Original subtitles

Okay, I'm going to share six cues with

you, six guiding principles that we use to

keep ourselves in that optimal headspace on a

wedding day.

And we owe so much of our luck

and so much of our performance to these

cues.

In fact, I think they're so important that

I actually have them written on the back

of my camera to reference on a wedding

day.

They're super important.

Okay, so first up, smile.

Okay, it's not a simple concept, but really,

really important on a wedding day.

Because if you look like this, it's pretty

much guaranteed that you're not in the moment.

And then good luck being in the moment

when your partner is looking back at you

like that.

It's because I haven't figured out how to

simplify yet.

Right?

Look at me there.

And that's actually, that's, that's just Erica's thinking

bitch.

Yeah, I'm working on my thinking bitch face.

But when I think I look like I'm

grumpy, but we'll often if we notice each

other's faces, not smiling on a wedding day,

I'll like go up to Lenny with my

iPhone and just sort of discreetly take a

picture of him.

And then I'll be like, this is what

you look like right now.

Not good.

Anyways, but we think our emotions control our

actions, but it's actually been scientifically proven that

the opposite is true.

Our actions control our emotions.

Another great book that we have included on

our book list is called Thinking Fast and

Slow.

And it talks about how these little gestures

or physical things that we do with our

bodies determine the emotions that we have.

It cites this one study where they have

students come in and hold a pencil between

their teeth like this for 30 seconds.

So it forces their mouth into a smile

and the students come out of the experiment

physiologically more happy than they entered the experiment.

So our actions control our emotions.

And when we get into our posing later

on in the course, you'll see that we

use that same philosophy of posing our couples.

You know, instead of saying, be romantic with

each other or be happy with each other,

we have to give them an actual action

to evoke the emotion that we're looking for.

And that's how we're going to get that

authentic emotion.

So next time you feel like the apocalypse

is coming down at a wedding, just smile.

It's going to make the scene a lot

easier for you and a lot easier for

the people around you as well.

Okay, so smile.

Next up, number two, if you want to

get lucky, you got to lose the ego.

Right, Lonnie?

Right.

Okay, so when I went to, when Erica

sent me to the foundation workshop, that was

at a point when I was really starting

to feel like my photography was lacking soul.

And one of the things I realized is

that my inner ego was hindering my photography

in so many ways, because I was always

so preoccupied with trying to find the next

most epic shot I could possibly make.

You know, the most dramatic image that I

could possibly come up with.

And so this wasn't leaving enough attention, enough

mental energy for the stuff that really matters.

It was taking me away from being actually

present there at the wedding.

So my photos weren't making me feel anything,

because I didn't have any reason to care.

Right?

I wasn't actually there.

I started to realize, and it's a continual

challenge for me, but that by focusing on

connection, like actually seeing my subjects.

Humans.

Right.

We've learned to not to refer to them

as subjects, right?

Because that dehumanizes them.

My humans, actually seeing them, rather than just

looking in their direction, right?

Actually listening to what's going on around me,

versus just hearing sounds.

That brings me into the psychological headspace I

need to be in order to bring the

kinds of photos that I'm looking for out

of myself.

And it is a real challenge for me.

I think I think because my previous career

as a firefighter required the opposite.

You know, at a house fire, at a

car crash, heart attack, I'd have to disassociate

myself from the people I was trying to

help.

So I could better respond to the emergency.

So I could sleep at night.

So at weddings, it's like a mental switch

that I have to consciously make to start

feeling again.

And when I do that, I stopped just

photographing subjects and scenes and start capturing moments

and humans.

Relationships.

That's right.

Yeah.

So, and Erica talked about how, you know,

we do really feel like on the surface,

weddings are these boring, scripted, predictable events.

But when we can see beneath that pageantry,

you know, when we can find interest in

the people and the story that's genuine, that

we genuinely find interest in, then we can

start finding those meaningful photos, which are hiding

beneath the pageantry.

Those meaningful representations of people, as opposed to

lifeless representations of ideas.

And we used to be really good at

creating lifeless representations of ideas.

And that stemmed from our interests in photography

and photo gear and cameras, lenses and flash

settings.

And that interest, that interest will only take

you so far in photography.

Right.

It'll only take you 10%.

Right.

It'll take you somewhere, but it won't take

you very far because once you get beyond

that, it's empty.

Right.

But having an actual interest in what you're

photographing, not necessarily the wedding, but the people

and the relationships and the glances and having

that curiosity, that interest is going to take

you so much further than an interest in

photography.

Yeah.

So when we're saying lose the ego, that's

essentially what we're saying is, is making it

about them and their story versus us and

our photography.

Yes.

So that's number one and two.

Number three, try and go into every wedding

you shoot with no expectations.

Okay.

And this one's really easy to put up

on a list here for you guys to

write down or absorb is actually really hard

to put into practice.

No expectations.

So no expectations about what kind of photos

you're going to get.

No expectations about what the light's going to

be like.

