Some great thoughts thus far..
"whenever you find yourself looking at an image for more than ten seconds trying to figure out whether it's a keeper or not — it's not."
"I think it's very different depending on what exactly do you do."
I am primarily a people photographer, and within that broad definition, I concentrate actor's headshots. It is a specialized subset of portraiture for some special reasons:
- A headshot is not discretionary. A performer must have one to get work
- In addition to bringing out the real person, I work to bring out the characters my clients want to become
- With any experience at all, a performer is not afraid of the camera
When I work, the technical side of image making goes on autopilot, and my main effort is in setting up different improvisations that the actor quickly relates to express the look of these characters. Clothing changes and lighting adjustments add to the mix.
So at the end of the sitting, and after eliminating the "blinkeys", "half eyes". deer-in-headlights, etc., we have about 100 images, all of which are technically OK, but we have to cull them down to four - which get the final finishing process.
When leaving my studio, the actor takes along a contact sheet with somewhere between 25 and 35 images after the first editing pass. In addition, I create a web-based slide show of these same images so they can get opinions from fellow professionals they might know in other cities.
(positive reinforcement from colleagues is a principal ingredient of the selection process)
Getting down to the contact sheet is the first hurdle.
Some time ago, while walking on the treadmill at my fitness center (not that I'm fit or anything) I noticed how young women on the machine next to me looked at entertainment/gossip and fashion magazines. You've all seen it. I marveled at the quickness of the wrist as they fliped through pages filled with images - even while jogging - while I had to hand on to the machine with both hands. I mean they went through 10 pages a minute! And then I'd notice that they would, just as quickly, turn back 3 or 4 pages because some image caught their fancy before the message got to the wrist to stop the forward page turning! Now these were all images by competent photographers, some in fashion magazines, that must have taken hours to do, and it only took milliseconds to either register and stop the page turning - or not.
So the axiom, repeated above, about rejecting an image that you look at for more than 10 seconds trying to decide on is very valid in my opinion - except that one second is more like it.
To get from those 100 reasonable images to the 25, I suggest to my client that there is an invisible line between us and the monitor - that we play the role of a casting agent and the character we see on the monitor is not them, but someone else! (being an actor makes this feasible - get them to mentally separate themselves)
Using PhotoMechanic, I display only 6 candidates on the monitor at a time and ask "which one do you see first? - "don't analyze it - go with your first impression - which one catches your eye in an instant?" I also instruct them that its perfectly OK if none of the 6 grab their attention - we'll just move to the next matrix, conversely, if they "see" two or three of the six, that's OK too.
Time after time - without consciously counting we end up with a 25% - 35% selection rate. And time after time, over several hundred performer/clients the ones selected are those where the eyes are expressive and open, and the person is "connecting through the camera". What does that look mean? Wow, look at that energy! That character look sinister - wonder what he's thinking?
The whole point here is, like the young woman flipping through images in a magazine, if we can get the casting agent to stop, even momentarily, and pull that headshot out of the big pile and place it into the little pile, I've done my job. The resume and subsequent audition is up to the client - and many of mine are cast - often based on that one second look.
As mentioned, I also strongly encourage the client to get (reinforcing) input from their agent and other respected professionals before down-selecting to the final four. Sure, exposure and color correction, cropping, retouching, and all that stuff is an important part of the finishing process, but the real critical part is that initial selection - or edit.
This is the realm of the psychologist, and deserves further study.
Anyway, I've rambled on too long.
You are invited to take a peek at my website.. The portfolios are under "Headshots"
http://www.johnmaiophotography.com