Anna Wintour’s Fashion Photography Tips

Fashion photography is the genre of photography that intersects with the world of fashion.
This includes shooting spreads for fashion magazines and photographing clothes on runways and in showrooms and on location for lookbooks. Fashion photography can be artful or commercial, but it’s almost always about capturing the relationship between a fashion model and the clothes on their body.

A good fashion photographer doesn’t just take pictures: They are highly knowledgeable about the brands and people with whom they work. When doing commercial work, fashion photographers know the fashion house’s codes. When shooting fashion editorial, they know both the style and styling conventions of the publication. Perhaps most importantly, fashion photographers know what’s going on with the fashion industry right now. According to Anna Wintour, their work should reflect a tangible cultural moment, but the best photographers know how to create an image that will still feel relevant years later.

In addition to a strong understanding of modern fashion, fashion photography requires strong interpersonal skills. On a fashion shoot, the photographer is just one of a large team of people, including models, hair stylists, fashion stylists, makeup artists, and seamstresses. Depending on the dynamic of the shoot, the photographer may become a leader, and it’s usually their responsibility to make sure models feel comfortable.

Fashion photographers generally have more responsibilities than just taking pictures. When working on location, they may have to set up the shot, working with both natural light and artificial lighting. They’ll often work in various locations, including outdoors, in studios, on runways at fashion shows, or couture presentations during Fashion Week. Fashion photographers often edit their own photos, as well.

5 Things You Need to Become a Fashion Photographer
Whether you’re getting started in your photography career or making the transition from another industry to fashion, there are a few tools you’ll need, including:

1. 1. A portfolio and/or photo book: Your portfolio or photo book is where you can show off your best work to potential employers
2. 2. Editing skills: Even though you eventually might find yourself working with a dedicated photo editor, you should still feel confident in your own photo-editing abilities. Get comfortable with retouching photos in editing software.
3. 3. Gear: Have a good set of gear, including a quality digital camera, multiple lenses, and lighting equipment. Know how to use all of your gear, and be prepared for multiple scenarios.
4. 4. Opportunity: You’ll find the most opportunities for fashion photography in New York, Los Angeles, and other cities that fashion designers, supermodels, and Fashion Weeks call home. When you’re ready, consider hiring a photo agent to help you find gigs.
5. 5. Photography skills: While you don’t necessarily need a bachelor’s degree in fine arts, taking a photography class can come in handy. If a school near you offers courses in fashion photography, that can be especially helpful. Develop a wide range of skills, since fashion photography can include portraiture, group shots, action shots, working with landscapes, and more.

The best way to start as a fashion photographer is to practice working with models. Perhaps more than any other branch of photography, fashion photography involves working directly with people. Learn how their faces and bodies move, and practice clear, confident, and personable communication by shooting models: You can start with your friends and then move on to modeling agencies, which will sometimes allow new photographers to practice with their clients.

Once you’re ready to book gigs, build lots of relationships. Fashion designers, art directors, and editors can prove invaluable to your network. And if you can learn from a mentor whose work you admire, even better.

Vogue’s Anna Wintour knows from experience that great fashion photographers have the power to lend transcendent meaning to an image. This is her career advice to aspiring professional photographers:

• Be bold. “We’re looking for somebody that takes pictures in a different kind of way,” says Anna, who looks for strength in an image as well as a quality that will allow it to resonate over time. “[Annie Leibovitz will] give you not only a portrait of a person that you think you might know, but then you look at the image, and you realize that there are layers there that you haven’t seen before.” As you develop your point of view, try different types of photography and be as bold as possible. The more extreme your experimentation, the easier it is to identify the DNA of your imagery.
• Come prepared. Annie Leibovitz scrupulously prepares for photo shoots before she ever picks up her camera. “She is someone that comes to a shoot very, very prepared and knowing who her subject is,” Anna adds. “She’s done her research very much the way the great Irving Penn used to work. It was remarkable. He would read about his subjects. He would study their work. He would talk to them. He would learn about them a little bit more on a personal level.” This helps the atmosphere feel personal and intimate before the shoot begins.
• Hone your eye. Photographer Tyler Mitchell is an example of someone who used every opportunity to understand his own point of view and fashion’s point of view. When he was coming up, he’d photograph everything from events for Vogue.com to the line outside the Supreme store. Anna says, “When you’re starting out on your career, it’s important to use every single opportunity that you can to hone your eye, to develop your eye, and to show your work to people because every day you will find an opportunity.”
• Work your way up to the big leagues: No assignment is too small when you are learning and building your portfolio. At 24 years old, and after working on smaller assignments for Vogue.com, Mitchell got the opportunity to photograph Beyoncé for the cover of Vogue’s September 2018 issue. “To throw an untried, unknown photographer onto the set with Beyoncé without any previous experience with Condé Nast, and particularly with Vogue, might have been a little bit overwhelming,” she says. “But because he had a history with working with Vogue.com, he was much more at ease.” Don’t write off a job just because you think it’s too small (or too big)—you never know where it may lead.

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