In many industries; although it seems particularly rife in the photographic one; training courses seem to be everyone’s new business plan, the average ‘course’ costs up to £600 per person; oh but places are limited! Up to 15 perhaps? Some are even generous enough to offer a sandwich or two!

I won’t patronise your obvious intelligence (based on the fact you are here!) so I’ll let you do the maths on that. There are of course a few nominal expenses to pay out, for models etc. Couple of hundred should cover the days expenses.

Until recently this ‘phenomenon’ seemed to be limited to wedding photography, and to a degree I find that at least partially acceptable, after all it’s better for a new wedding photographer to have a small idea about what they should be doing rather than ruin someone’s ‘special day’ completely, I still have some reservations about it but I’ll get to that….

On a recent Google I found all the usual suspects and not surprisingly a few dozen more ‘newbie’s’ and then I started noticing that some of the new pretenders had the Gaul to be offering ‘training’. At first I found this hysterical, then I became rather distressed, firstly I’ve never heard of these people and secondly the work on display was less than accomplished boudoir. Delving deeper into this just makes me wonder what exactly is on offer, similar to the wedding training situation, models are used as the subject; which admittedly is about the only way this could be done; but in REAL life these two parts of the photographic industry are dealing with ordinary people, not models. Models know; or at least should know; how to stand, how to look, how to smile………. you get the picture, they also get paid to do the job so you don’t even have to be nice to them!

Clients are not models ;they are everyday people; and especially in boudoir they are in an unusual situation, there is no training that can help with this, you need to be a people person, and with that you either are or you are not. You could be the greatest lighting guru in the world and have a team of retouchers in a darkened room, but if you cannot deal with a real live client then the rest of it is wasted.

The short of it is that we cannot teach something that cannot be taught, and what everyone else is offering should not be taught.

The case I’m going to deal with today is a little more worrying than the cut price weekend warrior norm, the photographer was, allegedly, a full time pro, charging a fair price for the privilege.

Without boring you with the finer points the clients were unhappy that a large number of the day’s activities were lost in translation, that is, the small number of so called images captured were badly composed, badly focused, incorrectly exposed and displayed all the flair of a supermarket budget brand box, and that was the moments the photographer actually remembered to take pictures of.

There are several options for clients who find themselves in this situation, the most common, bizarrely, seems to be, ignore it and show off your images to all and sundry, letting them know ‘you’ think they are fantastic, and hope that no one notices the truth! Secondly, argue, sue, and bad mouth the photographer into giving you some kind of recompense – good luck. Third have a look at your insurance policy and discover stupid photographers are not covered by way of clause 89.g on page 478. And finally the forth option which involves the most work, but, you may well get the images at the end of it…….. re-arrange ‘the day’ yes I’m aware this is in essence impossible, but hear me out, since this is precisely what happened with our recent ‘rescue me’ clients Suzzie and Richard.

After a great deal of pleading with the wedding venue (Comlongon Castle), the kilt shop and a florist, ‘the day’ was re-scheduled, All of the important people re attended (the bride and groom) and a new photographer was commissioned (that’d be us) to get ‘the’ shots, we of course had ample time booked to recreate the day (an hour and a half!) and were only cut short by the early arrival of bridezilla for her late afternoon wedding at the same venue (much to the dismay of the excellent staff )

Some images of ‘the day’ are below

Naked Tog: Wheres the venue?

Client: Cape Town.

Naked Tog:

Client: Hello….

Naked Tog: Cape Town? you mean South Africa Cape Town.

Client: Yes.

Naked Tog:

Client: Is that O.K. ?

Naked Tog: I may have to charge some nominal expenses.

Client: No problem.

Well O.K. that conversation was a little while ago, and The Naked Tog is now back from the Cape, fully refreshed from a total of 28 hours in the air and 10 hours in airports, nice. Whirlwind tour it may have been, but i would recommend the place for anyone looking for a holiday (or a wedding ). The weather was very good without being too hot (35 degrees on the wedding day) for someone who prefers a more moderate climate! The locals are among the friendliest i have met and the food, as well as being cheap, was excellent. I will post an odd image of the wedding, but; as with my Boudoir policy; not until the clients have seen and approved them. Below are some general quick snaps for now, the view up from the city bowl hotel (and diamond merchant). My Sunday morning breakfast guest (preying mantis), and one of the Blackpool-esque beaches.