I’m Megan Brame and this is Anything But Beige. Let’s go.
Hey, my name is Gabrielle and I love capturing portraits of people.
Gabrielle thank you so much for being here. I am super excited about this episode.
Me too, how’s your day going so far?
This is so far so good, man it’s you know, we are recording this in the tail end of summer and I got my slippers on.
I am so close, just water weather.
Yes and that is the best weather of all, so Gabrielle Deimeke .
Yes. Yep.
I did it right.
I know, I had to make a YouTube video for how to pronounce my name. so that people don’t struggle anymore.
So for those who are listening, one of the questions I have in my survey for guests is let me know how to pronounce your name and the reason that I do that It’s funny. You say you have the YouTube video. Is that when I would go on? Nobody knew how to say my last name, which is a brain and it brought me or brought me so I just started putting in any kind of survey like it’s like a frame with a B. I’m just making my life easier, so I’m gonna make everyone else’s life easier. And super excited that I got that right there. Okay you are a badass woman photographer who captures photos of badass women.
Yes, that is what gets me super excited. You know, I love taking pictures of women talking about uplifting women empowering women. And so I started this badass woman series jeez, like, two and a half years ago in New York photographing women. And I’ve been working on it ever since.
So let’s start with how you got into photography in the first place. Was this like a natural transition for you? or did you just kind of pick up a camera one day? And you’re like, This is it?
So my mom gave me a camera when I was like 12 or 13 to take to a concert that I was going to and I came back and I showed her all the photos. You know, it was a country music concert. I grew up on a farm in Missouri so that I grew up on country music and I still love country music to this day, although I have expanded.
My first concert was Travis Tritt and Marty Stuart.
So there you go, so like along those lines for sure, I mean, this would have been like, like probably you know, early 2000, 2004 and 2005. So in that era kind of just the bridge between classic country and kind of the newer more pop type version of country music, but she gave me a camera, and when I came back and showed the photos there, it wasn’t of the bands on stage. There were a bunch of people in the audience and she was like, Gabrielle you can’t take pictures of strangers. So honestly, I’ve had my camera ever since then, and I’ve never put it down. I just love taking pictures of people capturing personalities through photography. That’s just something that never gets old for me.
Could we talk about the gear that you have involved in a camera working with?
Yep, so I started on Nikon when I was in, you know, once I kept taking photos my parents realized after a few years, like okay, this is something that she’s really interested in. So I shot on Nikon gear, I got a D 5000 camera body. I used that all through high school and part of college. And then when I started interning for a photographer in college she was assisting with weddings, wedding photography, and so she had all of her own camera gear, which was all canon and so when I would assist, she would say, you know instead of bringing your own gear, you could just shoot on my gear and learned the cannon system. And I did that and once I really learned the cannon system, I became obsessed with it. And so I switched all over from Nikon Canon and I’m still cannon. Now it’s just for me, it’s really intuitive, like how the camera body is set up. I think the lenses are really sharp, so I’m cannon all the way.
I am too, by the way so I don’t know. But I grew up on Nikon. My mom had nikon and I don’t know, I was never like, outright against Cannon. I was just terrified of it, but you’re right. Like once I started using cannons like this is so much easier.
It is like just even like where your hands go for, like changing aperture and shutter and like, where the finger placement is like, I just find the body, especially to be super intuitive for like fast shooting, which is like, find out, you know, shooting a concert or wedding or something where I need to be focused. It’s just really helpful for me to have that gear and know, I can rely on it
Completely, so you go from this concert to deciding like this is my jam. This is what I love is going to start doing just full time passion. Let’s talk about the serious badass women. How did that evolve?
