If it's a studio shoot with inexperienced models, I'll always sketch out my ideas, and even ideas for poses for the models.. honestly tho, I'd much rather not have to direct him/her to that extent, so if I can throw them in there and they knock out pose after pose great, I'll just shoot away, but it's good to have some ideas sketched down roughly in case they do need more direction, and also in case you have specific results you need out of the shoot, eg. changes of clothes, backdrop, pose, beauty, full-body, styling, lighting. Like I might want to shoot the full body quite dark and dramatic, but do the beauty shots flooded with light and angelic, so I'll sketch out my lighting set up for each one, with some notes for props, make up, clothes, poses for each look..
I don't always stick to the shotlist, but I always check it to make sure I haven't forgotten anything very important.. if things aren't going as planned, take a break, or change something, or take a break while changing something!!
If it's an outdoor shoot, I don't bother with anything like the above, it's a lot more spontaneous, and you're at the mercy of the weather (Ireland
), so you get on location, and just shoot while walking around and getting good spots, one thing you could do is check the location beforehand and just see where you think will be good for each shot, so you might have water in one area, a cool rock close by, a field beyond that again, and that's your three shots, faffing around with bits of paper on location just bothers me, so it's all about the model really and you can still direct her, it's just what looks good on the day, that suits the model, suits the weather (eg. a shot list is fine, but on the day if the sky is white and you wanted moody, you might shoot her against a rock instead or whatever!)
I think your two rules are PERFECT..
