068: Toni Darcy – Shooting Creative Portraits in Uninspiring Locations & Mindfulness Tips for When You’re Feeling Overwhelmed

MagMod is an American based company and they make modifiers for your flashes. I think the best way to probably describe it is these modifiers can help you control the spill, the light, the colour temperature of the light. And the MagMod, the name MagMod, comes from the fact that it’s all on magnets as well. It’s really quick and easy to use, quick to change. And they just give you so much creative control, especially. Well obviously when it comes to creating flash portraits or flash work, really. I use them every single wedding on every single flash, anytime I use a flash. I would rarely, rarely use a bare flash because I like shooting in camera how things should look rather than editing it to how it should look afterwards.

It gives you that creative control of even the colour temperature of the flash. Yeah. I just enjoy using them and I enjoy how creative you can get with it all as well. You learn what’s good for you and what modifier works in what situation. You’ve got some that’ll increase the spread of the light and some that’ll control the spill of the light. And then as I’ve said already with the colour temperature gels and the creative gels as well. I think at the beginning I was using the colour temperature gels because the light that comes out of the flash is very blue. If you’re in an orange room, if you change that to orange and you change the colour temperature on your camera as well, it really balances the light. And it looks a lot nicer. And the effect you have by doing it right in camera for me, is so much better than trying to figure it out after.

I think that with the creative portraits, I think it’s definitely, at most photographers that do creative portraits will probably say it’s only 10% of the work that they actually deliver because it’s all about the people and the story, but it’s trying to capture those moments in the most creative way.

I think at the beginning of my career, I was really driven by all the award systems that are out there. And I was just aspiring to be all these award winning wedding photographers, with Fearless, et cetera. And I used to really study the pictures and think, “I don’t even know how they’ve created that. How?” And it led me to start a personal project. I think it was in 2015 and I started this personal project because I was lost basically in my own career and my style. And I was just going out and just shooting things and it could have been on my iPhone. It could have been with my camera and it was just learning me to teaching myself to learn to see things that are right in front of us, that you can make more creative. And this was a massive journey in my career around that time. And I was just trying anything to be different and get more creative.And I think at one point I was even shooting through a rolled up piece of paper at a wedding when I was second shooting, because I was like, “What will this look like?” And it was all about experimenting. And obviously that didn’t work and there was a lot of other failures along the way that didn’t work, but now, even in my office, now I can see loads of different things that will give me a creative picture, like water bottles or glasses or glass jars or even the wardrobes that are shiny behind. It’s about looking beyond the obvious, I would say, and finding things that are maybe shiny or reflective or what can you shoot through?

And even when you are taking the kids to school or when you walking the dog, just having a look around and training your eyes to see those little things so that when you’re actually on a wedding day, it becomes second nature rather than right, got to find a creative portrait. You’re actually just seeing it as a second nature type thing.

I think there’s a lot of pressure on photographers because everyone’s out there showing their basically 1% and what they’re not seeing is all those images that I’ve absolutely failed at or what the next person’s failed at. They’re seeing the absolute best of the best. And I think it’s hard sometimes not to compare your full selection to people’s 1%. I think, especially with awards and things, it’s hard to not get sucked into, oh my God, I’ve not got anything or I’m not good enough. I think it’s looking after yourself in that way, because even when you do win one, all you want is another one. It never ends. I think sometimes you’ve got to just step back and shoot for the couple and have good communication with your couple as well.Especially this time of year when we’re all so busy and people are chasing you. I’ll have a day where I’m like, “Oh my God, everyone’s just messaging me at once. And I don’t know what to do.” I think, “Right. Just message them all back straight away,” because otherwise it sits on you and then the dread starts sinking in and you just get worse. Definitely my tips would be good communication. Don’t let those emails build up. And I have an iPhone, so I have different do not disturb settings. At nighttime, I’ve got my do not disturb for sleep, which is basically everything apart from my emergency contacts. And then in the daytime, I’ve got a different do not disturb that’s basically all my social media, because what I don’t want to be doing is fucking around on Facebook when I need to be working.