Yep, so I went to college for photography, graduated and then I actually decided to go to grad school in London and I did. I studied fashion photography there for two years which was cool, but really just like an excuse for me to travel on, goof off for two more years before I became a full adult and had to start working. But once grad school was over, I was like, okay, I gotta like, you know, move to a city because my visa was expiring in London, so I had to go back to the U. S. So I have always, for my whole life, wanted to live in New York City. So I was like, okay, I’m gonna move to New York. I’m gonna be a photographer there. It’s gonna be great so I get there. I don’t have any photography jobs or contacts or network really so I’m like, crap I need to like figure out how I’m gonna make a living here. And so what I did was I just got a bunch of photography jobs off Craigslist. I network just, like, honestly, totally random stuff just to kind of pay the bills. But in the meantime, I kept seeing all these women like I would meet these really cool women entrepreneurs who are starting their own businesses. Who you know they had an idea, and they quit their job. And you know corporate America to start this cool project or I just heard all these cool stories from these women and I started informally, asking them like you know, how did you start this or what was successful for you? Networking Or how did you make these context and kind of for my own career and livelihood? I was just kind of wanting this information to know for myself as a female entrepreneur, like kind of how to navigate that space. And so, after about a year of doing that, I was like, I think I could make this into, like a formal project of like photographing these women, photographing their portrait in, you know, their workspaces, their offices, their homes, and then in doing like an interview style, where I asked them questions about you know, how did how did what? What things? If you could tell a younger, self younger version of yourself, You know, What would you say? What tips and advice would you give? And so that’s how the badass woman projected the N.Y.C. began.
When did you start doing this? I’m just wondering if we were in New York at the same time.
So I moved to New York in January of 2018 and then probably like six months into that is where I was, like, kind of toying with the idea. Started taking some photos, and then last January 2019 is when I was, like, got serious about it and started, like really prioritizing it, Like meeting these women, taking their portrait and then this March, right before covid. I had my gallery show showing 55 portraits of the woman I photographed.
Congratulations, that’s fantastic.
Thank you, It was my first gallery show in New York. So it meant a lot to me and I ended up being like, two weeks before covid and I had no idea at the time. So I’m just so grateful that I was able to have the show.
I would love to ask a favor of you. It is so helpful to have reviews on new podcasts as it really helps iTunes stitcher Spotify. All of those guys find out that you’re really enjoying it and that they should show it to new people. So if you wouldn’t mind just leaving a quick review about what you think about the podcast, I would really appreciate it. Thank you so much again. I’ll talk to you next week.
Definitely,Wow, let’s talk about serendipitous timing. It might have been like one of the last gallery shows for a while.
I know it’s a bang for sure, for sure.
So what have you learned from these women? Just all of these portrait’s and all of these lessons, like what are some really cool lessons you’ve learned from them?
So one thing that I really took away is this idea of kind of betting on yourself, even if you don’t have the answers or you don’t have the full plan because I think sometimes women especially want to have things like really laid out have, like, you know cross their t’s to do their I’s have a full plan in place before they may be quit their job or take a big leap. They want to make sure and feel secure. That’s like the thing they’re jumping into, is going to like have a probability of working and a lot of these women were like no, like, I just had to bet on myself, believe in myself and I didn’t know I didn’t have the answers. But I knew I believed in myself enough to know that if there were problems that arose that I would be able to solve those problems and just think of them as puzzles that could be solved. So that was one thing for me. It just gave me a lot of courage to, like, really go after things that I cared about and, you know, really put myself out there. But that I mean, it could be hard. It could be vulnerable to put yourself out there like that.
I think especially in New York City where we lived there eight and a half years. We left in 2016 and to me it was a sort of kill or be almost killed, but just in an aggressive way but also just I hate the sound. This late early New York teaches you so much about being confident because if you don’t go for it, someone else will.
Absolutely and like that’s what it is can be cutthroat in that way. But like that’s one of the cool things about it is that you’re totally right. It’s like when I was doing a photo shoot or working on anything, you know, I had to go into it with all my energy and with full confidence, because I totally knew that there was a line of 10 other photographers that could do the job. If you know, if I doubted myself or if I didn’t feel like I was good enough or if I didn’t show up, you know, full energy. So it’s crazy but in a way, it really can motivate you and push you to make much better work than you would have you know in another city.
Completely, absolutely so one thing that you’re taking away is just huge confidence in both yourself and the process, I guess. Would you say that’s right?
Absolutely, I think, and then one other thing that they taught me is this idea of persistence. So I love to tell the story about an awesome athlete. Her name’s Ingrid Silva and I knew from like, very early in the baddest woman series that I really wanted her to be part of it. She’s a ballerina, professional dancer, a Nike sponsored athlete like she’s just very cool, but like because she’s so successful, she’s like very busy. And so I really wanted to get her in the show and so over. Jeez, over a year we tried, I worked with her team and we tried to schedule and we just couldn’t make it work. We probably, like, rescheduled it like 10 to 12 times. And then, finally, the gallery show was on Saturday, the Wednesday before they were like she’s free for 15 minutes tomorrow. If you could make it work and I was like, I’ll make it work. So I went there to take a photograph here in 15 minutes. We did the interview digitally so that we didn’t have to worry about it, you know, right then, and I, like, got the photos printed the next day and then put them in the show like the day after that.
