Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: There are so many ways to be a photographer. You can be a wedding photographer, a portraits photographer, Buddha or photographer, landscape photographer. And today I want to talk with Lisa Halcomb, who's made a great business thinking far outside the box in terms of photography.
You're listening to sustainable photography, a podcast all about business tips, inspiration and confidence building. I'm Ingvild KOlnes, the host of this podcast, and after over a decade as a photographer, I now help talented photographers run sustainable businesses. And for full transparency, you should know that I'm a mentor with paid offers, and I will probably mention some of those in this episode.
Hi, LISA. Welcome to sustainable photography. I am so excited to have this talk with you.
[00:00:55] Speaker B: Hi. I am thrilled to be here. I'm thrilled to be here to do this conversation again. So it's a pleasure. Thanks for having me.
[00:01:04] Speaker A: Yeah, because we did it last week and then there was an error with the file and now we're doing it again. So even though we have had this conversation before, no one's actually heard it. So let's just start at the beginning and tell us who you are and your background and how you became a photographer and all the things.
[00:01:25] Speaker B: Yes, and I promise it'll be even juicier the second time. So hi, everybody. Thanks for having me here again. It's so fun to be able to be in this space and talk to photographers directly. I don't get to do that very often. So I'm Lisa Hawkham and I do a myriad of things. I'm a brand strategist, I'm a photographer, and I'm also the founder of the self portrait method, which is a process that I developed to teach people how to be comfortable on camera and heal the disconnection they feel when looking at their own image. And we do that through photography and self portraits.
[00:02:05] Speaker A: Brilliant. Because you mentioned the three things you do. Can you share a little bit of what's your perspective on brand strategy? How do you work with brands?
[00:02:16] Speaker B: Yeah, that's a great question. So brand strategy has always been there, just like photography has always been there. But I went in the direction of brand strategy first because it was my comfort zone. And like most photographers, we love what we do, but it's a gamble to go all in on your creativity, as you know. So that came a little bit later, although I was shooting and taking photos the whole time. So my approach to brand strategy is, and I work specifically with personal brands. So creative and lifestyle, personal brands. And for them, and for me, what we do is so closely tied to who we are. It's an extension of who we are as a person. It's something internal, it's something we care about, something we believe that we would be doing anyway. But now we get to do it for a group of people. And so because of that, because we are the face that goes out to the public, there's a lot mental hurdles to get through. There's a lot of mental friction that comes up, especially living in a digital age that we all are confronted with screens constantly and we're confronted with a bajillion people out there doing it differently and doing air quotes better. And so I help the personal brands, the creatives especially, dig into that piece of themselves that they've been keeping back, that they've been holding back. And we figure out how to do that through a combination of strategy and their visuals, because you need to be able to translate who you are and what you do into a visual medium in order to promote yourself. And that's really hard for some people to do, to take a value or a feeling or an emotion and then have it come through as something that your audience can see, feel and resonate with. So that is the brand strategy aspect that I work with a lot.
[00:04:14] Speaker A: That's really interesting. Can you give an example of that, how you can make something like that into a visual?
