Photography Tutorial · 2020-12-27
Two Photographers, One Scene: Planning and Shooting Process Revealed
Thomas Chu Photo
For photography, beyond camera settings and post-processing, the ideas and planning before shooting are also crucial.
In the same scene, how would the thinking of portrait photographer Wuxian TX differ from mine? In this week's tutorial, we share our planning ideas and exploration process for shooting in Northwest China.
Video Tutorial
▶ Watch the video tutorial on Bilibili
This is the fully illustrated companion to the video above. Thomas and portrait photographer WuxianTX traveled together to the desert of Dunhuang to face the same scene — one treating the desert as subject, the other as backdrop. The video records their planning and on-location process; keyframe screenshots follow in order, showing how two photographic minds unfold.
01 The Landscape Eye: Finding the Desert's Character
In portrait work the desert may serve merely as a backdrop to set off the model (at 0:58 in the video); for a landscape photographer, the desert is the subject itself. So Thomas's first step is hunting the desert's character — its most expressive aspects, the features that speak of local geography and landform (at 1:10 in the video).
Wind sculpted the desert into rich layers and fine textures, so Thomas uses light and close frames to render the dunes' layering, detail and grain (at 1:24 in the video); at dusk the raking light traces every ridge line with clarity (at 1:41 in the video).
Another detail moved him: Dunhuang's desert is not lifeless — tough, stubborn plants live between the dunes (at 1:47 in the video). He wanted to show the desert's vitality: in one frame, a plant photosynthesizes in the foreground while the Dunhuang solar-thermal power station stands behind, also turning light into energy — humanity's use of natural light answering the plant's (at 2:02-2:19 in the video).
On location Thomas composes deliberately: a river in the foreground, a dune edge mid-frame and a distant tree placed at center, the rising dune behind pushing the frame toward a high-key look (at 2:48-3:00 in the video). His settings: ISO 200, f/16, 1/500 s — the small aperture keeps everything sharp and guards against overexposure from the reflective sand, with extra frames for safety (at 3:02-3:18 in the video).
02 The Portrait Eye: Good and Evil on a Clean Backdrop
WuxianTX's theme is "Two Faces" (at 4:11 in the video): the opposition and unity of good and evil in human nature. He chose the Dunhuang desert for its clean, minimal elements that let the theme speak; the stylist prepared black and white suits to stage that opposition (at 4:17-4:36 in the video).
Scene selection follows the same logic: relatively clean yet not empty (at 4:37 in the video). The vocabulary of the shoot includes role-swapping between the two sides of a character, close-ups of their coexistence, mirrors expressing the opposition of two faces, and entangled bodies — making the inner struggle between good and evil visible (at 4:49-5:22 in the video).
03 One Scene, Two Answers
This Dunhuang trip reveals what happens before the shutter: the ideas, thinking and preparation of two photographers (at 5:40 in the video). A photo carries far more pre-work and thought than it shows — the landscape photographer hunting landforms and light, the portrait photographer hunting theme and styling — and one desert thus grows two utterly different bodies of work.
Shooting and post for the project ran entirely on the new large-screen Dell XPS 17 (at 6:11 in the video) — a machine balancing display quality, performance and portability, a capable companion for editing on the road. Thanks as well to the sponsors and audience for supporting the event (at 5:57 in the video).
1. The core difference between landscape and portrait is the subject — one hunts the land's character, the other lets the environment serve the person; 2. To express a landscape, capture its features first: layers, texture and light, then narrative elements like life in the sands; 3. Portrait work starts from a theme, with styling, props and a clean scene all serving that expression; 4. A good photo carries immense preparation and thought before the shutter — mindset decides how one scene yields different answers.
Works by Wuxian TX
Works by Thomas