Oh my God.
And so it was crazy because, like that it’s another thing that a lot of them said is like a lot of them said, You know if I had an investor that I really wanted like I wouldn’t be embarrassed or shy to you know go to their show up at their office every single week and asked to have a meeting with them or email them or call them or write the letters until they, like, took me seriously. That’s something that, like before I moved to New York, like, I would probably be too shy to do that or like maybe after Ingrid’s team had said like, five or six times like Oh, sorry, we canceled again. I would have been like they don’t wanna be in the show. She doesn’t want to be in the show. It’s not good enough. They don’t. It’s not like she’s just busy. So I think you know that that idea of like the stories you’re telling yourself versus like the reality and kind of kind of going back to the confidence of like, I’m gonna be persistent and not be shy about that. That’s one thing that really the series helped me kind of build up.
Could you talk more about that? I think that especially for women, that is such a, you know, ever ending about this before. But like we’re supposed to be polite and we’re supposed to be quiet and not route, you know, would be bitchy or Busey. You’re not selling and it’s to our detriment. So I love talking more about this. Can you talk just like actually is?
So that’s just one thing I think again with, like just being in New York like that really you kind of have to build up that, like, tough layer of skin and learned and not not take everything so personally and also like for me, like my nature is to like, you know, be more quiet, like let things kind of. I don’t want to ruffle any feathers or, like, be a bother to anyone. And so at some point, you know, depending on what the project is or how passionate you are about it, you have to be like well, even though my tendency would be to be more quiet or not speak up about this thing. It’s so important to me that actually, now I’m going to you know, project energy toward being more more vocal or more outspoken or you know, I think for women that’s especially key is like, even if it might not come naturally to you to be that way or act in a more aggressive way. Like there’s merit to being intentional about practicing those skills so that when the time comes and you really need them, you know, you have a little bit of practice behind your belt to say, okay, I’m gonna stand up. I’m gonna, you know, be more vocal or, you know, whatever it may be. But I think that’s really key for women, especially.
How have you done that?
Great question, definitely with, like, a lot just doing the bad ass woman series in general, I think that helped me like because again, these women were so busy and like, so successful that half the time me even reaching out to them felt like a big ask like oh my gosh. I wanna take an hour of their time like that. Like they have to think that my little project here is so important that they’re gonna actually give me their time, which is super valuable, so that really was a big confidence boost. Like whenever someone wanted to be part of the project and like, support one empowerment, it was like wow, like, Okay, this isn’t just me kind of in my little New York apartment. Doing something for fun, like this is something that, like people really care about and like, is an important thing to be talking about. So that was cool for me and just it really made me, you know, excited for the series. And a lot of women at the gallery showed that the response was just really cool, like there were literally, like, 55 portrait’s hanging on the wall. So just like it was like it felt like so much solidarity between women. It’s like, wow each woman individually is so successful. But then, like look, what we can accomplish as a whole like that was really cool, so a lot of them gave me feedback that I need to do the series in more cities, which I definitely am going to do in the future. I think that could be awesome.
That would be so cool. How do you think you know if we’re ever able to travel again? How do you think you will accomplish that?
Yes, so I actually was gonna do 30 portraits. I had all lined up for San Diego for April, but of course, that got canceled. So we will see the top cities I’m thinking about now are somewhere in California. I’m actually moving to Austin this week, so I’m definitely gonna do probably 50 in Austin, which will be really cool. And it’s very much like a new kind of tech start up city. So I think I’ll get a lot of creatives. I’ll get a lot of entrepreneurs there, which would be really cool and then of course. I’d love to do it in London eventually, like maybe get a grant or something like that to do it there. So definitely looking to just, you know, see where this goes. I have no timeline on it. So just kind of as my career progresses, see what other cities I can bring to.
So I want to step away from the career part of it for a second and talk about the artistry behind it. Like what interests you to photograph? Like what moments are interesting to you?