[00:04:21] Speaker B: Yes, absolutely. I actually have a really great freebie and that is the top of the funnel for all the offers that I have. So it's basically the first thing we do for the self portrait method. It's the first thing I do with a client before I do a photo shoot with them. And it's the first thing I do for my brand consulting as well. And that is to get out, find those threads that you keep coming back to. So I want to back up for a second because I think when we talk about branding, we talk about this typical package of, okay, I have a business now. I'm stairstepping down the pathway, right? The next stone is to hire a graphic designer, get my logo, what's my color, get a website. Great, I've got all that now. I put it out into the world and nobody cares. Nobody cares. And then we get frustrated and we maybe tweak and we change our colors because we're trying to hit on some magical combination of aesthetics that's going to bring people in. But if you haven't done the work to figure out how that's tied to you and how you can maintain that in a sustainable way beyond working with a graphic designer or beyond getting those professional photos done right. If it's not inherent to you, you can't keep it up. So you're going to go show up on social media, or you're not going to show up because you're going to realize your visuals don't match. And you're aware of that disconnect, and we're aware of it, too, as an audience. So part of what I do is I help people get into the headspace where they can just look at what they like without judging, without needing it to go into the brand, without needing it to be something special and just really sit in what they're drawn to. And then this is my superpower, but I teach people how to do this as well. So, for example, we'll go into Pinterest and we'll pull a bunch of images and we'll look at them. And as you keep going, a pattern starts to emerge and you can find the threads that are the commonality in your visual brand. So for me, that was, oh, and this is actually really fun. You can go to my Pinterest account, and I have a board, it's called you are gold. And you can see my very first pins when I started doing this process way back in 2019. And you can scroll all the way to the bottom and scroll all the way to the top, and you can see the evolution, but you'll also see things are the same. So my whites are bright, my blacks are true, and then within that, I have the warmer tone shade of white, the cooler tone shades of white. And within the blacks, there's a range. And then I'll have a color.
Sometimes it's a gold color, sometimes it's slightly orange. Sometimes I'll move into a different spectrum, but there's always something to pop off of and that sort of evolves over time. Or you might notice that you're drawn to really minimal images with a lot of negative space or really interesting light or texture in your brand. So right now you can think of all these ways to bring that in, like textures, right? So you could show videos of different tactile sensations like coffee sloshing in your cup. There's little ways to bring that forward. And then that's what we figure out for you, is what is that thing that is yours that as you need to continue to evolve and grow and shape and shift, you can take those visuals on the journey with you. And then here's the part we forget. You can take your people with you. Because I personally think there's nothing worse than falling in love with a brand, a personal brand specifically. So we're not talking about target or Starbucks, but falling in love with. Oh, actually, wait, let's talk about Starbucks for a second. So let's say you go to Starbucks and everything's purple.
All of a sudden there's a Merman instead of a mer woman, and everything is like glittery purple, and it would throw you off and you would be like, well, this. I really liked the old Starbucks. I believed in. Why don't they believe in it anymore? And it's going to question, am I loyal to this brand? And so when we keep doing that as a personal brand, I know we're doing it. It's a catch 22. We're doing it because we think no one's paying attention.
So we're shifting, we're tweaking, thinking that when people start paying attention, they'll now see this new version. But you forget that for Instagram, for example, there's so many people that are looking, but they don't click. They're giving no indication that they're interacting, but they like what you're doing and they believe in it. So if you constantly throw that overboard, it undermines your credibility. And so back to your question of visuals and how I work with people is I try to get this going in a sustainable way, and then we find the origins within you so that you can sustain that yourself. Because most of us don't have creative teams that are going to go out and create our media for us and our content. Like, we're doing this. We're doing this in between photo editing sessions and shoots for ourselves.
So it needs to be something you're excited about. It needs to be able to evolve, and it needs to be able to change as you do.
And that's how we do that.
[00:09:49] Speaker A: Yeah, that is so interesting. And it's a very powerful thing to keep in mind as well, because if you get bored with your brand, which I'm sure many creatives do, then they want to shift. And I think that a lot of people might have creatives, especially or maybe exclusively have this urge to like, oh, but I like this thing, so I want to share it. And I like this. So I want to change my font to this. And, ooh, I like all these colors, and it's impossible to choose. At least that's how it used to be for me. I wanted to include everything, and I didn't want to limit myself to just using a few colors or a few textures or whatever it is. What do you think of that?
[00:10:33] Speaker B: Well, I think you nailed it. Look at the language you used. Just using limited. I want to do this other thing. And so I think that is, it's really interesting that the platforms that we're using to connect with people and sell are inherently creative platforms. That's what Instagram was created for. It was photography based specifically to share visuals and specifically photos. And it was more of a storytelling platform to share through your visual medium. And I think that's why creatives were drawn to it. And then it became a platform that you could monetize. Right? And it's great, it's free. I mean, you can't get anything better than that. But with the monetization came this story with the other side that's selling the solutions for the people that need to monetize the coaching industry. This is the box you have to fit into in order to succeed on this platform.
