them with some of the board members.

As I mentioned in my last blog post, I went on stage before the event started and did a custom white balance with my Nikon Cameras. On the Nikon Z6 & Nikon D5, you can store up to 6 different presets. This way, you can do a custom white balance for the stage and then go to another room with a different setting and set it on an additional Preset.

Have a Flash

Now with the stage having two sets of lights at 45º to the location, it was even lighting. However, walking around in the Atrium of the Marriott Marquis, the light needed help with flash.

Laura Espeut, the second shooter, got this photo of me with the Nikon Z6 with a 28-300mm and the Godox V860ii on the camera and the MagMod Magshpere on the hot-shoe.

Save your Back

To carry two cameras, I use the HoldFast Gear Money Maker Two-Camera Harness with Silver Hardware (English Bridle, Chestnut)

Quality Photography Demands A Digital Workflow

The bottom line is you need a workflow. You prepare days ahead, from talking with the client to managing expectations to getting a shot list. You then must prepare before the event by charging batteries and checking the sensor of each camera for dust.

I recommend you create a workflow list of things you need to do for every photo shoot. Be sure that the order you do things is in the correct order. Please print it out and even laminate that list and keep it with you in your camera bag.

In my last blog post, I showed you some of the white balance when done without a custom white balance and then doing one.

I hope you are hearing from me today that if the quality isn’t up to the standards you want to represent what you can do for clients, the answer is most likely in your workflow. It is something you skipped or modified from what is the ideal way to shoot the assignment.

While I try to be consistent and do a custom white balance all the time, I confess I sometimes get sloppy and choose to try and fix it in Lightroom.

Here is a photo I shot with my Nikon Z6 shooting with Auto White Balance.

When the camera is seeing this scene it is factoring in the projection screen behind the speaker which was a different color temperature than the speaker.

I realized all the photos on the stage were off, so I selected all of them and did a color balance based on my calibrated monitor. Here is the result.

I had used the eye dropper on a microphone. Well, it is close but not perfect.

Then the next day I got there early and asked the lighting guy to turn the lights on so I could go on the stage and get a custom white balance using the ExpoDisc. Here is another blog post on using the ExpoDisc.

This is shot with the custom white balance. Big difference in nailing the skin tone.

Moral of the Story: Get A Custom White Balance

I recommend using the ExpoDisc. You can use it to help you 1) White Balance, 2) Set Exposure & 3) Dust Mapping. Here are the instructions for doing all this if you didn’t already know how.

[Cristina Baccay Holdsworth, Eleanor Baccay Reece, & Blair D. Sullivan]

Back when I was on staff at Georgia Tech [1993 – 2001] Facebook had not been created and the iPhone didn’t exist. I was still shooting film.

While Match.com was founded in 1995 students were still doing silly things at Georgia Tech to get dates in 2001.

I was shooting with ISO 100 most of the time. This meant I was lighting almost everything inside.

The cool thing is we did have PhotoShop. It was released February 19, 1990. This let me scan all the images we were making and put Metadata with each photo. So most of the photos we would put some caption information on each photo.

So often when we go back to photos the biggest problem is having some context around the photo.

This week I stumbled over a folder of images that I created when I left Georgia Tech to start freelancing in April 2002.

Seeing the family photos during this time of starting my new season as a full-time freelancer has put into perspective how long I have now been freelancing full-time.

Today it is easier than ever to just take a moment when you are in Lightroom, PhotoShop or Bridge to add just a few words about the photo that will help give context.

Without some captions generations in the future will not know any of the significance or who people are in the photos that you have been taking.

Don’t Rely on Social Media to Store Your Photos

My Samsung Galaxy S10 takes the wide shots at 3456 x 4608 pixels. When I upload this to Facebook it will cut that size to 1500 x 2000 pixels. This is basically cutting the quality in half.

For social media that is fine, but if later you want a large wall print now you are limited greatly to the size you can print.

There are many online services that you can use with your phone to store all your images at high resolution. Google Photos, Amazon Photos and many others can do a great job of storing images for you.

Adding Text with Google Photos

The process of adding a custom description to a single photo is the same whether you’re on the Google Photos app or website:

1. Tap or click in to view a single photo, then select the information button (a small “i” icon) to view more details on the photo.
2. You’ll see things like the capture date, file name, camera model and location — select “Add a description” to add more to it.
3. There doesn’t seem to be a character limit (or if there is one it’s quite large), so go ahead and add in any extra information you think is relevant to the photo. Maybe a little back story, what’s going on in the picture or perhaps some other bit of information that can’t be picked up from the plain EXIF data of the photo.