So with the baddest woman series in general, like that project for me, it was really important to photograph the women, like in a space that was natural to them. So when I, you know, some of them didn’t want a photograph in their homes or office and that totally makes sense. But in that case, I would say, you know where in New York is really important to you, like, do you have a special spot in the city that you like to hang out or like a restaurant, or like a park that you like to go to? So, for that series, I really wanted it to feel like the photograph was like them in their environment so you could get a sense of their personality. And I think that translates into a lot of my work in general to like, You know what? I’m doing a portrait session with someone. I wanted to feel like whatever, you know. Maybe they gave me some words like a mood. Maybe they wanted to be more contrast or dramatic or trying, you know, trying to be more out there like, maybe it’s more simple and they wanted to be more understated and just, you know, a simple portrait of them. So whatever you know, working with the person that I’m gonna photograph like that’s important to me to talk to them, learn about their personality, learn about their influences so that I could incorporate that into the image. And I think that that’s something that, like now, since the whole world has, you know, an iPhone or could get a DSLR camera to take photos, that’s what starts to separate, you know, artists from just people that are clicking the button is like really having intentionality behind the images that you’re creating.
It was three people who didn’t get their way into the grind. I guess you know what I mean. What recommendations? Okay, so let me ask you which way you want to go with this. Do you want to talk more about being a subject for photographers or do you want to talk more about the career part of being a photographer.
What I could go either way, but I have a lot of tips in terms of, like if there’s, like someone who’s interested in photography and would like some tips like, I think that’s like a good route that I could speak on.
Let’s do it, so I am someone with my iPhone and I’m like, I’m really good at my iPhone and I’m gonna be a photographer. I’m gonna get my camera. So what the fuck do I do next?
Yes, so I mean, I think iPhones and even just, you know, you know, points you DSLR and stuff like that, like that could be a great starting point. That’s what I started on. That’s what many of my photographer friends started on. So I think at the beginning, you don’t want to just limit yourself and think, Oh, well, I don’t have, like, $10,000 camera gear, so I can’t do this. That’s not true. Like you definitely can start picking up the basics and practice just on whatever you have. If you’re just gonna shoot on your iPhone portrait mode or if you’re gonna work up to like buying, you know, a DSLR camera body. But one thing that I did, jeez, for probably like the first, like eight years was I just photographed the people around me, so I carried my camera everywhere. I took pictures of my friends. I took pictures of us hanging out. I took pictures of my family I took, you know, senior pictures of my friends when they were graduating high school and then graduating college. So honestly, practice is like the first thing is just building up like your point of view and then you know, shooting enough so that you start having a sense of like, Oh, you know, I like to shoot outdoors, you know, around sunset, like that kind of golden hour. Like, really like something that you know works with my style or Oh, I really like shooting. You know, fast paced sports photography. You’ll start kind of figuring out, like what you really like and then in terms of like building up the business itself. One thing that I did right when I moved to New York, because I didn’t have any clients at all, and I was just like I’m a photographer, people should hire me. I went on instagram so leveraging social media can be huge. I would go on instagram. I would DM like 100 people a day. And I would say, Hey, this is my website. I’m a photographer, I’m in New York City, you’re in New York City. I’ll do a free 10 to 15 minute photo shoot with you, as long as you tag me on instagram like post one of the photos and like, say that I was your photographer and so I did like 20 or 30 of those right when I moved to New York and then that really worked. People started seeing like, Oh, she was your photographer. And then, you know, someone else who posted and then maybe that person, you know, six months later was like, Hey, I need, you know, an engagement photographer. So then they would reach out to me. But, I mean, you don’t always have to do free photo shoots. That’s just a strategy that worked. It really expedited getting my clientele in New York, but even just messaging people or, you know, sitting out cold emails and saying, Hey here, my rates. You know, maybe I’m doing a headshot discount this month. Or, you know, you could get 10% off my rates, stuff like that just putting yourself out there, like, all the time. That really helps. I would give out my business cards on the subway all the time. You know, sometimes obviously, you might not want to be If you’re not, if you’re more introverted, maybe that’s not something. You wanna the route you wanna go? But it was fun for me to just see someone like, Oh, my gosh. Like, uh, there was a girl who was walking by Times Square who had bright pink hair, and I was like, you are cool let me do a photo shoot with you any time, here’s my card.
That’s awesome. Did you do it with her?
It’s right when covid happened. She actually ended up being a stage manager for like, a Broadway show. That’s why she was walking around Times Square. She was like leaving one of the theaters and she was like, Let’s set one up. You know, after covid, I was like fair.