And so we've been trained to think that we have to choose, that we have to go in a box, that we have to be limited and specific. And that's really hard for creatives. We push up against that and we'll either get sick of it, like you said, and throw it overboard, or we'll just stop showing up if it's not lighting us up anymore. And so I think instead of putting yourself in a box, you need to brand yourself for that evolution. Like, you need to build that in up front. And that's the biggest and most expensive mistake that people make over and over again. I'll talk to people and they're like, I have a rebrand. I'm so excited to reveal. And I'm always like, why? And here's the thing, especially for the photographers and creatives listening to this, you have a camera. Like, you have the ability to go out and bring something that shows the direction you're going in. You're naturally evolving your skills, you're naturally figuring out over time who you want to work with and what you want to do for people in your work. So it's going to come through in your photos. You don't have to hit it so hard and be so obvious with these restrictive colors. There are so many other people out there who don't have access to the photography medium and they're just dying to have that creative skill so that they can bring what's in their head to life.
[00:13:00] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:13:00] Speaker B: So I think we overthink it and we think it has to be limiting, and I think it's the opposite.
[00:13:05] Speaker A: I think you're right. And this summer, I think it was, I went through not a rebrand, but more like upbranding, like just figuring it out, getting like a revamp. And I didn't change anything. There was no new colors, no new fonts, no new things like that. But I changed slightly, like, okay, so this color that I was only using a tiny bit of in the background, now that is the most prominent one because that's going to be more of that vibe that I need going forward. And I'm still going to have to be me. But instead of being as uncomfortable as I am in front of the camera, I have to actually look in the camera and show that I'm present and that I'm confident. So just tiny tweaks. But still, that matters so much.
[00:14:02] Speaker B: It does matter. And I think that the fact that you had that color in a different part of your brand and you realized that it could have more of a central stage and focus to be a little more eye catching, too. I mean, that's just something that you would never notice up front when you're ordering your brand from the graphic designer. Right? I mean, you would never know because you haven't done the thing yet. So there's a certain amount of lived experience that comes into it as well. And I think that it's an interesting conversation to look at people who are also more established and who have been around for a while and especially people who've plateaued, because this is when people come to me. I get people when they're in the middle of a transition or they're in a plateau and they're like, everything was great.
No one's calling. Things are drying up. I don't understand what's happening. And then when we look, there's some kind of personal evolution they've gone through or they haven't been showing enough of themselves.
I want to qualify that in a minute. I'll come back to that thought. But they're holding something back. There's something that needs to come forward, and the audience can sense that. And so they're plateauing, and it's usually the lack of them showing up. So it's interesting because you have the awareness that you need to show them that you're more present. But I also think that being creatives, there's a way to do that. So what are they doing?
I got my camera right?
[00:15:31] Speaker A: They're holding a camera.
[00:15:32] Speaker B: They're holding a camera.
So that's the go to. We know you're a photographer. We can see it in your Instagram feed. It says it right there at the very top.
And that's something I noticed about your feed, actually. I look through and you're not like, here's my camera.
[00:15:49] Speaker A: I do have one on my website, actually, where I'm holding a camera.
[00:15:53] Speaker B: And I'm not saying that you shouldn't do that. I'm not saying you shouldn't do that. But there are ways that you uniquely show up and things you uniquely do that you can capture. So don't always go for the obvious. And so in your example, just the awareness that you want to make more eye contact with the camera. Right. That's great. But it doesn't have to be like mugshot eye contact.
You can do that in so many ways. You can still curl to the side, you can still touch your hair. You can still be caught in motion in these genuine, candid moments of you.
That's just the first thing everybody thinks of is I've got to have that LinkedIn profile headshot thing.
And I think we're a little disappointed when we see that with photographers, actually, I think we expect something a little more creative as well.
