A few days ago I shared a sneak peek preview from THE London Jasmine Star Workshop! You already know that I admire Jasmine .. I wouldn’t have gone on her workshop if I didn’t like her, or her work or her business. I’ve already gushed and blubbed, now it’s showtime for what happened on the day and the night before!

Note: This is a LOOOOOOONG blog post!

THE NIGHT BEFORE

So before the workshop nearly all the attendees went out for drinks along with Kat from Rock N Roll Bride, Jasmine & JD. We had all been part of a private facebook group leading up to the event so that we could become familiar with each other before the workshop. I’m so glad we did. I was really nervous about spending a large sum of money on this workshop and yet just two weeks after reserving my spot, the facebook group started up and I began reaping the rewards! I had new friends and because of those friends from the group I also bagged 3 of the 4 weddings I have currently been the second shooter of todate. Not bad going.

So .. there we were, all trussed and gussied up (even the men) for a night out at Sanctum Hotel in Soho, talk about swanky! Free cocktails all round and the night was off. I was fortunate in that I had already met 5 of the 20 workshoppers and tried to put websites, logos, facebook friend details to faces. It was a great night and me n Carrie were nervous that the minute Jasmine & JD turned up the group would all go silent .. how horrible would that have been, the ‘lets all stare at jasmine moment’ .. eek. Fortunately she breezed in and immediately was welcomed, no visible awkwardness and the night continued.

THE DAY OF THE WORKSHOP!!

Got up early, said “morning” to my room-mate Ria (fantastic girl), and got ready for the day. I had my first breakfast at the hotel and then we trekked a whole 45 seconds from our Melia House Hotel to One Marylebone .. perfect! We walk in .. waited for the doors to open and in we go. I bagged a front seat slightly left of center and promptly realised I didn’t have a notebook to write in, but I did have my iPad thank goodness. This was not a problem though because JD handed out a series of J* workshop packages which included a pen, note book and personally hand written welcome & thank you note! We all spoke our little welcome greatings of who we are, what we do, how long we’ve been shooting and where we are based in the UK. Turns out we are all quite widely spread apart, a few all the way over in Cornwall and Bristol area .. wow.

We break and dash for second breakfast and tea! Yes, like all good creative people and hobbits, second breakfast is a must!

Then it was time to get to the nitty gritty and we learned the 8 Components of Branding from Jasmine. I won’t go into details on this as you should pay good money to learn from the pros about their systems and what it all entails! Suffice it to say though .. branding is all about YOU. No one else can tell you about you, so if you want a brand that reflects yourself to share with others as service & signature brand photographer, you better hurry up and figure out what exactly it is you like and don’t like!

I learned a heck of a lot during this section and I thought I knew about branding .. and I do, but there’s so much more in scale than just a logo or a website .. there is a whole system and more about branding. This was what I needed to know and far more besides. I loved that Jasmine gave a preface to this workshop saying (paraphrasing here) “that if you walk away from this workshop without your questions answered, that is no ones fault but your own. I am here today to give a no holds barred access to ask any questions you like about running a professional business” and that is exactly what she gave us.

Amazing.

Then came the fun and challenging part. We had to shoot the entire day in aperture priority manual mode, this is to push us to get exposures perfect as this will help us speed up and streamline our editing time & process. Get it right in the ‘can’ first and then later you don’t have to spend hours correcting a mistake made by the camera when it chooses its light levels during spot or evaluative metering.

THE STORY – Rachel & Dan

This lovely couple had recently gotten married 3 or 4 months earlier in the year. When Kat (Rock n Roll Bride) was organising this entire event (for free so that she could meet Jasmine in person!) she had sent out a call for couples who would like to have their photos taken in a mock wedding shoot. Rachel & Dan raised their hands and became our couple of the day. They are not professional models, but a boy & a girl in love who would like some better photos! Well with 20 photographers and an international wedding photographer on top .. I think we can deliver!

So Jasmine led the group through a few poses and shows how she works. We could yell out the word ‘settings’ and she would call out her camera ISO, Aperture & Shutter Speed so that we could follow along. Bless her for being organised enough so that we could do this!

Then she called out for volunteers to lead the couple into poses of our choice and direct them. I learned it’s incredibly important to speak to couples all the time that you are shooting. This is something I struggle with .. sometimes I’m great at talking all the time and other times I’m running out of words. I need to shove a thesaurus in my brain to give me more synonyms please! Also can you imagine Rachel & Dan suddenly being faced with a wall of photographers! I’d go blanche white if I had to pose like this :S

Part of the days branding exercise was to come up with three words that define your core business values. These can be feelings, verbs or anything that elicites a visual style. For me I am partial to these: quiet moments, passion and clarity. Life is so busy and hectic that to celebrate life, I feel we need to celebrate the quiet moments in between the harried times. We live with passion and clarity. If you don’t know what makes you happy .. how can you decide to be happy and achieve it? Anyway, I digress. While the couple were faced with this small mob, I decided to focus on a little feature I noticed: playing with each others fingers. How much they love each other and their tactile way of showing it.

