Design & Style, Arts & Entertainment

Principles of Narrative: Concept, Research, and Pitch

Lesson time 11:54 min

With a focus on editorial photography, Jimmy teaches you how to construct a photo narrative to win magazine clients and tell a compelling story.

Students give MasterClass an average rating of 4.7 out of 5 stars

Topics include: Concept: Find the Bigger Story • Research: Dive Deep Into Your Subject • Research: Develop Empathetic Relationships • Pitch: Share a Layered Narrative

Jimmy Chin

Teaches Adventure Photography

National Geographic photographer teaches his techniques for planning, capturing, and editing breathtaking photos.

Preview

I'm going to talk about the editorial process. I think there are a lot of different approaches that you can take. I'll talk a little bit about how I think about it. You know, there's probably four main areas to examine. There's the concepting of the idea. There's the pitching of the idea. There's the execution of the shoot. And then there's the edit. When you're thinking about a story, you want to have a lot of layers to it. I think probably the best way to illustrate some of these points is to talk about a specific "National Geographic" assignment that I came up with, pitched, shot, and then it eventually became a magazine story. So not every shoot is for "National Geographic." Usually you have some editorial control over the images that you share with the publication that you are shooting for. And clearly, you know, "National Geographic" holds the highest standard for kind of visual documentation. And they're a magazine that I always dreamed about shooting for. But that also makes it very challenging. And, you know, I don't think there's any photo shoot that I do that I feel more pressure on than a "National Geographic" assignment just because of your peer group and the bar that they've set and the expectations of the editorial staff. So I came up with an idea to shoot a story about Yosemite, which is very close to me. And it was about the climbing culture of Yosemite. And I knew that "National Geographic," you know, loved to do stories on the national parks. There's obviously a lot of visual opportunities there. But I also know that they've done stories on Yosemite. So I wanted to show another side of the park. My thinking is that, OK, you know, a national park pitch is something that they would like. And if I could put-- if I could pivot that in some way that would bring a new perspective to it, that would, you know, give me a better chance at landing the idea. So I thought about the climbing culture of Yosemite and kind of like what was happening in Yosemite, the cutting edge of climbing. And the idea behind it I knew had to be even bigger than that. And so what I had been seeing in climbing, in particular, but in a lot of sports, was that, you know, there were people pushing the boundaries of climbing. And every time you thought that, you know, we had achieved the highest human potential, somebody new would come along and break that barrier. And over the years, I started to realize that, you know, there was nothing that you could claim to be impossible because someone seemed to always break that barrier. So if you extrapolate from that idea, you know, the broader idea that I wanted to kind of examine is that the human potential is kind of infinite. So now the story had some depth. You know, we were looking at how beautiful Yosemite was. You had a subculture that you could kind of dig into. You had these physical achievements that you could shoot. And it was pointing to a larger idea beyond that, which was about h...

About the Instructor

Jimmy Chin has built his career taking photos at the top of the world, earning him the cover of National Geographic and multiple awards. Now he’s taking you on location to teach you techniques for capturing breathtaking shots. In his photography class, learn different creative approaches for commercial shoots, editorial spreads, and passion projects. Gather the gear—and the perspective—to bring your photography to new heights.

Featured MasterClass Instructor

Jimmy Chin

National Geographic photographer teaches his techniques for planning, capturing, and editing breathtaking photos.

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