So there's a lot of ways to make that your own. There's a lot of cool crops you can do. Even just the suggestion of you being present, like, even just like your hand in the frame or just some touch of humanity, I think is really important. And if you're going to ask people to trust you and to trust you beyond what they see in your portfolio, but to actually trust you as a human, and I don't know about you, but I think 80% of the people that I shoot with, they lead with, I'm not photogenic. I'm really uncomfortable.
I don't want to be here.
So if you've gone first and if you've already painted that picture for them without overtly saying in your copy, I know how you feel, but you're showing them, it's okay, I get it then I think that's really important to do and show up as a human, not as the photographer.
[00:17:45] Speaker A: That's a great point. Absolutely. And you mentioned that one of the things you do is actually you do take brand photography and you show other people how they can do it. I feel like this is a good occasion for you to talk about that as well, so we can understand both how you work and also to share what's possible when you think outside the box.
[00:18:07] Speaker B: Well, thanks for asking about that, because I think that that's one of my struggles with branding, is everything I do is out of the box. So I first have to define the box for people and then tell them what I do that's outside of the box. So when I moved from Los Angeles, which there's so many photographers in Los Angeles, to a more remote part of central Oregon, it was during the pandemic, and I was doing brand strategy for clients, and they were all trying to move their businesses online.
The brick, and was, it was very difficult. They needed photos. So I started shooting people through Zoom, and I just figured out a method. And then now there are private remote studio apps where you and your client can be inside the session together and you can shoot them remotely. And I realized a few things that make those sessions really great. So those nerves that we touched on and that sense of trust is so much easier when you don't have the massive camera lens pointed at you. So from my clients perspective, they're sitting in their homes or their office or even a studio, and they have a tripod and they have their phone on a tripod, and they hear my voice. I can also come on screen and I'm not physically there to position them. So I have to be very intentional with my communication with them, which is great because that means I'm completely present. And if you're used to, I don't shoot this way, but I know a lot of photographers get people in, they get them through a certain set of poses, they get them out the door, they get the next person in. Right? And you kind of go on autopilot and your creativity kind of suffers because you have your go to things, because, you know they work. You don't want to waste time with anything else. This was a whole new level for me to be able to trust that the person on the other side can bring forward what I want. And I believe pretty goes beyond pictures. So I am looking for aesthetically pleasing pictures, but I'm looking for pictures that people look at and they go, oh, my God, that's me. How did you get me? No one ever gets me. That's it. And I think part of it is because they're sitting there with the phone, I'm not influencing their energy, so they don't feel like I'm looking at them, judging them, or assessing them, comparing them to the previous client. Right. And I'm also teaching them. So part of me not being able to touch them is I have to say, this is what I see, I have to shoot it. And I say, come look at the camera. And then they come, they look at the phone and they go, oh, I see. Then they walk over and they nail it. They make the adjustment. And it's like I just got goosebumps. So to see somebody be empowered in that way and to understand why I'm asking them to do the thing. So they're learning, then they're having fun. And if you go through my instagram, I haven't posted any sessions for a while, but if you go through my instagram and you look at those sessions, you just feel the energy in those photos. They're so alive. So that was something that, it's very unique and it's very special, and I wove that into brand sessions. So I started doing that just for small packages, people who needed, I was underselling the magic of what I could do, basically. So there were just headshot packages or profile photos. And then people started asking, hey, can we do some outfit changes? Can we do some location changes? And I was like, well, sure. So now my packages, my gosh, I think I started charging $250 or $400 as we do with like 100 images. As we do. And now my images or my packages, the full brand packages, around 3000 now. And this is all done remotely. So I'm at home with my family. I'm not traveling. It's all done through an iPhone.
And I was told, you'll never get images published. You'll never be able to shoot professionally through an iPhone. And I've shot on phones as old as a seven, and they've been published in online, digital magazines and shelter magazines specifically.