Oh, my God, that’s so cool. It’s something I love. When that just happens, it just comes together, you know?
Like you never know who you’re gonna meet or even just going to like, I would go to networking events that weren’t specific to photography. It would just be business ones. And then you never know when someone’s gonna be like, Oh, actually, you know, my company needs a photographer to do headshots for everyone or I have a friend who’s a photographer, like let me connect you guys together. So really, just putting yourself out there 24/7 is like a key.
So let’s talk about the photographer community online. What is your experience other than with that?
So in New York, I joined a group called S.M.P., which is American Society of Media Photographers, and that was really good to kind of get a baseline standard because, like I came from St. Louis, Missouri, where I’m from where rates were different, right? Like you can charge a lot more in New York City because the cost of living is so much higher. So that was good for me to kind of build a circle of photographers and you know just like ask questions if I needed to like, Hey, I was charging, you know, $50 an hour to assist in St. Louis. But, you know, then they’re letting me know. Actually, no, you can charge 75 an hour like in New York because of, like, the different rates and stuff like that. So I think it. But I also have seen the perspective of photographers where it is very kind of like, Oh, I don’t want to tell you my secrets. I don’t want to give away my presets like it’s kind of like all for, you know, oneself type of mentality. But for me, it’s like photography is like such everyone’s gonna have such a different perspective and their photos, They’re all gonna be so different that, like, I don’t really have a problem sharing that kind of stuff because I just feel like the more that we could teach each other like the more everyone’s learning so I’m always down when people you know people will DM me or, you know, message me and say, Hey, you know how did you edit this? Or you know what preset would be used for this? Or how would you photograph this next time. What lens do you really like? And I love sharing that kind of stuff just because it’s, you know, it’s helping people out. And I started there. I remember being the person that was starting there, you know, messaging photographers being like, how do I learn how to shoot my camera on manual and then being like here, you know, let me help you. So I like to give back in that way too.
That’s so cool and I agree. I think that the people that shut off being part of the community, it’s to their detriment if I’m not a photographer, but just, you know, marketing or whatever, blogging.
Sure, and that’s that’s totally not selected to just photography. That’s anything right? It’s like I just feel like, you know, life is so short and we have only so much time to live, like, why not share all the knowledge that we’re gaining and be communicating with each other and, like just sharing like that so much more important to me than to you know? Oh, well, I know this one secret about photography that no one else knows. It’s like, No, I’d rather, I’d rather have other people to talk about it with.
I love that, so let’s go to the other side of it. Let’s talk about being a subject for a photographer and a lot of people are doing this for Instagram. You know they want to be influencers. They want to have a good product or not product photography. Good photos, how do you suggest finding a photographer? and how do you suggest making sure you’re maximizing that opportunity?
Yes, so finding a photographer there’s like a million ways nowadays because there’s, like a million photographer’s. But honestly, like I really love just looking on Instagram and I’ll do location based. So like when I decided to move to Austin, I just started looking up like Austin portrait photographers and kind of like seeing what the style was. But it kind of depends on what you’re looking for. So if you’re looking for wedding photography, I tend to tell people to check on the note. They have a pretty thorough database of every single city, photographers everywhere but another thing that I think has a lot of merit is asking for recommendations from people you trust. So whether that’s like posting on Facebook and being like, hey, like, I wanna do family photos or, you know, I want to do a photo shoot for my instagram like influencer page, like, who are photographers you’ve worked with and once you kind of have some photographers in mind. There’s definitely some key things to ask to make sure that they’re gonna match your style. So you wanna look at portfolios of like images that they’ve shot? So you know if you go on their website and you want to do like an instagram influencer type of shoe, you know, very fashionable and the only thing you’re seeing on their website are like senior pictures. Then it’s like, well you should definitely ask them for the types of photos you’re looking forward to, making sure that these are the kind of images you want. And then another thing I tell people to is to like make a Pinterest mood board and send that over to your photographer because that can really help them know, like how to do the shoe. Because sometimes you know, the general population might not know what golden hour lighting is or super bright or super contrast? They might not know all those terms, but they might be able to see a photo and go like I wanted to look kind of like this photo so that can help you just, like, communicate with your photographer to kind of plan out the shoot and then you just want to talk, talk through everything. So location, time of day, Is it gonna be midday or it’s gonna be really contrast or is it gonna be sunrise or sunset, where you have a really nice warm glow and it’s gonna be indoor in a studio with some lights. Like thinking about all those things can really change the mood of the images. And you know your photographer wants to plan for all that stuff. Maybe they need to bring lighting outside. You know, maybe they’re lighting a sunset, and they need to have some external lights or you know, just thinking about the things that you’re gonna incorporate in your photo shoot. You know, it can really help to make sure that you’re gonna get what you want, because like photography can be really pricey. So you wanna make sure if you’re gonna make the investment that you are getting the images that you’re gonna use for your website or what your brand, whatever it is.
