With most of our communication being via the internet (whether it’s through emails, texting, video chatting, or social media sites like Facebook), we lose a lot of in person communication–which happens to be my favorite! I absolutely understand when potential clients or clients are unable to meet up in person due to hectic schedules and conflicting times, but when possible, I strongly encourage in-person client meetings! Why? It allows for a clear connection between the photographer and those to be photographed! Let me understand your vision and style if you want a personalized shoot!
Just yesterday I met with a wonderful musician, Tara Honda, to plan out her lifestyle portraits session! Tara and I had been communicating via email for about a week or two to get down the basics of what she wanted her photoshoot to feel like and what I envisioned for it as well. When we finally met up together, we hashed out all the details and had great conversations about it all! Maybe you have a pretty good idea of what you want to bring to your photoshoot, or maybe you have no idea, I would be absolutely thrilled to help you out with that!
Tara and I met at one of our local Starbucks. There are a couple of things to discuss during a client meeting, such as locations, outfit choices, props, and other little nitty gritty details! For engagement sessions, there is more to discuss since there’s more than one person involved (& weddings require even more fun discussion)! What kind of details do we discuss during a client meeting you might ask?
Here are three things I make sure to discuss during client meetings! They might sound a bit obvious, but to get a better understanding of why it might be important to discuss these things in person (or on the phone) rather than email, here are a few reasons!
1. OUTFIT CHOICES
Believe it or not, but outfits are a pretty big factor in portraits–whether it be
If you can, bringing possible outfit choices to your client meeting can be extremely helpful because it allows me to see what you’re thinking about wearing! Of course I want you to wear what your style is, but there are certain outfits in your fabulous wardrobe that might photograph better than others! Bringing your ideas to the client meeting allows me to help you make decisions on what would look best for certain locations! Engagement portrait outfits are even trickier to pair, so it’s extremely helpful to bring those together as well!
Tara brought a couple of pieces that she wanted to wear for the photoshoot! This allowed me to narrow out her style and figure out what kind of poses were possible with her awesome outfit choices! She didn’t have all of them together yet, but bringing just the couple of statements allowed me to see what she had in mind!
Sometimes I do meetings before outfits are chosen, and that’s okay too! Sending photos of your outfit choices is also a very helpful way of communicating to me what you want to wear, and what your style is! It’s best to show me photos of them when they are actually on, since fit can also affect how portraits are photographed as well! If this is the case, I like to discuss what a client might have in mind before they show me their outfit picks!
2. LOCATIONS
This is pretty standard as well, but discussing locations during the client meeting can be really helpful! We may have locations in mind, but as we discuss your style and your outfits, sometimes those ideas can change into better suited locations!
Tara and I had discussed locations over the email, but after seeing her outfit choices and ideas, I felt like certain things had to be changed to accommodate her particular style!
3. PROPS
As I have mentioned before in my “How to Rock Your Photoshot” blog (here), props can be helpful during photoshoots! Other times though, depending on your style and what you’re looking for in your portraits, they may be distracting! Bringing props and discussing them during client meetings also helps me help you figure out what will help your photoshoot look best!
Or, if you don’t have props, but are thinking about doing them, I find that discussing prop possibilities over client meetings allows for major brain storming to occur! For instance, during my client meeting with my future engagement session, the bride-to-be and I discussed several prop ideas that fit her theme and her style! It was a great time of bouncing ideas off of each other to help figure out what would work best!
Sometimes these discussed ideas might not be completely settled by the end of the client meeting, but it’s my goal to have a better idea of my client’s style and desires, & to have my clients have a better idea of what they want to bring along to the shoot!
HELPFUL TOOLS FOR CLIENT MEETINGS
There are a couple of tools that I love that help a client meeting be more objective, or better understood!
One of my favorite tools is: PINTEREST. If you talk to any invested pinner, you will be warned that it is a huge time-sucker! I try to limit my times on it, but it’s quite difficult! It’s an awesome place for putting your ideas together (you can follow me here if you’d like)!
My past two client meetings involved Pinterest sharing, which was an invaluable tool for me to clearly understand the style and feel of how both clients (an engagement client and a portraits client) desired their shoot’s feel to be–whether it might be through outfit examples, color schemes, etc.!
EMAIL is another great tool! If you don’t have Pinterest (or you just don’t want it), email is a great way to show me the photos and inspiration you might have in mind! If you email me the photos beforehand, it allows me to pull them up and bring them along so we can discuss them at the client meeting as well!
If you really can’t do client meetings in person (like if you’re hiring me from another part of California, another state, or even country), it’s okay too! Like I stated before, this can be done via Skype, email, etc! We can make it work! I’ve done photoshoots with little communication and photoshoots with more communication! My point is, the more communication there is between you and I (whether it be quick emails here and there, ore more detailed emails), the better the understanding of each other we’ll have for when the final shoot day arrives! Which subsequently means you get to feel a little bit more at ease the day of! :)
So what’re you waiting for? BOOK YOUR CLIENT MEETING WITH ME HERE! Tell me your ideas and thoughts, & what kind of photoshoot you’re interested in having done! OR tell me about your future wedding! Those client meetings are my favorite! ;)
I think client meetings are a great time to connect with your photographer! & It’s an awesome time of getting to know me before you get in front of my lens!
Happy Friday everyone!