Among other fabulous photographers, I had the pleasure of meeting and learning from celebrity portraitist Brian Smith at the recent San Francisco World Photography Festival.

Based in Miami, he came to the event to share some of the things he has learned from photographing celebrities, CEOs and models over the past thirty years.

A few things I took away from his style, which is very different from my own, yet he makes it work so well, you can’t help but admire his work in the same way you’d admire a Salvador Dali but may not want to hang it on your wall. 

There’s a fabulous shot that doesn’t look like much when you first look at it, but note the careful selection of white against white yet his shoes nearly match the floor; natural earth tone next to natural earth tone. And….it just works.

Whereas this one combines a natural look with a little glitz in the background, but glitz in a solid color making the whole thing feel unified and balanced.

A few other takeaways.

Use contrasts. If you’re shooting a boring subject – a traditional conservative CEO for example versus a Las Vegas singer, set him in a dramatic environment or change his / her clothing dramatically, i.e., outside the office and against a large gold pillar background or his example of putting Bill Gates in a black turtleneck.

OR combine the look of deep rich contrasting colors with contrasting images that don’t appear to go together — on the surface, such as what Brian did below. I LOVE THIS PHOTO btw. 

You can also put celebs or other subjects you’re shooting in different clothing, different backdrops (tennis player in a suit on the top of a large building or an athlete in a graveyard showing their strength/that the rest of the industry should fear them because they’re so good). He made some really interesting points about getting creative with ‘how you depict’ something.

For example, there are several ways outside of traditional thinking you could visually represent wealth or academia or entrepreneurship or design or glitz or fashion or beauty or health. You get the idea.

Other tips on speed….he says, “you don’t always need to shoot 10 frames a second or more, you can do it one shot at a time with a strobe.”

Apparently he uses strobes frequently and on touching photos up in the post shooting process, he had this to say, “I like to touch people up so that they still look real, but perhaps just left a really fabulous spa treatment – in other words, it’s not so dramatic that someone wouldn’t look at the subject and say it’s an unrealistic representation of them.” I thought it was great advice.

The keep it simple message kept coming up, which frankly is a message that works for most things in life. He also suggested not skimping on production or background since the environment (next to lighting) could make or break your shot.

I found him inspiring and down-to-earth, not to mention an easy listen. What I loved about his “show-and-tell” approach was the human part of the shot, i.e., not just what light or lens he used for the shot, but what the environment was like, the situation and occasionally adding funny add-ons throughout. Below is some video that I shot during the session.

Check out his work over at www.briansmith.com, where you can see countless images, ranging from travel, lifestyle and celebrity portraits to fine art and athletes.

Below, Ford’s head of social media Scott Monty on the TWTRCON stage, says, “People don’t change, they want you to think and feel and be just like them.” Globally, trust is down year after year and less than 40% of people trust ads. “Who people trust are third party experts and people like themselves.”

Transparency and authenticity are key when you’re dealing with human emotions and rather than use robotic language that won’t have an impact on people’s emotions. He says, “we’re training people to talk like humans again.” He also emphasized the importance of relevance.

Says Google’s Avinash Kaushik at the recent TWTRCON Conference in San Francisco, don’t get caught up in sheer numbers – whether it’s followers or hits. He also says don’t spend a ton of the time on positive, negative versus neutral sentiment, but focus moreso on people’s emotions. He says with humor, “HITS stand for How Idiots Track Success.” In other words, HITS alone equate to a ‘glorious datapuke.’

What’s even more critical, he says, is to understand the behavior behind tweet purchases & data links.

I've been meaning to attend TWTRCON since its first one now over a year ago, so was thrilled to discover I'd be in San Francisco when their second one hit the west coast last week.

TWTRCON is entirely focused on the business use of the real-time web with social media tools like Twitter a core part of the conversation.  

They highlight case studies from leading brands, workshops led by social media practitioners and mini tutorials about real-time tools. They also collect and publish social media business case studies, statistics and videos on their site.

What I loved most about their event is how well it combined great networking and high quality speakers and sessions with "fun." They had beach balls on the tables and introduced a game at the start of the day as a way to meet others and tweet out a little love about the person you just met.  

Some of my favorite people were on stage, in the audience and sponsors with tables.

As a non-morning person, I was shocked that I managed to make it there for Laura Fitton's (aka @pistachio) early morning keynote which kicked off the day.  

Her message focused around relevance – in other words, don't just go for numbers, go for engagement. And after you kick that into gear and are part of the conversation, remember to use the right analytics tools: links, click throughs, conversations AND context. All are important. 

