What I Learned At The Portrait Masters Shootout 2021
This October I had the amazing pleasure of being a mentor at The Portrait Masters Shootout event in Phoenix, Arizona. This shootout saw 150 people over the course of 4 days, 26 different shooting bays for the attendees to learn, create, and be inspired, and amaaaaazing educators from all over the globe who were ready to teach, empower, and create! Originally I was coming to speak to people about how body image impacts our work as photographers, however, I didn’t just get to talk the talk, I also had to walk the walk - I ended up modeling for the 4 days so that the attendees would have larger diversity. As such, I learned a lot and that’s what I want to share with you today. Here are a few things I learned over the course of 5 days at The Portrait Masters Shootout:
My brain will try to convince me that I don’t belong somewhere that I’ve never been, so I need to make sure that I am intentionally telling myself otherwise
No matter how much work one does on their mindset, old beliefs and safety mechanisms will pop up - this includes the thoughts that rise to the surface when discomfort is experienced in the body. Of course, the brain is just trying to protect us from harm - so I like to treat myself with compassion when these thoughts come up. Prior to leaving for Phoenix, I made sure to journal and essentially do lines that said “If I didn’t deserve to be here, I wouldn’t be here” and “My only job is to show up” and “I worked hard to be here”. By the time I arrived the first day for set up, I knew I was about to meet a bunch of new people and that gets the ol’ anxiety up a bit - this anxiety will usually trigger the feelings of imposter syndrome, lack of worthiness, etc. but I was prepared with a new soundtrack so when my brain would try to convince me otherwise, I was able to talk back with my rehearsed script and thus, I felt confident upon entering the room and meeting everyone!
2. Purpose isn’t WHAT I do, it’s HOW I do it
As mentioned above, when I arrived I thought I’d spend more time teaching people about body image through the lens, but what I ended up doing was creating an experience that made people feel good. We danced, we laughed, we hyped each other up, we played, we removed the rules, we encouraged and challenged our attendees. My purpose isn’t what I do only when I hold my camera, it’s when I meet someone new and make eye contact, it’s when I use my body to show what is possible, it’s when I throw a sequin robe on someone or when I yell positive compliments at my model. My intentions with everything I was doing was to empower, educate, challenge, and encourage compassion. This experience reminded me that it can happen when I smile at someone, when I introduce someone, or when I put pantyhose on their lens and fuck up their shutter speeds.
3. There’s a lot of room for improvement in the photography industry
My experience with being an educator in the photography industry has mostly been in the boudoir sphere and I know for certain that there have been massive strides in the realm of body image there since I began teaching, but I forgot that a lot of this information still hasn’t infiltrated the portrait, wedding, or family industry and so I am realizing that my work isn’t done - it is only just beginning. I am pleased to have this opportunity and platform to be able to help photographers in different genres take a step back and look at how their body image may be impacting their client experiences and what can be done about it. This week was a great opportunity to show folks how different bodies can pose outside of “slimming” them down and still achieve glorious imagery. I am VERY excited to be in here and challenging those belief systems and inner biases!
4. MY BODY IS MAGICAL
If you would have asked me if I could dance for 6 hours a day for 4 days I would have laughed and told you to find someone else - but somehow, this glorious body of mine showed up and worked like nobody’s business. By day 2 I was super impressed of what I was capable of doing - how high I could jump, how much I could twirl, how pointed my toes could get and how much energy I could give out. I hadn’t felt this strong since I was in martial arts or in sports in school and it felt SO GOOD. My body was made to move and boy, did I move her. I made sure to thank her every day with some CBD cream provided by my buddy Jen Swedhin (the best momager a woman could ask for), some self massage, and rest.
5. You don’t need the fancy stuff to make people feel fabulous
When I first walked in to the model room and saw the fabulous garments, professional models with their professional hair & makeup I began to second guess the items that I brought AND I began to doubt my bare face & frizzy hair. However, I quickly snapped myself out of the comparison game and reminded myself why I was there: TO EMPOWER THE FOLKS WHO CAME TO MY BAY! I rolled up with my $40 Shein dress and handmade robes (affectionately called “shitty but photographable”), bare face, and messy bun and focused on the folks in front of me. While in my heart I know that stuff isn’t important, however, the brain does a wonderful trick of trying to make us think that that is what will help us be more accepted - this experience provided me more evidence to counteract this false belief. People fell in love with US - not our stuff and in real life, people fall in love with US - not our stuff.
This week was amazingly wonderful and I met so many incredibly, talented, beautiful humans who are changing lives with their photography! I am pleased to have been part of their journey and I cannot wait to see what comes next. Stay tuned for a few sessions I crammed in while I was in Phoenix!
