Robert Watcher
Well-known member
It’s been a few years since I photographed a Love Story Session —- last was 2015 I believe. So it was a nice and kind of scary treat getting hired to photograph this couple a couple of months ago.
They are a wonderful couple, but working with mature 70 year olds created interesting challenges that I’m not used to when photographing young or younger couples as is mostly the case with my Love Story Sessions. Some of those are related to agility (on their part and mine from the last time I got down in the trenches) and the need for a lot of discrete retouching and liquifying on all pics in the final selection (44) - to maintain a youthful appearance, while maintaining a real look.
The couple selected the area that appealed to them, and I selected 5 or 6 spots that would provide variety to keep the final book layout interesting. We just drive to each spot and spent a few minutes getting the shots I had in my mind, then drive to the next spot. I used my charm and whit to catch them off guard and induce reactions I anticipatingly captured.
I have been getting all of my professional printing done at WHCC for the last few years, but have never tried their albums or books. And so this was the perfect opportunity. I first send off a few test images that would be going in the custom LayFlat book to make sure they came back the way I wanted. Then processed all of my images in on1Photo Raw, to the same appearance on my screen. The completed Layflat book came in a week and a half ago, where I got to see the result in person, take this video of Anne leafing through the pages, and then ship it to my clients in Florida. They received it today and were overjoyed with the result.
What I like about the WHCC Layflat book, is that it is printed on real photographic lustre paper. The result of the images was indeed very filmic (analog) looking. This book is 9”x12” so contains spreads that are 24” wide. My Olympus micro four thirds files held up very well. The pages are made by gluing 2 spreads back to back.
They are a wonderful couple, but working with mature 70 year olds created interesting challenges that I’m not used to when photographing young or younger couples as is mostly the case with my Love Story Sessions. Some of those are related to agility (on their part and mine from the last time I got down in the trenches) and the need for a lot of discrete retouching and liquifying on all pics in the final selection (44) - to maintain a youthful appearance, while maintaining a real look.
The couple selected the area that appealed to them, and I selected 5 or 6 spots that would provide variety to keep the final book layout interesting. We just drive to each spot and spent a few minutes getting the shots I had in my mind, then drive to the next spot. I used my charm and whit to catch them off guard and induce reactions I anticipatingly captured.
I have been getting all of my professional printing done at WHCC for the last few years, but have never tried their albums or books. And so this was the perfect opportunity. I first send off a few test images that would be going in the custom LayFlat book to make sure they came back the way I wanted. Then processed all of my images in on1Photo Raw, to the same appearance on my screen. The completed Layflat book came in a week and a half ago, where I got to see the result in person, take this video of Anne leafing through the pages, and then ship it to my clients in Florida. They received it today and were overjoyed with the result.
What I like about the WHCC Layflat book, is that it is printed on real photographic lustre paper. The result of the images was indeed very filmic (analog) looking. This book is 9”x12” so contains spreads that are 24” wide. My Olympus micro four thirds files held up very well. The pages are made by gluing 2 spreads back to back.