The extra details should help if you’re searching for pictures in the future on Google Photos, but at least right now you’ll have those details synced up to that photo for your own benefit when you view it manually. Go forth and add all of the extra info your pictures deserve!

I came across a folder of images from when I was on staff at Georgia Tech. Just take a look at some of these memories. Can you find pictures on your computer from years ago?

In the past 20 years, technology has improved. Here is a scan I did 18 years ago:

Then today using the latest Adobe PhotoShop software I was able to get this with just minor editing:

The Raw Camera Filter has some cool features.

The best feature for scans is the Dehaze slider.

When you slide it to the right, you get less haze, which comes from a backlight that scans the film transparency.

The other feature is all the tools at the top of the Camera Raw. I use the Detail tool [two triangles] to adjust for noise and sharpening.

By the way, the Develop Module of Lightroom is the same as the Camera RAW filter of PhotoShop.

Hope this tip helps you if you have old transparency photos that you scanned and look washed out.

Here some photos I fixed just today

In 1996 I photographed Dr. Sam Shelton, the guy who designed the Olympic Torch.

Then in 2002, Dr. Sam Shelton designed the Winter Olympic Torch. These are some of the photos from then that were used to promote Georgia Tech’s involvement in the Olympics.

While the cameras are better today, with enough light, the past cameras also did a great job.

I have been going through old photos from 17 years ago during my last staff job before going full-time freelance in 2002.

I worked at Georgia Tech as their only staff photographer, which I have done since 1993. I took lots of photos of Buzz, the mascot during those years.

Tech Square was just being built.

I was always in the research labs capturing the latest technology.

Sometimes those researchers were working on the coast of Georgia.

Georgia Tech beat The Citadel back then. This year they lost to them.

I was often capturing lasers and the researchers working on projects.

Be sure you store your images on hard drives. I recommend using SSD and having your pictures in 3 places. 

Today’s digital camera makes travel photography more accessible than ever.

You’ll need several memory cards if you plan to take many pictures, or you can carry a small Memory Card Back-up Device to store and view your digital images. These are available in various hard drive capacities and are equipped with screens for viewing your pictures. You can keep your photos on your laptop and free up your digital cards for more photographs. 

A single zoom lens such as an 18mm – 200 mm may be all you need to carry. Traveling light makes your trip more accessible and enjoyable and has some hidden advantages. I love shooting with my Nikon 28-300mm.

It is easier to make natural photos when people don’t perceive you as a professional photographer. They relax and are more themselves. Whipping out a considerable lens or lugging a large camera bag around can intimidate your subjects. Another advantage to traveling light – you want to attract as many thieves. 

Buy a good guidebook about the places you plan to visit. National Geographic publishes excellent travel guides that help you plan your trip and your photography. We used their book for our trip to Hawaii. 

Guidebooks tell you about incredible places, and many describe the best time of day to photograph specific locations. Guidebooks are a must-have. They’ll keep you from being in the wrong place at the wrong time with the bad light for great photos. 

Check out the postcards. They can save you time finding the best angle. Looking at the postcards and perhaps asking the locals where they were made puts you on the trail to the most scenic locations for great photos. Once you find that general area look around, and you can probably improve on the postcard picture. 

Make the best photograph possible when you find the perfect spot, then do the obligatory “in-front-of” shot. You know, the one that shows that you and yours were there, but be careful. There are a couple of things to watch out for. Place the family so that where you are is (1) the only place that photo could have been made. Place the people to one side, perhaps up close, so that (2) the folks are recognizable and be sure the “scenic attraction” is also identifiable in the photo. If you covered it up, you could have stayed home and taken the picture in the backyard. 

Overshooting ensures excellent photos. Give yourself room to edit when you’re back home. If you seldom write, you probably wouldn’t use the first sentence you thought of to start a paper. In writing, we usually put down as many thoughts as we can and then edit. From all the thoughts and ideas jotted down, we find the ones that work best. 

Do the same in photography. Take lots and lots of photos. It gets the creative juices flowing. Besides, it’s fun. Try different angles: close-up, wide angle, zooming in. Shoot at low angles, climb up high and look for new ways of seeing the subject. Back up and take the long, establishing shot. Turn around and see what’s behind you; it could be just as exciting as what is in front. 

Use your camera to journal your trip. Photograph the food you eat, where you stay, and the people you meet. Some of these “notes” may appear in large print on your wall. 