So for anybody who is listening to this and who's like, I live in a really saturated area, or a lot of family photographers, they work with them for a very, very long time, but then they move or the families move, and there's this constant like, oh, I wish you could come shoot this. I wish you could come shoot that. So I have a lot of family photographers that have, oh, I have a package. It's called the elopement photographer roadmap, where I teach you how to do this whole thing. So you get this onboarding sheet that you literally give to your clients so they know how to prep for the remote session, and then you get to come behind the scenes and watch me shoot. But it's just been really phenomenal for people who want more flexibility and want to expand. What I'm hearing from people who have big studios as well is it's harder and harder to get people into the studio for their package sessions. So my photographer friends are, I mean, they're getting creative. They're having people send their custom Spotify playlist over in advance. They're offering champagne, they're offering a foot massage while they get their makeup. I mean, it's like they have to keep ratcheting up the things that have nothing to do with photography in order to make their studio sustainable.
So I think it's really important to talk about right now because, I don't know, every ten pictures I scroll through on Instagram are an ad for that AI headshot photography. Have you seen that?
[00:23:56] Speaker A: No.
[00:23:57] Speaker B: People upload a snapshot, and AI takes just this picture of you sitting in your car, in your sweats, and it changes your hair, your makeup, your outfit, your background, and it's an instant headshot. And, I mean, it doesn't really look a lot like the person. It's doing a lot of facial work on the people, so it's not an accurate representation, and not everybody wants that. But that's what's coming for photography right now, and people want the convenience. Everyone's got a really great quality camera on their phone right now, and I think it's just really important for photographers to look at how they can be flexible. And I did not see any of that coming when I started doing this. I was just trying to be scrappy and help people get their photos.
[00:24:50] Speaker A: You should go to ingridculinas.com mindset to download the free mindset resource.
It can be just a thing to help you clear out those money blocks, to figure out what's really holding you back from having the business that you want again. Go ingvild kolnes.com mindset to get your free copy.
And I think what you've done here, it's really interesting because you've taken advantage of something that a lot of us would look at as the competition, the smartphone. That's something a lot of photographers are scared about, because every person has a camera now we're not needed anymore, but it's not the camera that makes us need it. So I hope that someone is listening to this and is feeling inspired and is realizing that there is something you can do and you can think way outside the box and find a way to have your business that works for you.
[00:25:55] Speaker B: Yeah. And don't be afraid to think outside the box, because once people understand what it is, they get so excited about participating in it. The elopement photographer that I mentioned, it's not just the annual family photo shoot anymore. Like they're popping on a tripod next to the table for first day of school photos, or when grandma comes to visit or grandpa comes to visit and they're capturing the moment. They walk in the door. I mean, they're finding all these other ways now to have her shoot for them. And so I think it's changing the perspective, not just for the photographer, but for what we think of photography for. Normally as a consumer, you're getting your photo done once a year, or your brand photos or your family photos, but now it just opens up this whole world of possibility. And why not use the technology that people already have?
[00:26:52] Speaker A: Yeah, that's a good point.
The method that you teach, is it for branding photographer as well as family photographers?
[00:27:01] Speaker B: So the remote photography method is for anybody, any kind of photographer. I have wedding photographers, elopement photographer, boutoir brands. The people who come in to do it for brand photography want to be charging a different price point. So they're shooting a lower price point package now. And typically with brand photography you can charge more because you get that strategy background and there's normally a bigger budget because of who you're working with, leaving wedding off the table, depending on what kind of a wedding you're shooting. But brand photography is second in terms of being able to bring in more income. So yeah, it's everybody, I would say. And also, you don't have to already be a photographer. So this is actually perfect for somebody who wants to get into photography. And maybe they're putting ads on Craigslist to shoot weddings for $400 and this is something they could do instead.
