Today’s Seniorologie 101 comes from a wonderful photographer who I met at a workshop!  Wendy Vonsosen of Wendy Vonsosen Photography is located in the San Francisco Bay area which provides her with beautiful locations to photograph her subjects!  I asked Wendy to share some of her tips on location scouting!  Check them out below!  And be sure to check out Wendy’s work on her website and blog.  Thanks Wendy!

If you’re anything like me, you get tired of shooting in the same places and you’re always in need of new locations to keep things fresh. With gas being so expensive right now, driving around aimlessly doesn’t make much sense. So, I’m sharing  three smart tips to help you find new and exciting locations.
1)  Get personal

One thing I love to do, if possible, is incorporate something personal and meaningful into each senior session I do.  This is a session I shot a few weeks ago with this beautiful high school senior.  She didn’t have a specific location in mind when we talked during her pre-session consultation but I did know that she’ll be focusing on music in college next year and that she is an amazing pianist.  So, of course, I suggested we start off at her home with her piano.  You can almost always find something personal to incorporate into a session when you start at the client’s home.

2)  Look at the Big Picture

During our consultation we decided on a field location.  At the moment, I have two fields that I can rely on for beautiful light.  But I was pretty bored with them so I wanted to see what else I could find nearby.  Instead of driving around for hours hoping to run into a beautiful field, I turned to Google Maps.  This is my favorite resource for location scouting right now!  In Satellite View, I locked into my current address and zoomed out so that I could see the neighboring towns and their topography.  Fields are usually easy to find because they appear as yellow patches without buildings, for the most part.  I found three in my immediate area that I hadn’t been to before so I jotted down the names.  I then, and this is my favorite part, chose one of them and zoomed in as close as I could and took the little figure of the man that’s at the top of the zoom tool, left clicked and dragged him onto the road at the entrance to the field.  I was now in Street View and had a 360 degree view of that exact spot.  I could see exactly what I could expect if I were to take the time to drive to that field.  I did that with all three locations and ruled out one of them, crossing it off of my list.  Now I had two locations I would drive to before the session to make sure at least one of them would work.  You can use Google Maps to find lakes, beaches, forests, hills, an urban areas as well.

 

3)  Keep an open Mind

Our third location idea was to find a parking garage and do part of the session there.  I had used a parking garage before but it wasn’t ideal so I wanted to find an alternative, if possible.  I Googled “public parking garages” in a few towns nearby and came up with two possibilities.  I looked them both up and found out if they were fee based or free and jotted them down on my list alongside my two field locations.  Now I had four specific locations to visit instead of aimlessly wasting gas.  I headed out in my car to check them out.  The first field I visited was ideal with parking, a restroom, picnic tables, long grasses, a wooden fence, and even a barn structure.  The parking garage that I visited next didn’t have the light that I was looking for so I resigned myself to revisiting my “backup” garage.  BUT, as I was driving back home, I passed under a pedestrian walkway that I had driven by time and time again without really noticing it.  This time I noticed it and thought it might make a unique alternative to the parking garage.  I pulled over, opened my Google Maps on my phone and found out where both ends of the bridge were located and drove to each end to determine where to park for the session.  It’s important to keep an open mind when locations scouting so that you don’t miss an opportunity to try something new.  Always keep a camera handy so you can take a quick shot of the location, jot down where it is, and when the light will be the best.  Keep a running list in your car of possible new locations for future sessions.

I hope this inspires you to get out of your “location rut” and find some new places to try.  Happy shooting!


Seniorologie 101 – {Location Scouting}

  1. Great post! I recently moved to a new town, so I have some serious location scouting to do, and this will definitely save me some gas!

  2. Linda Dalton says:

    Wendy, I love how you personalized this session (and all your sessions), I also love how you use Google maps for location scouting. Thank you!

heck, yes i do!

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