rp_photo wrote:
As a naive and geeky engineer, I am often tempted to share technical information on shoots in gory detail.

I have learned to restrain myself for two reasons: Possibly giving away "secrets" or boring my audience to tears.

Ha!  If you don't overdo it, nobody will be bored.  As for sharing secrets... scared someone will come along and out-do you with your own setup?  Really though, why keep it to yourself?  Anyone savvy enough to pull off your tricks could probably look at your photos and figure a way to replicate the looks, even if a different setup is used.  If you think sharing your techniques will diminish the money in your pocket and the food on your table, then don't share. 

On the other hand, perhaps being open about them and daring others to outdo you using them may make you a better shooter...

rp_photo wrote:
Possibly giving away "secrets"

This is the most ludicrous thing I've heard (and I hear it many times on these boards - not a slam against you).

I work mostly in film and video and there are NO secrets.  Anybody, no matter how big, will gladly tell anyone else, no matter how small, how they did something.  Technical matters are simply a way to achieve a vision.  Whether you tell me how to do something or someone else does or I learn it through trial and error, eventually I or anyone else will be able to learn the technical aspects.  It is the vision which is of value, not the means by which you achieve it.

Paramour Productions wrote:

This is the most ludicrous thing I've heard (and I hear it many times on these boards - not a slam against you).

I work mostly in film and video and there are NO secrets.  Anybody, no matter how big, will gladly tell anyone else, no matter how small, how they did something.  Technical matters are simply a way to achieve a vision.  Whether you tell me how to do something or someone else does or I learn it through trial and error, eventually I or anyone else will be able to learn the technical aspects.  It is the vision which is of value, not the means by which you achieve it.

I agree about technical "secrets". I am not sophisticated enough to have done anything that could not be figured out. Just me, a D50, SB600, diffuser, and two lenses.

What is worthy of secrecy are locations that set you apart others. I have worked hard to find and proof locations and make connections with others that own or control them. Giving away such a place too easily might cause someone to go there with misguided intentions and ruin it for everyone else or make it too popular.

rp_photo wrote:
As a naive and geeky engineer, I am often tempted to share technical information on shoots in gory detail.

If I could get half the people in my department to feel the same way as you, and actually document the network and all our business processes in gory detail, I'd get more rest and the Senior Managers would stop being nitpicky...ohhh,,,wait up.

If everything was properly documented, we might not have our normal chaos and crisis situations, which would mean, we'd be working so efficiently that a good part of our days will have no work to do at all, which would mean Senior Managers would most likely be bored out of their skulls and the next thing you know, they'll start nitpicking our haircuts and send us to technical colleges to fix our penmanship.

YIKES!!!

Nevermind. Don't share. Good thing! 

"It would be curious then, if an idea, the fugitive fermentation of an individual brain, could, of natural right, be claimed in exclusive and stable property. If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation."

This isn't a contest, it's a community, so I see no reason to not share my "secrets" (such as they are with my relative inexperience). Now, if I were constantly bumping into local competitors, I might be a little more reserved, but that's fortunately not the case here (I'm from a small city).

rp_photo wrote:
As a naive and geeky engineer, I am often tempted to share technical information on shoots in gory detail.

I have learned to restrain myself for two reasons: Possibly giving away "secrets" or boring my audience to tears.

I share technical info.  I've certainly learned a lot from other people, so I view sharing as a good thing.

David (6of7) wrote:
If I am asked for details about a shoot I will offer the information.
Even if they know exactly what I did it doesn't matter since our talent is different and we would not take the same pictures.
On decriptions of images I try to not mention anything so as to not influence one's initial feelings.

- I agree with what you say.

Merle wrote:
Sharing is great, but you cant alway's get the horse to drink, and then he'll get beaten to death here...

I totally agree.  I think there should be a sticky at the top of this forum that asks people to use the search function first before asking a question, like the Site-Related Forum.

Shall we just go ahead and create one and ask the Mod to sticky it?

lll wrote:
Shall we just go ahead and create one and ask the Mod to sticky it?