With digital, you can shoot a thousand rolls of film and fit it into a memory card. Talk about traveling light… and cheap -no film cost. 

I’ve never heard anyone say they took too many photos on their trip. I have listened to the sad stories of many people who left the camera in the room and missed golden opportunities. 

A person’s expression can make the photograph or break it.

Everyone recognizes and is affected by people’s expressions of being happy, sleepy, cheerful, silly… you get the idea.

Understanding how our feelings we translated into expressions helps you understand and capture these moments. 

You need to learn to look at people’s expressions and immediately be able to know how this makes you feel.  Your reactions to others’ expressions help you understand the power of what they are communicating to the world through their expressions.  One of the benefits of this exercise is realizing each of us is expressing how we feel to the world through our expressions.

Once you have taken the time to realize what an expression communicates, you can then ask what causes this expression.  The answer to this question will help one to anticipate.  What caused them to smile?  This cause and effect help you know when you recognize those events that get reactions—you need only point the camera in the right direction and zoom in for a successful photograph.

When people open their birthday presents, those who bought the gifts will often know if this was on the person’s wish list.  Watching my daughter open her presents on her birthday and Christmas was easy to anticipate the expressions of joy.

Alfred Eisenstaedt, known to millions worldwide through his work for LIFE Magazine, made a famous photograph of children’s reactions to a puppet show.  Today professional photographers point their cameras as much to the reactions as the actions for storytelling expressions.

Where are some of the best places to start making great expression-driven photos?  I think special events with some obvious timeline scheduled events are the best places to start—opening the presents we have already mentioned.  Another would be an audience reaction to a speaker. 

Some funniest expressions are when people forget they are the center of attention—like a children’s performance.  Parents can capture great photos of their children during performances.  But to capture the expressions, you have to be close.

A good rule of thumb for ensuring an expression is seen to remember can you tell time by the size of the person’s face.  There is a convenient reason we do not have wristwatches hanging on walls to tell time and just a good reason we don’t wear wall clocks on our wrists.  When you look at a wristwatch on your hand, it is very close to your face.  It is almost the same size as the clock face on the wall across the room when you hold your hand up with the clock on the wall in the background.

So, if you want people to see the expressions get close.  Great expressions only work if they have the “WOW” factor, which is achieved by the expression being large enough for people to see.

Hawker – a person who travels around selling goods, typically advertising them by shouting.

Fixer – A fixer is someone who carries out assignments for someone else or is good at solving problems for others. The term has different meanings in different contexts. In British usage, the time is neutral, meaning “the sort of person who solves problems and gets things done.” 

I have always been a fixer. I am a fixer. I like problems, and I like puzzles, and I like to help people, so I have been a fixer, and I have always been an educator.

Tabatha Coffey

I feel like Tabatha says what I believe about myself so reasonably. Just the other day, a college student came and stayed with us. He had an event to go to the next day in our town.

While we were sitting around, he pulled out his Macbook Pro and a separate keyboard and mouse. I asked why he was using the keyboard.

His trackpad and keyboard were no longer working. He was a poor student; before he left our house, I had the trackpad and mouse working again. It was my mission to solve his problem.

Become a fixer, not just a fixture.

Anthony J. D’Angelo

Sometimes you need to be a Hawker because you cannot find anything to fix for others. Hawking is then a matter of telling people the skills you have to fix things they have forgotten to mention.

The problem is if you see yourself as a Hawker, you cannot become the Fixer. You are too busy, Hawking.

Spend a lot of time talking to customers face to face. You’d be amazed how many companies don’t listen to their customers.

Ross Perot

I would change that quote to “Spend a lot of time asking questions and listening to customers face to face.”

Your questions should not be “do you have photography needs,” but what keeps you up at night? What are the most significant problems your customers are struggling with today? How is that different than a few years ago?

Get to know their business, not just look for how they can use your business. Sometimes the best way to build a client is to refer them to someone else for something you don’t do, but someone you know does well. They will remember you.

While there are times you may need to be a Hawker, spend most of your time trying to be a Fixer.

I have written several posts in the past talking about business practices to make it.

Today I want to address what I have noticed is the difference between those who are successful and those who fail.

What kind of a Dreamer are you?

There are typically two types of photographers—some dream about having the experience of enjoying the perks of being a photographer.

I know many people are fascinated by who I have met as a photographer.

Many people want the experience of seeing the world. Whatever they dream about is more about the experience of being a photographer that occupies their dreams.

The other type of photographer dreams as well. They are thinking about their clients and prospects. They are thinking of how their photography can help them.

