Ray Prevost

Hot off the press, check out this guy.  No, he is not a model, he is Ray Prevost, Photoshop Master.  We were honored to have been able to interview him.  We hope you enjoy, and please check out his website www.photoshopfitness.com

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TPP:  Tell us about yourself.

RP:  Went to San Jose State and graduated with a BS in Microbiology in 1974. Trained as a Medical Laboratory Technologist in 1975 and worked in that profession until 2002. I started my business part time in 1984. By 1994 it was my full time job and I worked progressively less in the lab until I gave up my license in 2002. I received my Master of Photography from PPA in 1996 and will get my Craftsman in Nashville in January. I have two kids, both girls. One is married, my first grandchild due in April, and the other is engaged to be married in October next year.

TPP:   Is it true that you have every version of photoshop saved on your laptop?

PR: No! That is a myth. I do have CS still, as that was the last version that didn’t require activation on the Mac. That’s just in case I travel and forget to transfer my activation to the laptop—at least I will have Photoshop! I do like to keep older versions around so that I can help with Photoshop questions from people with older versions. It’s hard to keep track of which features were added in which version.

TPP:  When it comes to posing at a wedding, what are the top 3 things to remember?

RP: 1) If it takes you longer than 10 seconds to set it up, you are taking too long. 2) If your subject(s) is not having fun, you are doing it wrong. 3) You should already know the next thing you are going to do, but be ready to jettison that idea if the session takes you a different direction. By that I mean, if you ask the groom to do something, and he does it, but not in the way you expected, go with it. I often tease the groom about “doing it wrong” but liking HIS way better. The session should have a script to fall back on, but ad libing gets you a better result.

TPP:  Wacom tablet, or mouse?

RP: Both. I use a stylus for most things in Photoshop but use the Wacom mouse for everything else. I keep the stylus in a coffee cup next to the keyboard so I don’t have to be a good aim putting it down or picking it up. So far, I haven’t put it into my morning cup of coffee.

TPP:  How much can you bench?

RP: I don’t know. Since I work out alone—I have part of my garage set up as a gym—I don’t bench with free weights—too dangerous. Back in my early 30s I could do sets with 250 free weight—until once my spotter wasn’t paying attention and I dropped it! 3 months to recover from the shoulder tear. The machine I have maxes out at 235, and I can do sets of 18 with that weight. But using bench press as a measure is foolish—like measuring a camera only by megapixels. I try to exercise most of the muscle groups when I work out, and I also do lots of cardio.

Most of my friends and colleagues were unaware of the extent of my commitment to fitness, which started in college. It wasn’t until the last few years that I finally got up the nerve to pose for some muscle shots. Of course some of it is vanity, but I also thought it would serve a much larger purpose if I could serve as an inspiration to take better care of themselves. Talking and preaching don’t work well. Setting an example works better. If a guy my age can do it, so can 30 and 40 year olds. It gives me great pleasure when someone emails me with their success story.

TPP:  Whats your advice on posing for senior photography?

RP: That’s not a simple question to answer, but here is it, distilled to one sentence: You need to be sensitive to your subject.  It’s easy for me to identify with the guys, because I know what it’s like. Even the most macho guy can shut down in front of a camera. It can be that inside they don’t feel macho, and are afraid you will show a weaker side of them, or make them look stupid. Sometimes, his appearance can be deceiving—he looks sullen and tough, but secretly hopes that you can show the self that is hidden inside.

With girls, it’s about self esteem as well, but there it is more connected with looks. They want—no, NEED—to be shown that they are beautiful, hot, exciting, mysterious.

And I fully realize that those are generalities—it goes back to my first sentence: You need to be sensitive to your subject.

TPP:  What kind of car do you have?

RP: An Acura MDX and a BMW Z4

TPP:  Where do you draw your inspiration?

RP: Ansel Adams and Edward Weston taught me how to see light, and it is light that I see every day that inspires me. Trying to capture in an image how I feel when I see that light is a lifelong challenge—I always fall short. As far as photographers, the work I see from other photographers, both new and experienced, in my niche or another, challenges me to keep stepping up my game.

TPP:  If you could live anyplace in the world where would you live, why?

RP: I don’t know—I haven’t seen all of the world yet, so any decision is premature. But it would probably be somewhere like the Sierra Nevadas, because I love the mountains. I would like to go back to hiking and cross country skiing again, since I rarely do that anymore.

TPP:  Anything you want to promote?

RP: My site, www.photoshopfitness.com of course. I do have some instructional DVDs for sale there. What I like to do is teach people how to use the tools in Photoshop to correct and enhance their own images. So many photographers think that it is too hard to learn Photoshop. That’s because they get overwhelmed by the huge number of things that Photoshop does. But as portrait and wedding photographers, we don’t need to know ALL of those things. I try to teach those things that I have found helpful to me as a photographer and retoucher. Sometime early next year, I hope to introduce a more interactive site that people will enjoy coming to to learn. Now that I have publicly announced that, I now have the impetus to actually do it!  I will also be teaching a Master class on retouching techniques at WPPI in 2010!

TPP:  What is your favorite photoshop tool

RP: Not really a tool, but Layer masking is the most powerful feature for photographers. If you are not using them, it is like a carpenter using a screwdriver to hammer in a nail—he can do it, but he could do a much better job with a hammer. There are very few images that I work on that didn’t have a layer mask employed at some point. All of my corrective actions have them. And I didn’t use layer masks for the first 10 years I used Photoshop! I was hammering with a screwdriver!

BTW I started using Photoshop in 1992. Version 2.5. It came on floppy discs.