That’s something I’m just about to you. So I think that for people who have not worked with a photographer before, there’s an assumption of I’m paying for the time. And then I get all the images and I think that a lot of people just don’t realize that it doesn’t really work that way. It’s more like you pay for the time, and then you get a selection of images and so can you just talk about that process too?
Yes and that totally brings up something I forgot to mention, which is that you should look over your contract and see what it says, right, Because so many photographers have different packages. Like my package that I offer for all my photography includes your right, a selection of the digital files. So, you know other photographers offer different things they might say. Okay, you know, you get 30 digital files and then you get 50 prints. So you want to think that through because, you know, if you’re just gonna be posting all the images on your website and your instagram you don’t need like 50 prints of it. But if these are family photos that you wanna hang up in your living room and you know, getting princess pricey. But that’s included in this photographer’s package that’s gonna make more sense for you to do. So you’re totally right, basically, what a photographer is gonna do is they’re gonna come, you know, meet you on the shoot. Do you know anywhere from a 30 minute shoot to a two hour shoot with you, and then they’re gonna go home, cold down the images, so they’re gonna delete all the blurry ones, the ones where your eyes were closed and then they’ll pick up, you know, the top, typically, you know an average photographer will be it will be about 30% of the images they took. So if they took 1000 images on the shoot, you know they’ll pick the best, like 200 to 300 if they took, you know, 500 photos it’s gonna be you’re gonna get maybe, like, 52 you know, 200. So it just depends. It depends, you know, the photographer style. Whatever their contract says, some photographers give, like, 10 images. You know, that’s just they have a really selective process. I tend to give a ton of photos. So, like you know I just did a senior picture shoot yesterday, and we did. It was an hour long shoot. They’re going to get, like, 200 photos, so it really just depends, but you wanna make sure you know what you’re getting, You know, when you book the shoot?
Definitely and I think that that’s an excellent segue into I booked the shoot, put my money down. We figured out the location, the date I’m going out. How do I not look ridiculous in a picture?
Yes, this is key and okay, so one tip I like to say it goes, not even just for like, doing a photoshoot. But just like if you’re taking photos on your selfie or like, selfies on your iPhone so if you’re I’ll start with that and then I’ll move to, like in the photo shoot. So if you’re just taking photos or like, have having your partner take photos of you know, for the gram, things that help are being outdoor and natural light or if you’re indoor, standing right next to a window is really good, because then you’ll get natural light which, like really just like smoothes out any harsh lines on your face. It’s just really flattering and then when they’re holding the like, the phone or the camera, if they could do it at a little bit of an angle of looking down on you, that’s always like I’m really flattering. The angle to do is just slightly looking down at the person. But not nothing crazy not, you know, overhead. Just a slight angle and then when you’re at the shoot. One thing that really helped is to just, like try to relax a little bit and like maybe loosen up. So one thing that happens is people get really, really stiff and then their shoulders or like up here because they’re a little bit nervous. Maybe they don’t do photos too often, So the first thing that you want to think about is just to breathe and relax. Make sure that you’re in good posture, so your shoulders are back. You know you’re standing in a nice posture, but you’re not tents and you’re not slouchy. So just trying to remember to have because I think you know a lot of us just in normal sitting, you know, tend to like, slouch a little or have bad posture. So it’s just you want to think relaxed, you know? Nice post, but make sure shoulders are back and then have the photographer alternate your expressions. So go from, you know do some really smiley to some soft smile to a serious to, you know a more candid laugh and kind of rotate those around because sometimes if you’re just doing the same pose for a long time, it starts to go crazy. So, like maybe you’re smiling. And then after smiling for like, three minutes, you’re like this kind of thing, and it’s like it’s like the cheeks are hurting so again, rotating out from those poses will make you like you’ll calm your muscles a little bit and you can. It looks a little bit more natural too.