And you become really creative. So the interesting thing is, after doing all these sessions and then going back into in person sessions, because my in person sessions are working with interior designers and so I work to feature them in the spaces that they're curating, and then we shoot the spaces for publication. And so going back to work in person, first of all, it was amazing to be able to touch people again and be able to help them move, but I stayed in that empowering teaching mentality. So rather than just directing, I was really bringing them into the experience and they're so much more willing to participate and offer something that you wouldn't have thought of, especially if you're in a rut with what you're doing. You've got to feed that creativity and do something new and get out of your comfort zone to go back in with a new perspective. It's really important for creatives.
[00:29:03] Speaker A: Yeah.
And the final thing you do that is also something that is very different from anyone else, I think, because it has to do with how people feel when they're showing up online or in photos. And I'm sure that elopement photographer can relate to it because we're usually the ones behind the camera and not in front of it. So can you share with us about that as well? Yes.
[00:29:35] Speaker B: So that's what I alluded to at the beginning with my transition from brand strategy into picking up the camera for people again. And what I kept running into was that my brand is plateaued. I don't know what to do. I just had my branding done. My website's new, and it's crickets. And then we look at it and there's maybe one picture of them on there and it's a wedding picture, or it's from their high school prom, or it's whenever they felt last special and good, they've used that photo. And digging into it, I realized there's a lot of. It's more than just I'm afraid to show up on camera. It's this idea that what I see in the frame is not. That's not me. I don't look like that. And it's very frustrating because in my mind and in the mirror, I look one way and then somebody snaps a candid photo and all I see is this image where I'm not masking or I've come caught off guard. I can't give you the image of myself that I want.
And for some people, that's okay. Some people just.
We've been raised to believe that we're not photogenic and we're awkward in pictures. And people have embraced that story, which is its own kind of sadness. I don't think that has to be true. But other people, it really ruins your day. And so that was happening for me because I had to go online and I had this great thing. I was shooting people remotely. I can help your business not go under.
Let's get you online and get some photos. And I was just like, are you kidding me? Trying to show up. I was picking my photos apart. And after coaching people to bring themselves forward, I realized I was guilty of this, too. So in the self portrait method, that came out of me sitting with a camera for 30 days looking at my non reversed image. So a non selfie, non mirror image. So this is the image that you see looking at me right now, but it's the image that I don't get to see. And I dug into a lot of research and psychology to really understand what's happening and the conditioning that happens from years of just seeing yourself one way. And I was just really fascinated by that sense of disconnection between.
It's almost like existing as two selves right? And we have this denial of that second self will feel really good in the moment, and then we see that.
So why can't we maintain that stability? Was my question between those two things. Why can't that just be stable? And we accept that both are true.
So that's what I figured out. So in the self portrait method, we reconditioned the brain to see this alternate image of ourselves. And there's a lot of other mindset support that goes into it. But then they also get the technical aspect as well. So with this, I'm empowering the individual, the personal brand, the mom who is tired of not being in family photos, the people who are realizing that they don't want to put themselves up for the big thing to be considered for the big goal, the big reach, and that's holding them back, and they don't want to be held back anymore. And then people who just realize they have to show up online in order to sell their thing. And so they come through the self portrait method and they come out the other side, and most of them start shooting their own photos for their websites. And now they know what to do on the other side of a camera. And by the way, can we just talk about that for a second? Everybody comes into the photo studio like this, and they think that they're this lump of clay and the photographer is going to sculpt you. Right?
And, yeah, okay, that's fair. It is fair. And that's why photographers have had to rely on these tried and true poses, tried and true positions, depending on people and body type, but one's feeding the other. So what could happen if those people, instead of coming in as an unformed block of clay, they came in with, this is what I know, I need to give the camera to look a certain way, and they're playing equally on their side with us, and it's a collaboration.
And I've got goosebumps again, honestly, when that happens in a shoot, when you get someone who is scared and you know this, but they're willing. I'm so willing, just what do I need to do? And all of a sudden they're sparking and there's magic.
That's what I teach people to do on the other side. So they either shoot their own photos or they go and they make that massive investment in their photography and they get exactly what they want. They're not just getting this camera roll of images that looks slightly different and they end up using four because they're mostly the same and they're disappointed and the photographer is disappointed.
