When you’re photographing someone or a team for business purposes, how do you interact with them? Do you spend time trying to put them at ease, ask how they want to be portrayed, or just say “stand here, lean back, look here. YES YOU’RE KILLING IT!”? I got professional headshots done by my company with some team photos and I hate how I look in all of them. The headshots I though would be chest up so I didn’t pose my lower half or I was told to pose a certain way and it looks awful. I’ve seen the other’s photos and they look natural and relaxed. I look awkward and rigid. The photographer said maybe 4 sentences in all 5 photos for how I should stand and none look good. I’ve never had photos taken of me outside of school pictures and I really tried with posing tutorials beforehand so I was excited. Was this the norm for team type shoots or do others do this differently? What could I have done differently as a subject to get the most out of a rushed session?
No two photographers work exactly the same. So all we can do is speculate.
I shoot volume headshots, and I rarely have more than 5 minutes to work with someone. You are correct, headshots should be mid-chest up. I personally give a lot of direction, and I also let the subjects choose which image they want to be edited (they get one for volume jobs). The only thing I expect from my subjects is to read my pre-shoot guide (grooming tips mostly) and to listen to my instructions. I wasn’t there, so I don’t know that you could have done anything differently.
I’ve found with headshot work that people are often their own worst enemies. A very common scenario is for someone who actually is photogenic (or who at least photographed better than average) to tell me they hate every single photo, and all of their coworkers tell them “THESE ARE THE BEST PHOTOS EVER!!” Or I get folks who immediately proclaim to me that they are not photogenic, ugly, require an immense level of retouching, etc. before the first photo is even taken. It’s very hard to achieve something positive in a short time frame when someone immediately dumps a ton of negativity into the situation from the very start. So if you began your interaction with the photographer on the “I’m not photographable” train, then that may have contributed. Otherwise, it’s hard to say.
Thanks for the insight. Although it was my first time I actually went in confident and excited but it lasted less than 1 minute then onto the last guy (there were 10 of us). We weren’t given any pre-shoot stuff, just told to show up. I have no idea how to pose properly so I was hoping for more direction but got 3 broad instructions. We also didn’t get to see them after he took them so we couldn’t say anything.