I was just around, I had a photo shoot in California once, and the photographer was trying to get me to do different poses, and she said, Okay, I’m gonna have you laugh. But how I tell people how to do this and tip for people who need to do this, I’m gonna step away from the microphone, get really loved, she says. Just go ha really loudly because it’s so ridiculous. You’ll naturally laugh from it. California, as in Palm Springs, Gone just like.
And that’s the thing too, it’s like you also need to go into the shoot with the mindset of like, I might look a little ridiculous during parts of this, but like it’s okay if you if you walk by, if someone walks by and you’re laughing like a crazy person, they’re gonna go. Oh, that’s kind of a weird person and then continue walking and never see you or think about you the rest of their life.
Absolutely so like if they want their Instagram fans and they got to see you in person.
Exactly so it’s just like for me. I just tell people if they’re feeling really awkward or uncomfortable, it’s like laugh, do a spin, twirl around like it doesn’t matter. We can have fun and not be really self conscious. So I think that’s one huge key.
I completely agree but in one to segue into your background freebies and can we talk about all these offerings?
Okay, so I just started a bunch of fun give away things on my website. One of them is my background freebie. So I also did food photography when I moved to New York for, like a year just to like pay the bills. I randomly started doing food photography, which ended up being awesome because I got free food all the time but I did a fun collaboration with a cookie company, and I took some really cute pictures of, like, cookie dough cookies. And there’s like pink and Sprinkles all over the place, and they’re just really fun. So if you go to my website it’s Gabrielle Diemeke. Photo dot com slash links. There’s tons of freebies. There’s those backgrounds that you can. There’s a desktop background for your computer. There’s a phone background which, honestly I had to take it off my phone because I kept looking at my phone and being like I want a cookie. So it was kind of a little not great for my diet, but, uh, they look they’re really fun and playful. And then I always have new stuff that I’m throwing up there. I did a pink preset giveaway for a lightroom preset. So if you use lightroom mobile or lightroom on your desktop, I gave away some pink presets that are very like my style and are very pink and colorful. So there’s some presets that I had made that I did giveaways for. So I’m always doing fun stuff like that on my website and on my instagram as well.
So people have more questions. How can they get a hold of you?
Yes. So if you have questions, you want to chat with me? You wanna learn more about photography? All that good stuff? You could message me. You can send an email, or you could message me on instagram. So all my social media is at G dimes so G is Gabrielle dimes, as in the first few letters of my last name, Deimeke with a Z at the end. And then my emails just go to deems@gmail.com so you can drop me a message there as well.
They’ll be in the show notes too, but so amazing I feel like we have so much more to cover. And yet we’ve covered something. Like, what else do you think that we should talk about before we end the show?
Oh, my gosh, probably just reiterating. Just women empowerment in general is super important to me. And even with everything that’s going on now, not just with women, but just making sure that we’re empowering minority groups and that we’re being equal and fair to everyone like I just think the world is so like in a disaster right now with coronavirus and everything. I just wanna always make sure that I’m putting good energy out into the world. And I just wanna make sure, too that, like, even if it’s with, you know, my photography or my business, whatever I’m putting out into the world, I just want to make sure that we’re all projecting equality and making sure that, you know, with with everything that we do, we’re trying to include everyone because the world is just a better in place when everyone’s included and we get to share everyone’s ideas.
That is the perfect way to end this. Thank you so much.
Awesome. Well, thanks for chatting with me.
I definitely am. Everyone, go check her out. She is an amazing photographer. You have to go see her parents. They’re amazing. Thank you so much.
Hey, guys, one thing before you go at the end of every month, I’m planning to do a Q and a special answering all of your questions either about what we just talked about or anything in between. I am happy to hear back from you and help you out if I can. If you could do me a favor and go to https://thebeigehouse.com/askmegan, you can leave your comment or your question. I’ll be able to answer it on the next Q and a episode again. The address is https://thebeigehouse.com/askmegan. Thank you so much. I look forward to you.
On the next episode by whatever the news is telling us, and it’s very hard if we’re constantly plugged into that to settle. So I really recommend for most people, Most of us can stop it sunset, and then we can unplug from that and we can start relaxing and we can eat some of these self care habits.