No expectations about how good the dance is

going to be or what kind of moments

are going to, if it's going to be

a moment rich environment or whether it's going

to be sad or happy or anything.

Right.

If you go into a wedding with expectations,

it's going to be impossible for you to

be in the moment because you're going to

be focused on how you think things should

be based on your expectations versus how things

actually are.

Right.

You're going to be trying to fit something,

the wedding into a box as opposed to

let the wedding be what it actually is.

This is actually one of the reasons why

Lani and I never pre-scout for our

weddings.

We used to, used to pre-scout for

our weddings all the time, but it led

to expectations.

You know, we'd pre-scout the portrait location.

We'd have it all storyboarded out.

And then inevitably we'd go there the next

day for portraits and it would be raining

and the light wouldn't be the same.

And, and so those, those pre-scouting missions

that we went on just led to these

expectations and, and inevitably it would end in

disappointment for us.

And instead of focusing on the opportunities that

existed before us, we're focused on what we

thought we were missing out.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I would say that we still, we still

scout for, you know, if we're traveling for

a destination wedding, we'll try to get there

and go get a lay of the land

and figure out, for example, if we only

have half an hour for portraits, where's the

best spot to go?

Exactly.

Should we go here?

Should we go there?

But we don't, we don't sort of like

pre-visualize the shots we're going to do

anymore.

Not anymore at all.

I would say the only expectations that we

do feel are healthy and bring with us

to weddings would be A, that it's going

to be a struggle.

Yeah.

Okay.

B, that we're going to, we're going to

work our asses off.

It's going to be hard and there's going

to be failures along the way.

Yeah.

Apart from that.

And that's a good expectation to have.

Yeah.

Apart from that, we try to be this,

this blank canvas.

So no preconceptions.

But that, that's actually a really good introduction

into number four, which is enjoy the struggle.

Okay.

Enjoy the struggle because if there's one expectation

you're going to have is that it's going

to be a struggle.

So I'm going to tell you guys about

three types of fun.

Okay.

So this is type one fun.

Type one fun is enjoyable while it's happening.

It's like a dance party.

It's like eating really good chocolate.

It's, it's fun while it's happening in the

moment, right?

It's when you're, you're, you know, you're on

the dance floor, you can feel the beat

in your bones and you just, someone's pouring

alcohol down your throat and you just can't

stop smiling.

Fun in the moment.

Fun for real right now.

Fun for real right now.

Yes.

Very few of the weddings we photograph fall

under this category of fun.

Okay.

There's some parts of some, some of our

favorite weddings.

Parts.

Yeah.

That might fall under this category of fun

where we're like, Oh my God, I love

my job.

But not very often.

Okay.

Type two fun is fun only in retrospect.

Okay.

So it's only fun after the fact.

I think the best way to describe it

is like a workout.

Let's say you're doing hill sprints up a

hill.

You're doing like 10 hill sprints up the

hill.

You know, in the middle of your 10th

hill sprint, you got lactic acid pooling in

your legs.

You're breathing heavy.

You can taste blood in the back of

your throat.

Life sucks.

You just can't wait for it to be

over.

But when you finish your workout and you

stretch out, stretch your muscles and you cool

down, you're like, you know, that was fun.

Let's do that again next week.

Right.

And so I would say a lot of

our, quite a few of our weddings probably

fall under this category of fun in the

actual moment.

You're like, this is, I can't wait for

this to be over.

But afterwards you're like, that was pretty fun.

Let's do it again next weekend.

Okay.

And then there's type three fun.

So type three fun is defined as not

fun, not even in retrospect.

Okay.

And I'm sorry for all the male viewers

out there, but the only thing I can

really think to compare it to is childbirth.

It's like suffer through it.

And the only satisfaction comes from it being

over.

You got through it in one piece and

you've got something to show for it.

Okay.

And I was, this sounds awful, but I

would say there's quite a few, or at

least parts of every wedding that will fall

under this category of fun for us.

But the very long winded point that I'm

trying to make here is that it doesn't

have to be fun.

Be fun.

Okay.

You don't have to, I feel like as

artists, we always feel like we have to

be loving our job and we have to

be passionate about our job.

You don't have to be loving every moment

of your job for it to be your

passion.

I feel like you might even be able

to compare it to marriage a little, right?

Like I love Lanny enough that I can

hate him, right?

I married him and no, there's no one

I feel more hatred towards than Lanny.

And that is not a lie.

I mean, I'm not feeling it for you

right now, but there's times where I'm like,

I'm seething hatred to Lanny, but that doesn't

mean I don't love him and I don't

want to be married to him.

Right.

It's like, I love him enough that I

can hate him.

Right.

So just realize that photography often has that

same sort of curve to it.

You got to love it enough that you

can give yourself permission to hate it sometimes

because you're human and allow yourself to be

human in that regard.

Okay.

I think I've done that part.

Enjoy the struggle, just like enjoying the struggle

in marriage.