How to Prep for a Brand Shoot Without Losing Your Mind or Your Style
If you've been putting off a brand photo shoot (because posing awkwardly in front of a camera sounds like actual torture), this one's for you. In this episode, I’m breaking down everything I’ve learned from doing three very different brand photo shoots for my business. From choosing the right photographer and prepping props to nailing the outfits and planning a shot list, I’m walking you through what worked, what I’d do differently, and how to make your next shoot feel fun, intentional, and totally you. Plus, I’ll show you the behind-the-scenes setup and talk through the difference each shoot made for my confidence and marketing!
Transcript below!
Resources I mentioned:
Shout out to Gillian https://gillianrobbphotography.co.uk/
My personal photoshoot Pinterest board: https://www.pinterest.com/hmmm_i_wish/branding-photoshoots/
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00:00 Hey, welcome back. Whether you're listening over on the podcast or watching here on YouTube I'm really really grateful to share these insights with you and that you trust me To hang out and learn a little bit from me and my experiences.
00:12 One of the things I really wanted to talk about Something that has come up with me and my clients over and over and over again is brand photo shoots It's one of those things that people put off, especially women put off Uhm, we want to feel the best about ourselves We want to feel like we're being represented
00:35 well Uhm, it does make you feel really awkward just to be sitting there, or standing there, posed over and over and over again But, I've done three photo shoots for my business over the years, uhm, my first one was in twenty-eighteen, and I've done them over the years and gotten so much life and so much
00:55 value out of them So, I really wish I had done the first one sooner, uhm, because it did two things.
01:03 One, it really legitimized my business. Having professional photos on your website, your social media, uhm, makes you just that much more leveled up.
01:10 But the other thing that I found was that it made me feel really comfortable to promote my business. Uhm, with that level of, like, I feel good in these pictures, I feel like I look put together, I feel like I look professional, website, my social media, uhm, press releases, uh, collaborations, guest
01:35 broadcasting, it all felt so much easier when I had that really professional photo to hand in. So I want to talk first a little bit about the lessons I learned in my photo shoots and And then I also want to show you visual.
01:51 Some of those things and the difference between my different photo shoots. So, let's talk about the lessons I've learned. Uhm, the first one is to find a photographer you're really comfortable with.
02:04 Uhm, so first of all, shout out to my photographer. I've used her for all three of my shoots over the years.
02:10 For the business, I've also had professional shoots for my wedding and for my senior photos. and I'll high school and other various things, but for my business, Jillian has done all of them.
02:21 Uhm, the reason you want someone you're really comfortable with is, I mean there's a million of them, but one is you want to feel relaxed in front of the camera.
02:31 Uhm, and two, you want to to pose if you want to change. Change outfits really quick. If you have a, uhm, what we'll get to, but more of a shot list that you're trying to get through, you want to be comfortable to direct the, to be the creative director of the shoot.
02:54 Obviously, you're trusting them to get the right shots, but you need to be the creative director of the actual shoot so that the look, feel, tone, All of it is exactly what you're hoping for.
03:07 So along those lines, I would, one of the other lessons I learned your research, uh, research wherever feels comfortable for you.
03:17 For me, that's usually Pinterest, YouTube, uhm, and I do research for a lot of these things we're going to talk about, but, uhm, shot lists, props, tips, tricks, uhm, makeup, hairstyles I want to do, outfits I want to wear, all the things.
03:35 Like, do your research both around photographers you want to work with, that creative directory you're going to need to do to get what you want out of the shoot, and just plan ahead.
03:48 So, part of that, I want you to think about where you will be using those images, uhm, is this going to be predominantly social media, is it going to be, uhm, for a different type of PR, it's going to be on your website, how much white space do you need, if, what type of website design are you going
04:09 for, do they need to be horizontal, do they need to be portrait, uhm, think about your orientation, think about your white space around you.
04:18 Are you going to be layering text over these, uhm, think about how all of those things. And then when you come to your photo shoot, come hella prepared.
04:28 Uhm, my first photo shoot, actually every photo shoot I've done, I've done prop shopping, sometimes, first off, I'll shop my house, find the things that I already own that represent my brand, uhm, I wear a lot of burgundy, I wear a lot of gold, uhm, I all my, you know, stationery is already typically
04:45 burgundy, uhm, I will, so I'll shop my house, and then one of the ways that I shop quite a lot for my photo shoots is I will go and by things that are returnable.
04:55 I'll pose them in the shot so that any stickers or anything aren't showing, uhm, but if I just need a really photogenic pen cup, but I don't actually use a pen cup on my desk, uhm, I'll buy one and return it.
05:08 The other thing about that is there's a balance to be struck. You want to be authentic, but also you want it to be photogenic, so use what you can that your own.
