I recently joined a few fellow photographers in a volunteer project call Help Portrait earlier this month. I am hoping to follow up on that experience in the near future, but that’s not what this post is about. It’s about a different kind of experience, or almost lesson, I learned volunteering that day, regarding…

Shop Talk.

We all do it, almost just rolls off the tongue… talking tog slang that is. And I’m sure the more you are into photography, the easier it is for you to “talk the talk” and even becomes a habit. I even do it naturally in my ‘day’ job (us internet marketers love our acronyms.) You see it a lot in the industry mainly because, well, let’s face it, pho-to-gra-phy is a pretty darn long word. I mean we’re talking 4 syllables or more just for one word!

I’m sure some of you have even heard people with conversations like “while shooting, the photog went down a few stops to really pop the bokeh.” (Ok that might be a little over done, but believe me, I’ve heard worse! ) Heck, I’m even guilty of doing it a lot. I think it’s because I surround myself with such a great group of photographers that understand this industry speak. I really had’t encountered any problems with it until…

That Saturday Morning.

What I didn’t realize was speaking in this comfy and familiar language is hard to shake when around the non-photo community. Surrounded by a group of my peers, we quickly set up our equipment at the local Women’s and Children’s Shelter, excited to help out on the big day. We finally had the first set of ladies ready with hair and makeup when I was to direct them to their photographer for the day.

I quickly introduced myself and shook hands, eager to meet everyone, asking them if they were ready for their picture to be taken. I walked them to the set and asked Mike, their photographer that morning, if he was ready “to shoot them”. Mike smiled and nodded at me, but I could tell I struck a nerve with our model to be.

Now this is classic photog speak for taking photos. We shoot things. I even consider it kind of our hip lingo, BUT I had not accounted for one small detail… We were volunteering at a Women’s Shelter, where we were not allowed to publish any photos or names due to the fact that a lot of them were escaping domestic abuse situations.

Lesson Learned

I felt bad about it when I heard others use those terms throughout the day. I’m not sure they encountered the same reaction I had and most likely did not think twice about using this slang.

I did however meet up with a fellow photog who had been photographing at the main shelter and had been calling everyone ‘subjects’ (a term used in legal proceedings which a lot of the folks at the shelter had been or were currently going through.) He told me he realized that he needed to change his choice of words to ‘clients’ so that everyone would feel more at ease, including himself.

I realized that something so simple could mean so much. Ultimately the lesson I learned is that I need to be receptive to my working environment. I can still talk shop on twitter or forums, but out in the field I need to lose the lingo in order for my customers to feel comfortable in front of the camera and with me.