Photographing models when you aren't skilled at photography

 Saying I'm not skilled at photography would be an understatement, barely good enough is more accurate. I've been trying to get used to the more professional standard DSLRs that the uni has and for a while I was doing pretty well. I did 2 photo shoots with  my models and while I now realise I did make some relatively obvious and simple mistakes (not framing the model properly, having the photos be in the wrong format) none of these were awful they just gave me a bit of extra work to make them serviceable. I had had some trouble with the camera going out of focus but with some lens adjustment and some simple setting changes I could always get the image sharp enough to draw from (probably not to be a usable photograph in it's own right though).

When it came to my third model however the camera just would not focus, at all. The worst thing was some of the images looked okay on the camera at least only to be a blurry mess when I uploaded the photos. I've since realised how to properly focus a camera and make sure it stays focused but that doesn't change that I've wasted a session with a model (one unwilling to come in again). Some of the photos are actually usable because although I'm awful at photography I can make up for it with my drawings, however I can't really use the photos to make large scale work that I'm thinking of because too much of the detail has simply been lost.
I can always take more photos of other models but I'm ideally going for a specific style that is hard to find in Huddersfield, even the current models are a pretty big compromise. I'm going to start being less uptight about the models I work from though otherwise I simply won't have enough material to work from to create what I want to achieve.
Since taking these photos I have been to a photography workshop and now know where I went wrong and how to take far far clearer and visually appealing photos.