05:19 But don't necessarily worry too much if you're going to buy a little bit to have that extra prettiness, right? Uhm, I also, yeah, we're going to talk a lot about this, but coming hella prepared comes with a shot list.
05:36 Every photo shoot I've done, and I'll show you this in a moment, I have a Pinterest board that, um, I have to show the photos that I really love, uhm, I kinda have an in-depth Pinterest board which I'll walk you through before we do, I walk you through all of my photo shoots, uhm, but my point is, my
05:57 point is, that if you have, go through Pinterest and go, ooh, I love that photo, I love how she's posed there, I love what she's wearing there, uhm, it makes a world of difference for you to be able to hand over the tone of the shoot to your photographer and say, hey, have a look, this is what I'm thinking
06:16 . So, and along those lines, outfits, uhm, I've gone a few different ways with outfits over the years, usually, of course, I'm wearing burgundy, I'm also typically already kind of an anti-pattern person, I don't wear a lot of them, but finding things that you would naturally wear that feel good, that
06:34 fit you really well, uhm, if you need to go and see a personal stylist or something along those lines, do it, uhm, because you want to love the photos, we've all received photos of ourselves that we're like, oh, I'm not sharing those with anyone, you want to feel really frickin' good in these pictures
06:54 , right? Another lesson that I learned the hard way, which I'll show you, is to make sure the space is right.
07:01 My first photo shoot, uhm, we did in a coworking space that later did become my coworking space. It's beautiful inside, but it's all very warm and wood and it didn't quite fit right for my vibe, which is kind of vibrant and bright, uhm, with some burgundy to tone it down a little.
07:20 Uhm, my second photo shoot was really good, but it was in a park, which meant everything in my background was, like, vibrant green.
07:27 We did it in the spring, so everything was, like, real, real bright, and green is nowhere in my brand colors, uhm, so the third shoot, we rented a, an Airbnb, got permission to do photography from the Airbnb owner, and it made a world of difference as far as Totally. Oral vibe being really, really good
07:46 for that. Things that I've learned for the day of the shoot, let's, there's, this is a little bit of a chunk, but day of the shoot, give yourself so much time, uhm, give yourself buffer time, you never know how long something's going to take, you don't want to feel frazzled, you don't want to be running
08:06 from place to place, you don't want to be sweaty, you don't want your hair. Hair and makeup coming off, so set up lots of buffer, uhm, I, the day of my last photo shoot, I went and got my hair done, I spent a lot of time doing my own makeup, but, like, let myself do it really nicely, uhm, I went to the
08:23 Airbnb early, I set up all of my outfits, props, uhm, books, like, everything that I brought with me, which I'll show you, and made it look really, really nice, I had put a couple of drinkies in the fridge, uhm, and just really made it as best as I can, like, and then when my photographer arrived, I
08:44 was ready to go. So, as we talked about, make sure you're feeling as close to a million bucks as you can.
08:51 You really want to feel like, hell yeah, this is, I look amazing today, let's go. And, I want that to be my hair, my makeup, my outfits, the music, uhm, do something to get you feeling really centered, whether that be, eh, and whatever that vibe you want to go for.
09:09 So, whether that be a playlist, a really nice coffee, a really nice, uh, cocktail, uhm, doing some dancing, meditating, whatever floats your boat to get in that, the right headspace to have a lot of fun and enjoy this photoshoot.
09:27 The last day of tip I want to give you is to get some b-roll. I've only done this in one photoshoot, well, technically two.
09:35 So, my first photoshoot, a friend came and helped me do my makeup, and she took a lot of background pictures and videos, and that was a lot of fun.
09:42 and my second photo shoot was just me. The photographer didn't really get a whole lot of background. The third photoshoot, I brought my tripod and just put it on various time lapses, recordings at various stages of our photoshoot.
09:56 And I had a lot of really good content from that, it was really useful for reels and things like that.
10:02 So, so good. Use it. It's so good for storytelling. All right, so, All of that are probably some of the biggest lessons that I've learned.
10:12 I want to walk you now through my Pinterest board and my, like, photos that I've gotten and show you the difference between my three photoshoots and lessons I've learned.
10:22 So let's hop over.
10:24 here is my Pinterest board. As you can see, being as organized as I am, it has a lot of sub-boards and things like that.
10:31 But I have a few, uhm, really valuable, uhm, tutorials and resources I found on blogs and things that I've tagged here.
10:39 Uhm, I'll put this board in the show notes for you, uhm, for your resources. but so at first off I have outfits, uhm, this has evolved, this, oh, the other thing I should say is I treat this board, this Pinterest board, as sort of a working document.