[00:34:44] Speaker A: That sounds so familiar. I am very uncomfortable having my photo taken. And I'm the one who's like, as soon as someone's going to take my picture, I'm like, okay, so what do I do with my hands? What am I supposed to do? Where am I supposed to look? I don't know. And it is a horrible feeling. And, yeah, my solution has been just take a ton of photos and I'm sure there's going to be a couple that I can use.
[00:35:08] Speaker B: Okay, so I have a question for you. How I'll put you in the hot seat very gently, I promise. But when you take those photos and when you're taking, I don't know, like 100 to get two right, are you looking at them like, are you really looking at those photos of yourself or are you just flipping through until there's flipping through?
[00:35:28] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:35:29] Speaker B: So that's the other thing that's happening and it's contributing to the problem because all those pictures, the ones you don't like that you're flipping past, they're still true.
They're still true. So you've got to look. So one of the rules, and I'll give this as a tip for anybody listening, but one of the rules we have in the self portrait method is we don't delete photos. Every photo is a benchmark of progress. And then another rule that we have, another principle we have is you got to look at your photos, got to look at yourself, because if you're just deleting it and you're just looking for the one that is pleasing or the one that most closely represents the mask that you wear when you have your public face on or your camera face on, we all have a camera face.
You're never going to ease that discomfort.
[00:36:21] Speaker A: That's really interesting.
[00:36:22] Speaker B: So stop deleting your photos.
[00:36:24] Speaker A: Feel like I have a lot to learn.
Actually haven't deleted them. I'm just not really looking at them.
Yeah, it is interesting. And I know that the more you are exposed to your own photo, the more comfortable you'll get because you'll be more used to seeing yourself. It's just not something that I.
Well, when I first started doing recordings, for example, of course, recordings, I had to look at myself, at least afterwards when I was done. And that was so uncomfortable that I was certain that I could not do online education because it was so horrible looking at myself. It just felt so like, this is awful, this is terrible. But then I've done it so much now because I still kept doing it. And it just took me a while before I got tried again. And now I'm on Zoom all day, and I have these interviews, for example, and when I record courses, then I have to sit there and edit them afterwards. So I feel like the exposure is helping.
[00:37:40] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, that makes sense. And video, too, is you're seeing yourself in far more angles than you are in a photo, so your brain could be getting used to it faster.
During the pandemic, when everybody started using Zoom, when you opened up your screen, people were freaking out because it was the non selfie image. It was that reverse image. Do you remember?
[00:38:04] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:38:04] Speaker B: So, because it was distressing and disturbing so many people, and they were complaining like, I can't stop looking at myself when I'm on Zoom with people, and I hate the way I look. So Zoom actually fixed it so they had to go in and add a feature because people were so distressed at this non reversed image that they had to add a feature so you could flip your own image and it would still show the non mirrored image to everyone else, but you could look at yourselfie face.
[00:38:35] Speaker A: Is that how it works?
[00:38:36] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:38:37] Speaker A: Like everyone else see?
[00:38:38] Speaker B: Correct.
[00:38:39] Speaker A: I didn't know.
[00:38:40] Speaker B: Everyone else sees what they want to see. You see what you want to see.
[00:38:44] Speaker A: Interesting.
[00:38:45] Speaker B: So you stay in this bubble.
[00:38:48] Speaker A: Comfortable, comfortable bubble.
[00:38:52] Speaker B: But it's such a pervasive problem that they had to build that feature in for people.
That was probably part of it when you were recording, especially if you were recording on a zoom or something for your workshop doing the videos, it was probably a non reversed image.
[00:39:09] Speaker A: Yeah, it was through, like quick time or something like that. And it was just horrible. And then when I've done my course recordings now, I use my real camera, like my professional camera, and that's the same. Of course, you can't reverse in that. And I think I've tried on some videos, like, can I just flip it once it's done, once I've edited it? But then if I'm sharing something, of course I can't do that because it's sharing it in reverse.
