Whether you’re preparing for Your Headshot, or Promotional Video, the following information holds true. There’s a lot more to it than just showing up! Like the saying goes “It takes two to Tango” is true here as well! Spend some time to prepare yourself properly and you’ll see a much greater return.
The Philosophy
Relax it’ll be easy, PROMISE. Have fun!
First Some Thoughts;
Your Eyes are critical to making you stand out. THEY ARE THE WOW FACTOR! The eyes define a person. They are the windows into the soul. The eyes are one of, if not the single most, important parts of a great Headshot, or Promotional Video. It is the first feature noticed!
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Click HereIt is also the one place where a night on the town, little or no sleep, or a hangover shows a lot! Yes I can retouch a portrait but it will never look right under these conditions. And. . . there really is no retouching for video.
YOU WILL LOOK YOUR BEST WHEN YOU ARE WELL RESTED, RELAXED IN A POSITIVE FRAME OF MIND AND RARING TO GO!
Consider What You Want to convey in your image. Strong confident appearance of an attorney or doctor, or the soft friendly look of a friend, or maybe a big toothy smile, or no smile or a hint of a smile. All these are right, there is no wrong, it’s all in what you want to convey
Don’t worry if you are not certain about this, we’ll help you figure this out, but if you can come in with your own ideas that will help!
REMEMBER. . . A QUALITY HEADSHOT SHOULD CONVEY SOMETHING TO THE VIEWER not just a pic mom took because you look so cute
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9 Tips, Let’s Begin. . .
Clothes:
- Solid colors always look great in both Photo’s & Video.
- No bright colors or neon looks. It’s all about you, not the clothes! However, there are occasions in some Editorial Shoots where they are used. If this is the case, you’ll be notified in advance.
- If going with a pattern keep it simple. Let’s not wear bold colors, like plaid shirts, dresses with flowers or animals etc. They distract from you.
- Start with a simple shirt or blouse and slowly add layers.
- Turtlenecks completely hide the neck, which is very unflattering, and should be avoided.
- NO DESIGNER LOGO’s ON YOUR SHIRT or JACKET UNLESS IT IS YOUR COMPANY.
- Make sure that ALL clothes are ironed and pressed before your session. Wrinkles in clothes are difficult to “Photoshop” out of a photograph and impossible in a video. Don’t expect the studio to do this. WE DON”T
- Remember, we are creating your marketing/sales tool. I want to focus on your eyes and not be distracted by your clothing.
- Bring a lint brush or roller with you.
- Don’t worry about shoes if we’re just doing headshots. Be comfortable.
Jewelry:
- Accessories are great but you want to avoid distracting accessories, such as large, shiny jewelry.
- If you have pierced ears, wear studs or small hoops.
- No matter how much you love your gold necklace, remember it will take the focus away from your face.
Hair:
- Bring a brush and some hair product (gel/hairspray) with you to the shoot to help calm fly-a- ways.
- Generally we do not recommend that new hot hair style for ladies, especially the morning of the shoot. We cannot change your hair style in the resulting image. (We have found if you don’t love your hair you will not love your photo making the shoot a waste of time and money.)
- If you must get that new hairstyle have it done a week or two in advance. You have time to get used to seeing yourself with it and if you don’t like it, you have the time to change back.
- Understanding that you should look like your headshot photograph, choose a hairstyle that you can easily recreate.
- If you can afford it, hire a hair stylist for the morning of the shoot.
- Men: If you need a haircut we recommend you get your haircut 4 to 5 days prior to the shoot so it doesn’t have that “freshly cut” look.
Makeup and Face:
- Start natural. Just enough to cover up any blemishes. Avoid heavy makeup, like you’re going out to the club! Wear normal work day makeup. During finishing of your selected images, we will take care of blemishes and other ‘artifacts’ on your skin during the basic retouch process. Heavy makeup tends to look caked up. Remember that my cameras and lenses produce images at far higher definition than even 4K TV and my job is to flatter you, but your headshot has to look like the person that walks into the room!
- Try not to use matte styles of makeup. It will dry out your skin.
- Bring your makeup with you to the shoot in case you need a touch-up.
- Bring lip balm or lip gloss with you to help keep lips looking soft.
- Don’t do any extreme beauty regimens right before your shoot, like facial peels, waxing or extensive exfoliating. Your skin can look very irritated.
- Get rid of any unwanted hair a few days before your shoot. Clean up brows and upper lip hair.
- Tanning often leads to burning and at least irritates the skin. Spray on tan’s are never even and often look fake. Please do NOT do either just let us know and we can give your image the tanned look in post-production.
- If you can afford it, hire a Makeup artist to do your makeup and stay with you during the shoot for a touch-up.
- FOR MEN. Shave right before you leave for your shoot. A 5 o clock shadow can NOT be retouched out.
Teeth:
- Avoid anything that may stain your teeth on the day of your headshot photographs such as coffee & grape juice.
- If your teeth are noticeably yellowed or stained, don’t worry we can easily whiten and brighten your teeth with a little bit of photo enhancements.
- Eyes – Glasses
- Bring clear contacts with you if you wear them.
- If you normally wear glasses and have a strong prescription, we do advise that you visit your opticians and either borrow a pair of blank frames or get them to remove your lenses for the shoot.
- Depending on your eye glasses we can have problems with reflection and refraction. Invariably we’ll shoot some shots with and some without glasses.
- You might like to bring along a couple of pairs of frames.
- Attempting to retouch out eye-glass glare is very difficult and never looks quite right.
Eyes – Glasses:
- Bring clear contacts with you if you wear them.
- If you normally wear glasses and have a strong prescription, we do advise that you visit your opticians and either borrow a pair of blank frames or get them to remove your lenses for the shoot.
- Depending on your eye glasses we can have problems with reflection and refraction. Invariably we’ll shoot some shots with and some without glasses.
- You might like to bring along a couple of pairs of frames.
- Attempting to retouch out eye-glass glare is very difficult and never looks quite right.
Nails (Yes, Nails!):
- Your hands may end up in some of our shots, so get a manicure for your nails.
- For women choose a neutral, skin tone polish, or a clear coat, so as not to distract from your face.
- For men a clean trim is enough.
Posing. . .
- If you are like most people you probably hate to be posed! I know, so we don’t pose you. We give you direction like a good movie has a director we will direct you to get the best angles and expression. It may feel a little funny, but trust me you’ll look great.
- Relax, let’s have some fun. You may even like some of my corny jokes.
- Do think about what you want to convey before your shoot day! Some people prefer a strong look with no smile, some people prefer a slight smile and yet other people want a real big toothy smile. That is part of our direction, to help you get what you want to convey. (There is NO Right or WRONG 🙂 Unsure, call we’ll talk about it.
- Remember, this is a collaboration, we both want it to look spectacular, so don’t hesitate to ask questions or express your ideas. Guaranteed we will be asking you questions.
9. Wrinkles, laugh lines & spots…
- We can never escape the aging process totally but we can help reduce the visible signs. Generally we use a soft wrap-around lighting which helps to naturally smooth lines.
- Remember though, we can NOT retouch Video, so following the above guidelines will definitely be recommended.
- We also do basic retouching on your images to soften lines, remove scars, spots, and generally clean up the face. However some things such as a mole or wine stain we ask you before we even consider removing. (Cindy Crawford would go crazy if her famous mole was removed.) or Who would ever want to say good-bye to Harrison Ford’s chin scar? We never remove lines completely as it looks too false, we can help to reduce them further should you feel the need.
Have question we didn’t cover Please Call 734-513-8100 for added questions!