10:57 So you can see a few photos and, of outfits I like, there's only a couple in here. Uhm, what I tend to do is go to, back to my own, I have another board on Pinterest about outfits I like and I've got that broken and then the seasons.
11:12 Things like that. So I'll go and kind of add some of those photos from that are more relevant to my personal style at any given time and update this before a photo shoot.
11:21 All right. So I've also got photos of me that I love. Some of these are from my, actually all of these almost are from my professional shoots.
11:30 So there are examples of the photos that my photographers taken that I love the You can see this one I loved so much is on here.
11:36 Here twice. So let's go ahead and remove that, but, um, photos I love of myself. So you can see the vibe I really like of myself, which is, as you can tell, usually a little bit goofy.
11:46 And then I've got flat lays that I like. So it's good. It's important to have photos of your S of things that aren't just your face.
11:55 And we'll talk about that a bit when I show you the difference between my shoots. Um, but having flat lays, pictures of your hands, pictures from above, that kind of thing are really important.
12:04 So I brought flat lays. I like poses. I like, you can see again, it really showcases that fun style. I like kind of a little bit silly, um, and a lot of like, Hey, I work digitally.
12:18 Here's me in my laptop. Right. But trying to keep that as varied and not necessarily as conventional as possible. So these are shots that I just loved.
12:25 I've created this board so that my photographer knows what I'm up for. I also have this dream to eventually get all my team into a room and do a photo shoot.
12:35 So these are the vibes that I want for that day. When it finally happens. And that is my board. Um, keeps me grounded, centered, and on the same page as my photographer.
12:47 Most importantly, my photo shoot. So here's some of the B-roll I did at my last photo shoot. Um, and you can just see this is on a, we'll play, there There we go, like on a bit of a time-lapse, and you can just see all of the little things, and it just made for, I could cut these into various clips and
13:06 use them, and it was lovely. lots of b-roll, was able to use this for lots of things. But, so my professional photos, this was my first photo shoot.
13:14 Again, we did most of this in a co-working space, these top shots here, a few of them we also did in a local coffee shop that had just opened and was happy, like very empty, and very happy for us to come in.
13:25 I did do some shopping, that one I already had this, um, I did some shopping, and you can see, oh, you can see I did my first photo shoot in 2018, and so we were able to get these calendars and use them, and it was really lovely, but remember, Instagram and social media were very different, like these
13:40 types of posts were so cute back then, and aren't really used anymore, uhm, but I can't. I got a lot of things, I had just had my branding done, but you can see very few of my props are in my brand colors.
13:52 They've got the gold, but they've not really got the burgundy. My outfits I did a little bit better, uhm, the shots are, we, my glasses at the time were really glaring, so that's another fun tip for you, if you wear glasses, make sure to get the anti-glare coat.
14:05 So a lot of this photo shoot was done without my glasses, and while I'm not wearing them today. I actually.
14:10 Don't really feel like myself without my glasses, so I learned that I wouldn't want to get the glare coatings on my next glasses and do my photo shoots with them.
14:20 So these were all done in a coffee shop. I had shot lists, a lot of this worked out well, but you can see, I just don't feel super comfortable.
14:27 A lot of this, I just feel kind of posed awkward, a little bit too corporate as well, as much as they're done in, uhm.
14:34 Kind of more fun places, a lot of the photos just feel a little stuffy to me, uhm, so this was my first shoot, this was my second shoot, this was the start, so, uh, these, these photos are actually done at my house, which I felt nice, but there's things, like, about my house that we have really limited
14:51 space, I lived in a terrace house in Belfast, uhm, I hated, we rented and I hated this wallpaper. So, I felt like I had some limitations around that, uhm, but I got to show off, you know, I love our dishware that we had in Belfast and things like that, uhm, but I hated some of the things around it, and
15:11 then these photos were done in a park, and I loved, I loved the ability to bring my Brompton into the shot, and have my favorite bag, and all these things that really felt like me, like I've had this scarf for a number of years, and years, and years, and I was finally in my glasses, and I've had, I still
15:26 wear this bracelet all the time, uhm, so it was so good to have some of those things, like the, the vibe of me, and how I felt, getting to have a little, a little bit sillier, uhm, I didn't get my hair professionally done for this one, but I made sure that I felt really nice in most of the other ways
15:42 , for moving back to the US, I wanted to get, one more photoshoot done with Jillian before I left, and what I love about this shot, this shoot is, we really focused on getting a lot, I felt like I had a lot of really good pictures of my face, a lot of really good pictures of me and my laptop, so we focused
16:02 on getting a lot of pictures of my hands, a lot of pictures from behind, I got to wear this lovely hat that I got from a local maker in this area.