We moved on and round and through different poses and at one point I was right behind Jasmine and I got one of my favourite styles of images. Where people are framed by something and I’ve always loved seeing through the space next to the crook of an elbow.

A few more shots indoors and then it was time to try a tougher light. Because honestly .. it’s easy shooting beautiful photos when the lighting is as glorious as this in One Marylebone! We needed a challenge .. so outside it was, into the little courtyard.

While all this was happening I was getting more and more nervous because I was wanting to direct a posed shot too but HOW?! I gave myself the challenge of ‘quiet moments’ for my brand and those usually just happen :S .. *pant, pant, mini hyperventilate and feels faint* I asked JD for help and he reassured me to remember, think of the end pose you want and then of a way to get them into that pose. If necessary ask them to do so a few times doing something slightly different on the each time. Remain calm, something always happens, that little slice of magic when the girl meets her boys eyes and smiles.

So I screwed up my courage, took a deep breath and approached Jasmine as we started to walk inside and I said, “I’d like a go please .. inside where I can set up the chair I’d like to use”. Jasmine must have seen nerves and fear in my eyes because she said “sure!” and stroked my back up and down a couple of times as I started to walk past her. Thank you Jasmine, that little moment of tactile reassurance meant a lot.

So we all went in and good thing too, the light was starting to fade on the ‘shoot’ side of the building.

So here it was, after waiting for a couple of people to finish their little ‘director’ moments I got a chance at mine. Thank goodness I spoke up when I did because I was the last one of the day and if I hadn’t  .. I would have missed out on this:

I asked Dan to walk up to Rachel and stroke her shoulder, then quietly asked Rachel to reach up for Dans’ hand when he did. Then I moved to my spot and said ‘go’ and that little moment of magic happened. A little moment of tenderness that I always love to see, even if it was no more than 20 seconds long .. it worked. *happy sigh*

Then we corraled back into the ‘workshop’ section and watched a few photos being post processed by Jasmine. This was also very informative .. it just confirmed for me that my post processing skills are solid well learned & earned skills. Nothing she did was different from what I already do .. the only difference was in the levels of what she chooses to do for light, colours and composition. BUT .. this is where we all are such individuals, for as many eyes as were in that room shooting in the same location, with the same models and same light .. we all saw things differently and colour the world with our perceptions.

While Jasmine does look a little stern in this photo, she was smiling almost 80% of the time, even when talking at super lighting speeds. One of my fellow workshoppers just happened to be asking a really detailed question at this point that I took the photo, stern face = pure concentration .. don’t ask me what the question was, I didn’t hear it very well and even if I did, I couldn’t remember to tell you anyway! So, the workshop is done and I had the last question: are we doing a group photo?! Heck YES WE ARE!! Things were packed a way and we lined up in a scruffy line to have photos with Jasmine & JD and then we had our group photo, thanks JD!

Part of the lessons I learned in this workshop is just how great life can be with a partner who works with you and that it is possible. I love how in love J & JD are :)

We all leave a happy bunch and celebrate a successful day with a dinner and wind down at the Villandry restaurant on Great Portland Street. Delicious food, great conversation and a chilled out evening. Bliss all round.

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These were the organisers, vendors and suppliers of this fantastic workshop.

Venue: One Marylebone – Alicia Barren (Private Events Manager)
Flowers: Pollen Nation
Cakes: Restoration Cake (mini cakes) and Janet Mohapi-Banks (large ‘rose’ cake)
Furniture (chairs/tables/screen/sofas): Great Hire
Caterers: The Recipe
Hair: Severin Hubert of The Hepburn Collection
Make Up: Elbie Van Eeden
Behind the Scenes Video: Richard Wakefield of FX Films
Organiser/General Dogsbody: Kat Williams of Rock n Roll Bride
Models / Bride & Groom: Rachel & Dan

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To finish, these were my compatriots for the workshop .. it has been a pleasure to get to know all of you and to second shoot with a few as well!
elizabeth, venetia, carrie, jessica, caroline, emma, jaz, leo, mark, delia, peter, denise, ria, crissi, lucy g, sam, lucy d, caro, tony

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So even if I didn’t get to meet Jasmine a year and a bit ago at New Zealand, I DID get to meet her a couple of days ago in London. It’s amazing that if you wish hard enough and say it out loud, maybe, just maybe .. it’ll come true, like mine did.

Here’s to the future of all our dreams, businesses and lives.
Cheers me dears.