[00:39:38] Speaker B: Yes.
You just have to deal with it. And then the other thing you have to remember too, is you're asymmetrical. Everybody's asymmetrical. Less than 2% of the population is photogenic. Less than 1% would be considered almost perfectly symmetrical. So if your face is symmetrical and you're used to seeing yourself reversed, then when you take that symmetry, asymmetry, it's playing into the distortion. When you see yourself in the non reversed image. So it's like this little layer cake of all this weirdness. So that when you do see that picture that someone snapped of you and it gets passed around and everybody's like, great photo. This looks just like you and you're like, freaking out. That's legitimate.
[00:40:28] Speaker A: Yeah. Is this how I look?
[00:40:30] Speaker B: I know it's legitimate, but when you go online and you google with the bajillion other people googling how to look better in photos, or why do I not like my photo? We hear instead of hard scientific evidence, and then the solution to change it is to use the device that's causing the pain in the first place in a very specific way. And that's what we do inside the self portrait experience. But they say, find something positive to say about yourself. Remember, nobody's perfect. It's just all this bypassing that doesn't make you feel better. The only thing that's going to make you feel better is to understand what's going on and to understand that where you think that there's a wall and you feel powerless, there's actually a whole world of possibility there waiting. And that's the pocket that I tapped into. And that's probably the core of what I give everybody, is I show them the possibility where they feel stuck.
For all those threads that we talked about today.
[00:41:34] Speaker A: Yeah. I think it's really interesting what you've done, because you've got these three different things that you do, and they're all done completely unique. I've never heard of anyone who has your kind of perspective, and it's really fascinating and inspiring.
[00:41:53] Speaker B: Thank you. Thank you very much. I think this is where we're going.
I know there's other voices out there and they're quieting themselves because it's very hard to explain what you do when there's no precedent for it. It's so much easier to say, oh, you know this person. Yeah, we know that person. Okay, well, I do this instead. It's so much easier to do that, which is what we're all trying to do in the marketplace. So I think if we throw that out and just think I'm exclusively the person that does what I do and bring it fresh, it's a really interesting thing to play with, with your own business.
[00:42:31] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm sure. And I am curious, since you do things so differently, and I always ask this, but I'm just really curious of your answer. When it comes to sustainability, what do you think is what makes a business sustainable?
[00:42:46] Speaker B: I think what makes a business sustainable is being able to change easily. And it's everything that we talked about today. I mean, just going back to the simplicity of thinking about what a brand is and looking at your brand as an evolution rather than a brand in a box, and knowing that if you have the tools to evolve it creatively, then you should use them. And if you don't, it's not that difficult to figure it out and to give yourself the tools to be able to do that.
And this is great for anybody starting a business, especially, don't start it with limitations. Don't start it in a box like plan for its growth, because you're going to grow and it's going to grow with you.
And if you're keeping yourself out of your brand, it's a shame because that's the magic. That's the magic. No matter who you are, that's the magic that you're holding back.
[00:43:50] Speaker A: Yeah, that's really great, Lisa. And how can we find you? How can the listeners keep learning from you and where can they find your different offers?
[00:43:59] Speaker B: So find me on the web at thegoldenbrand Co. And then find me on Instagram at thegoldenbrandco.
[00:44:07] Speaker A: Perfect. I will be sure to link to all those, and I'm going to link to your Pinterest board as well because that is something that we talked about and I want to make sure that that's easy to find because it sounded like something that everyone should check out as well.
[00:44:20] Speaker B: Yes, it's a great way to see the evolution of a brand in visuals to get an idea of what that looks like. And the early ones are a little cringe, but I think that's what makes it all that sweeter to look at it.
[00:44:31] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm sure.
Well, thank you for your time once again, this has been lovely and it's great getting to know you better.
[00:44:39] Speaker B: Thank you. You too. I appreciate it.
[00:44:45] Speaker A: You just listened to an episode of sustainable photography. Please share this episode with a photographer you care about.