Kara Swisher interviewed Adam Bain on revenue models, digging for more data on how Twitter will make money. It's clearer that revenue is coming – what's the ole saying? Build an audience first and the money will follow and it's not as if they can't tout numbers – real numbers. 

Adam says they plan to focus on the product plan in the next year and product growth will be key over revenue, at least in the next twelve months.

On future revenue models, he reminds the audience that with traditional display advertising, .5% engagement is considered a win and with Twitter, they're seeing single and double digit percentages in engagement.

Tons of major brands are already using Twitter and setting up campaigns to increase engagement and get customers on board – it's an organic movement that is only growing, not shrinking. Small businesses are seeing a tremendous benefit as well. 

Then, Google's Avinash Kaushik talked analytics. Full of energy and passion, he zipped from left to right across the stage emphasizing all of his key points – with humor…..a lot of humor.

He talked about the whole notion of HITS and tracking hits alone, which he says stands for: (HITS = How Idiots Track Success). He referred to it as a glorious datapuke. 

He reminded the audience not to get caught up in straight hits or simple analytics around positive, negative and neutral. Sentiment analysis is key – focusing on people's emotions and how they're feeling and thinking when they retweet or make a comment. It's important to understand the behavior behind tweets purchases and data links, he says. 

Stefanie Michaels (aka @adventuregirl) talked about the value of Twitter to create change and make a positive impact on the world. 

"In social media, your reward is YOUR reward," she says. In other words, focus on what you care about and talk about that on Twitter and elsewhere on the web.

It can be as simple as helping ten kids out and having an impact on two of their lives in a way that can not only be life changing for them but for you in the journey you take along the way.

They had an interesting small business panel which included Nic Adler from The Roxy Theatre, Andrew Israel from AspenSpin, Akash Kapoor from Curry Up Now, and musician Zoe Keating.

Below, HootSuite's Ryan Holmes, Maksim Ovsyannikov from Zendesk, Sprinklr's Ragy Thomas, and Gigya's David Yovanno talked about real-time strategies and tools now and what's next.

Ford's Scott Monty showed up in a bow-tie and raised the bar for the local geeks who dressed in t-shirts, jeans and sneakers. He shared a few case studies and talked about some of the lessons he has learned through implementing social media campaigns over the last few years.

At the end of the day, people still care about the same things they have always cared about, he says. "People don't change, they want you to think and feel and be just like them." Globally, trust is down year after year and less than 40% of people trust ads. "Who people trust are third party experts and people like themselves," he says.

Transparency and authenticity are key when you're dealing with human emotions and rather than use robotic language that won't have an impact on people's emotions, "we're training people to talk like humans again."  He also emphasized the importance of relevance.

Below are a few random shots…..I'd love to see them turn this into a two day event in the future. Kudos to Tonia Ries and her team for an incredibly well-executed event.

Above: Tonia Ries, Fusicology's Zsa-Zsa Rensch and James Bowyer

Musician Zoe Keating

Kara Swisher

Thomson Reuters' Alastair Goldfisher, Marie Domingo, Harry McCracken, Renee Blodgett

Above – Marylene Delbourg-Delphis and Rachel Polish (taken by Harry McCracken)

HootSuite had a mascot 🙂 The Owl was dancing around all day! (and then some)

Laura and friends sign books – Twitter for Dummies. Twitter for who?? 🙂

And, unlike a lot of conferences, the sponsors actually made sense and were very relevant for the 'conversation.' You didn't feel pitched and the companies that showed up all had a solution for putting together real-time strategies and solutions in small businesses and corporations.

The "relevant" companies included folks like CoTweet, HootSuite, Objective Marketer, ThreadMarketing, tap 11, Foursquare, Sprinklr, ZenDesk, TweetReach, Fliptop and others.

Kara Swisher interviews Twitter’s Adam Bain at the third TWTRCON event, the second in San Francisco, which was held at the Nikko Hotel on November 18, 2010.

Kevin Kelly argues “what evolution wants is the same thing that technology wants” at TEDxSF at the California Academy of Sciences on November 16, 2010.

Jaron Lanier starts his TEDxSF talk in San Francisco this past week by playing an instrument from Laos which originated 8,000 years ago and still has close to its original design. It’s the first human made thing that has rows of keys with an on and off. The instrument has a remarkable history across cultures and the Romans apparently stole the design as have others who have adapted its design to create other instruments around the world. He talks about how the connection between “it” and technology.”

Hear the latest from Yahoo’s Carol Bartz at this year’s Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco.

Journalist Adam Lashinsky interviews Zappos’ Tony Hsieh and Susan Lyne with Gilt Groupe on eCommerce and managing hypergrowth.

Toni Schneider from WordPress at the Web 2.0 Summit this past week.