16:13 We did, of course, get some of my face, but less of them with, like, me and my laptop. Like I said, we rented an Airbnb, so everything was, like, I made sure that I picked a place that almost everything was fairly neutral, black, white, etc.
16:29 I owned most of the stuff. I bought this notebook, like I said, and returned it after this, but I owned that.
16:34 I actually bought this cup for the photo shoot. Uhm, I brought in my AeroPress, and we did a bit of that, uh, coffee making.
16:44 I pretended to write in this notebook, but didn't write in it because I returned it. Uh, my AirPods, they have that case on it in real life.
16:52 More pictures of my hands, and so these have come in so much handy, you don't even know. And then we came back as the coffee was done ready, and we kind of finished that.
16:59 Uhm, I brought my phone. I brought because, you'll see later, we have some pictures of me and Whiskey, and, uhm, so there's some Whiskey in this flask, and she took some pictures of me in it, and I was telling, this, all these pictures, I was telling a story about how I tend to sneak this flask into
17:14 events, and I love that it's black and hides at the bottom of my bag. Uhm, I was also brought one of my favorite mugs, I still use this mug all the time, uhm, brought this one over from Belfast.
17:25 the US, and got to put, showcase that with my coffee, uh, put tulips, white tulips, I brought this vase from home, white tulips, uhm, tulips are my favorite, so made sure that I just have that pop, and, you can see, some of these, like, would be crop-able, or blur-able if we wanted, so if I didn't know
17:46 what was in the background of that photo, we could handle that, uhm, but most of them are just really nice, like, you can see just, bits of Belfast, you can see just bits of Belfast and the terrace houses and things back there, which I love, she's got these photos that I haven't actually found the right
18:03 reason to use yet, but it shows me switching my lipstick, so I brought a few different outfits, which I'll show you, and I brought, uhm, a few different accessories, and I just put one point, switched my glasses and switched my lipstick, and switched out my earrings and all of that, so I had just a bit
18:17 more variety, so I went from a neutral color, kinda, to my burgundy, and she took photos of me doing that.
18:23 So you can see, I've already swapped outfits here, like, I think, one, oh wait, there's one at the top here, so, oh yeah, so there's the first outfit, one, and we, this is a 90 minute shoot, to then I put on jeans, but kept the same rest of it, so there's three, four, different top there, and again,
18:49 more photos of kinda me, this is Asana in the background, so things that I talk about, things that I work with all the time, uhm, I sit on the floor a lot, but these ones are in the kitchen and they're so some of my favorites, honestly, like of me and this bottle of Prosecco, and we're just having fun
19:06 , uhm, then there, I switched tops again, so, and, switched glasses, uhm, these, this candle, I ended up giving to my sister-in-law for a gift, I returned, I think, these coasters, Or maybe I gave those to her too.
19:24 and then I've got, you know, my, my lipsticks on the cup, and I wear this clip all the time, and, that's, my face is in a bit of a weird pose there, but, me, working, on the bed, with a glass of whiskey, it's just very, very me, uhm, okay, other tips, from this, we got, this is a, my lead magnet, we
19:44 just, took some photos of this, it's been my lead magnet for quite a long time, so, photos, of this, to use for various promotions, uhm, and then I think one of my favorite tips, and I think I got this from, Ashlyn Nusson, is, to, bring a box, bring some ribbon, and take some photos, so, one of the things
20:00 that I did, back in Belfast, is, all my clients, would've gotten, this, uh, congratulations, you, have either sent me signed up with me, to do, make your business simple, or, you have, launched your new website, and so, we took some photos of that, but we also, I brought another box, and we just took
20:18 these pictures, and this, so, every time I have a sale, or a discount, or a giveaway, I'm able to use these pictures, and they're really, really useful.
20:26 Alright, I brought some other props, uh, my sister I don't know, he gave me this gorgeous bag. Um, some books that were on my shelf, so they're really my books, um, and just got some nice, kind of, b-roll pictures, she got these fun, vid- pictures of me, uh, throwing confetti in there, and they're some
20:44 of my favorites, and I think, we missed the ones, thanks for bearing with me. I had to hunt for a little bit, but I also got this photo.
20:53 You can see these are all the outfits I wore, um, but it also made for this nice synthetic photo. I brought this bowl, there's my bag, one pair of shoes I wore, this sits in my house.
21:00 It's an actual picture, you can't really see, it's kind of glaring, but that's my favorite pub in Northern Ireland. And so, bring as much of it in, of you as can, but don't feel like you have to make your home or your space work for it, because sometimes it just doesn't.
21:16 It's just, practically, things don't always work out that way. I hope you came away with some tips, tricks, and resources from this.
21:24 If you did, like, subscribe, share it with a friend, it really means the world. So, have a great day!
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