Headshots 101, part 1: Who are you?

Who Are You? A picture is worth a thousand words. Think of your headshot as the biography that makes you irresistible to your target audience. The art of taking good headshots is the art of visual rhetoric. Your headshot's job is to speak plainly, simply, and powerfully on your behalf, seducing your potential client or boss with an enticingly authentic vision of yourself. First impressions count, and these days we rarely have the luxury of making the first impression in person. HR departments search online for an applicant’s professional and personal information before making a job offer. And, just as in real life, people on social sites judge you based on what they see. So why not use that fact in your favor? Humans are a visually-oriented species. Use this knowledge to control the image you project. Together, we'll create a compelling visual story for you.

A headshot is the visual story of yourself that engages your audience with you in the way you choose to engage them. What story do you want to share? What conversation do you want to inspire in your audience? What's your job, what's your brand, and what do you want to communicate with your market? A personal headshot shares less of your commercial brand and more of your off-duty personality. It can be more casual or more glamorous than a professional headshot. A personal headshot invites a broader spectrum of options for wardrobe, styling, and background, because we are more free to create the world we want the image to live in as well as the personality we want to inhabit in it. A professional headshot will have a clean solid background, but a personal one can have a setting.