Commercial portrait photography works at many levels. From professional headshot photography to stylish portraits we plan every shoot in detail and make sure the subject is comfortable, relaxed and happy with the final pictures.
Headshots are used by actors, musicians and dancers to get work, the rest of us use them on social media and web sites to make contact at a personal level with our clients.
Portrait photography should be part of the life blood of every business marketing plan.
It’s an old cliche, but people really do buy from people and if you want your customers to connect with you and your staff, the very least you can do is show the who they are talking to.
We produce staff portraits at the place of work, which has the double benefit of showing clients what your staff and your business looks like.
Is a portrait photograph a statement about the sitter or nothing more than their likeness?
If you believe in the latter and have no intention of shifting your view, I would strongly suggest you keep staff portraits off your web site. A portrait is nothing without personality.
If you believe that a portrait says something about the sitter please, please, please don’t use selfies, they really don’t flatter anyone.
Business portraits need to say something about the sitter and their place in the world. And that’s not an excuses for doing boring portraits of solicitors and creative pictures of designers – it’s a bit more complicated than that.
Ansel Adams, arguably the 20th centuries most renowned landscape photographer said, “There are always two people in every picture: the photographer and the viewer.” He didn’t mention the sitter because he preferred mountains to people, but you get the idea.
When shooting staff portraits the photographer has to consider the sitter, the business and the interpretation the businesses clients )and potential clients) will place on the pictures. So if you are accountants the last thing you want to look is dull: If you operate in the health care sector, cool, calm, blue-suited professionalism may well be the order of the day. If you deal exclusively with the creative industries you might want to reconsider the blue suit.
