The secret to shooting JPEG photos. I got three things for you.

But first, look at this neighborhood. It might be hard to tell with these trees. This house is for sale, and yeah, it looks like an old Spanish villa.

Got some old antiques coming out here, but I bet this house right here definitely needs some work. Fix her up for $5 million.

Yeah, cleaning it out. I would bet somebody probably passed away.

This neighborhood’s crazy. This is just the norm. One of the most prestigious neighborhoods in LA. Probably this, Brentwood, Pacific Palisades, what’s left of it.

I could legit go from this neighborhood and drive for an hour straight down the PCH to Malibu, and there’s probably not a house under three or four million dollars.

It’s just wild how much money is in Los Angeles.

But anyways, on to the point.

Three crucial steps for JPEG photos.

For a long time, I was afraid of shooting JPEG. I didn’t want to mess it up. I finally got over this.

All right, so three things.

The first thing is your metering setting. The second thing is exposure compensation. And the third thing is mindset.

Mindset is actually the most important thing. I’ll cover that one last.

First thing is the exposure compensation, right? This thing.

That one’s easy. You look at the photo on the screen. If it’s too bright, turn it down. If it’s too dark, turn it up.

Boom. You’re set.

Metering mode.

The next important thing is I use multi-metering.

I used to use highlight-weighted, which is fine if you’re just going for that super dark look where the only thing that’s exposed is whatever is being illuminated.

I shot like that on JPEG for about six months, and I like the photos, but I think it was a little bit too limiting for me because all my photos were just a little too similar.

And I don’t care about blown highlights.

If you’re using multi-metering mode, you are going to have blown highlights, especially if you’re shooting closer to sunset or in the morning when the sun’s real low. There’s a lot of deep shadows and long shadows.

If you’re exposing for the highlights during those times, there’s going to be a lot of dark areas in your photos anyway.

So I got away from highlight metering.

Now, the concern is missing shots, which will happen, but it really doesn’t happen to me that often.

I don’t even remember the last time that I shot something and couldn’t use it because I messed up the settings.

I mean, this GR, what is it, seven-year-old technology? It does great with exposing everything the way it should, and I’ve never had a problem with it.

So I’m not even worried about missing shots.

It does happen occasionally, but it would have to be just complete human error on my part. As long as I’m conscious about what I’m doing, whatever. It’s no problem.

But the most important thing is the mindset.

Look at this place. Looks like some mafia, cartel type of video surveillance.

Pretty nice. Got wide streets, parking everywhere. Nice.

All right. Mindset.

By far the most important thing.

Because look, if you are worried about missing shots, you are just not shooting enough photos.

That’s all it comes down to.

So that is the mindset that we need to have.

500 photos a day. 200 photos an hour.

If you’re shooting that much, it’s not even going to matter if you miss a shot here and there.

Like I said, I don’t even remember the last time, but I would say I probably have to delete 1% of my shots right now from shooting JPEG.

So if that’s really that big of a concern, you’re just not shooting enough.

I don’t care if, out of the 1% of shots that I miss, the odds of that being a shot I even want are so low.

And even if it was a great shot, I still don’t care.

I’ll just take more photos tomorrow and I’ll make up for it.

If it was a great shot in the first place, I should have been working the scene and taking a lot of photos anyway.

So if the first one didn’t work out, I should have had some backups anyway.

So that is the mindset.

And it’s also useful, too, if you shoot a lot like me.

Like I’m saying, 500 photos a day. Dealing with all the RAW photos and the backing up and managing all that crap, it just becomes a hassle.

And then you have to deal with the decision-making, right?

That’s why I stopped shooting RAW in 2023, because I started to flirt with color again.

I was like, well, maybe I’ll go in color.

But I think that’s just an unhealthy way to look at it.

The only way we can really strive as artists is to dedicate ourselves to a certain look.

Work within the constraints of that look and just go ham at it.

So yeah.

Mindset, exposure compensation, metering setting, and just shooting a lot so you don’t care if you ruin any exposures.