Mods can't make things sticky.  With certain exceptions.  https://modelmayhem.com/posts.php?thread_id=42169

Brian Diaz wrote:
I'm amazed by the stark contrast between opinions expressed here and those in this thread: https://modelmayhem.com/posts.php?thread_id=40018

Those who have little of value had better overcharge for what they have or they'd starve, metaphorically speaking. (Shaking head...)

Brian Diaz wrote:
Mods can't make things sticky.  With certain exceptions.  https://modelmayhem.com/posts.php?thread_id=42169

I think that was pathetic, to be honest.

Sean Armenta wrote:
i don't think we're really helping people by saying, set the camera to this, put the light here, press the button.  or open file in PS, apply this filter with these settings, done.  the person doesn't know the why's, which is really the most important part of knowledge, is it not?

Agreed.  That's another reason why I am so against those "recipe" books (for lighting, PS and what not).  It doesn't help anyone improve their craft; it turns them into one-trick-pony (or limited multi-trick pony).  What's the difference between that and Walmart training their portrait studio button-pushers?

rp_photo wrote:
am often tempted to share technical information on shoots in gory detail (...) have learned to restrain myself for two reasons: Possibly giving away "secrets" or boring my audience to tears.

Richard, have enjoyed watching your work be born & start to develop ...

... but as for any perceived exchange of "secrets", no I disagree. Other photographers can have my tech info, throw in the locations too, even let 'em shoot with my equipment, all day long but they'll never have my vision.

Best always,
FML

lll wrote:
Agreed.  That's another reason why I am so against those "recipe" books (for lighting, PS and what not).  It doesn't help anyone improve their craft; it turns them into one-trick-pony (or limited multi-trick pony).  What's the difference between that and Walmart training their portrait studio button-pushers?

Recipes are the kiss of death. Unfortunately, thats precisely what a lot of OP's on a lot of these threads are asking for. And they're naive enough (and contemptuous enough, in a sense) to think that making good work really is just as easy as doing A, B, and C in the right order, and if you just tell them what A B and C are they'll shoot just like you.

Just ask the people in Canon and Adobe's marketing departments.

retlawjt wrote:
bad.  you went to school to get yourself educated and had to pay for that info.  let someone else pay for that info.

If all you think you learned in school is info, then your education is worthless.

Brian Diaz wrote:
I'm amazed by the stark contrast between opinions expressed here and those in this thread: https://modelmayhem.com/posts.php?thread_id=40018

Jay-zuss!!!  I'm speechless (and that's saying a lot)...

lll wrote:

Agreed.  That's another reason why I am so against those "recipe" books (for lighting, PS and what not).  It doesn't help anyone improve their craft; it turns them into one-trick-pony (or limited multi-trick pony).  What's the difference between that and Walmart training their portrait studio button-pushers?

The sticky is a great idea...hopefully Brian can make that happen, get Tyler to set it up, or whatever it takes.

I'd like to elaborate more on what some have said from my perspective. I started with a lighting book, and for real basic's, cool, but my photo's didn't really start looking what I thought were good, until I practiced like hell. Since I hate tfp with new models, and have better use for my money than paying for models, I made a make- shift crash dummy to practice on. I have practiced for hours and hours, and until I figured what they meant by 'seeing the light', and it was frustrating at times. Learn...no..., see the difference by using 1 light, and noting the difference it makes turning the head/modifier a little this way, then a little that way...up and down too. If your creative enough to be a photographer, your creative enough to make a practice dummy. Dont wait for day's (or hours) before a shoot and start asking how to light seemless, or take onstage event photo's. Go practice now (or at least search the forum...it's all been hashed out already) ...it's fun. You'll make mistakes, and at 1st it'll look like crap, but what you learn from the experience will alway's far out weigh what you get for asking for cookie cutter recepies.

Just remember, you'll be all prepared for a shoot, and everything will turn to crap, either weather, other talent, client desires, whatever, will throw you a curve when least expected. You'll have to wing it, and have the confidence to say, 'no problem', and pull it off. You wont get that seceret from a book, or here. Better to learn the basics, and go practice.