I often find myself thinking through assignments and what I will need to help take the end product up a notch. I am thinking about questions I need to ask to understand the expectations of clients and prospects better.

If you dream about how fun it would be to have a career, then don’t pursue this as a career; keep it as a hobby.

However, if you are thinking of how to problem solve for people to use your skills to improve their lives–you might make it.

[NIKON Z 6, 35.0 mm f/1.4, Mode = Aperture Priority, ISO 100, 1/160, ƒ/1.4, (35mm = 35)]

Creating a portfolio should be about showing what you can do so that others can decide to hire you. The decisions on what should go into your portfolio should be to persuade people that your work style will help them promote their business.

With my portfolio, I like to show my skills to educated buyers. Most of the time, I am hired by people who are used to hiring photographers and therefore are looking for competency and warmth.

I like to show my ability to create using light and not just capturing the natural light.

My good friend Tony Messano, an art director, coached me to show a different skill with each photo. Once you have established you can do something, don’t just show the same talent over and over.

One of the skills I like to show is my ability to get the moment. Sports photos show this, but everyday life that seems to be moving slowly is just as fast as a sports game. This is true when looking for that “slice of life” to grab people’s attention and move their hearts, as you need to do with nonprofits.

Some clients want to know that I can “Create a Moment” as much as capture it.

While the ability to get the norm is required, bringing the unexpected is what can separate you from others.

My tips for a portfolio

• Your Best Technically Executed Photos
• Photos that evoke emotions and engage the viewer
• Show your technical versatility
• Each image shows something different
• Show you can work with a subject
• Show who has already used you
• Show what you love to shoot – Your Passion [that people will pay you to shoot]

I like to show clients I know how to capture lasers which are invisible to the eye most of the time.

Photography is about transporting people to a moment in time that they would also like to be a part of.

You are busy but not Happy

Sometimes you have done an excellent job promoting yourself, but you forget to pursue your passion. This is why you should do personal projects that help define what you are most passionate about. While you may still need to do some of the work you are good at to pay the bills, you must also have projects on your calendar that you look forward to.

I love shooting the work missionaries are doing around the world. I love meeting people from all walks of life.

Check out how I have presented my work on my website under “Portfolio” http://stanleyleary.com/.

I have been reflecting on the work I am doing, what I used to do and what I think I will be doing in the years ahead.

If I had the same skills ten years ago today, I wouldn’t be a photographer now. In 2002 I bought my first digital camera, the Nikon D100. I was able to make the digital switch relatively easily.

In 2002 most of my work was shooting still images. I was shooting a great deal for colleges and publications covering sports. I was covering the games, shooting portraits, and helping shoot the team photos used for promotions. Many of these photos were used in the media guides for promoting ticket sales, and some of the pictures even made it to the sides of buses.

Today, there is mainly hobbyist who trade out giving the photos for free to those organizations for the opportunity to be on the sidelines. Some of their work is quite good. However, I could no longer get the clients to pay me when they got the photos for free.

In the fall of 2005, I did coverage in West Africa. When I returned, I worked on my first Slide Show using the software SoundSlides. They now have a newer version that no longer uses flash. I haven’t tried it, but this may be a good solution for those just wanting to combine still images with a sound file.

While I just put the images to African Music I had recorded, it was a turning point for me. Now I am shooting video and combining it with still images and audio to create multimedia packages. Now I am using Final Cut Pro X or Adobe Premiere Pro CC.

Most of my work today is as an executive producer who shoots, edits, and then gives this to clients to post on the web. Many of these packages are 2 to 3 minutes in length. I did one on my daughter’s mission trip to Chattanooga this summer.

Many of the packages I have done are for “Best Practices” of people in a company to share internally. The stories have helped spread good ideas.

Looking into the future has been very difficult to speculate. If cameras continue to change as they have these past ten years, I can expect to upgrade a camera every two years.

My computer will need to be replaced every three years to keep up with the software and the camera files. My first computer’s hard drive was 20 MB. That would not even hold one of the photos I shoot on my Nikon D5 or Nikon Z6 today.

I will most likely still be telling stories in ten years, but how I tell them will change in some way. I will still use visuals and audio to communicate, but who knows. Maybe we will be able to capture the smell and play it for audiences in the future.

If the past indicates the future, I know I must stay informed of changes. I need to read all I can to keep current. I need to be involved in professional organizations. Most of all, I will need to remain curious and ask myself “What if” questions.

Don’t be like many of my friends who didn’t like to change and are out of work today.