The Business Portrait Company turns two-years-old on Sunday, and what are we doing to celebrate? We’re growing!

We’re currently on the lookout for good people to deliver our high-quality photography to businesses across the UK. If you are, or know a photographer who might want more details on how to get involved with us, please visit our photography jobs page.

We’ve proven that there is demand for a professional, dependable photography service in the midlands and are now expanding our portfolio of delighted clients to a national audience.

Click here to learn more straight from our director

Testimonial — Visual Answers

Do you hate having your photo taken? In this video testimonial, Mohammed Bhojani of Visual Answers Opticians tells you his secret in just 60 seconds…

Just a quick one today. Life, and business, are all about value.

Have a think… what do your customers value? Do they value knowing who they’re dealing with when they view your website, when they receive an email, when they view a brochure?

If the answer to any of these is yes, then portrait photos are the way to go. They put you and your team in front of your customers when you can’t be physically present.

Your customers may well thank you for including portrait photographs on your communications both online and in print. They won’t necessarily express it in words, but could well do so in sales.

Why so complicated?

When you’re in a business, it’s sometimes difficult to see the business from the outside; to look at how the ‘lay man’ perceives the products and services on offer.

Because of this, I am revisiting our product offerings right now; working on simplifying our services into a couple of clear categories.

For example, a client of ours neither knows nor probably cares what different equipment, workflow and processing is involved between a studio headshot, a bespoke location shot and a white-background cutout for the web.

We photographers are all too aware that kit packing lists, camera settings and post-production expectations are very different between these styles of photography.

The client, however, just wants a photo that looks good and works hard for their business goals.

So watch this space; we’ll soon be simplifying the pricing of our photography – whether you want a studio shot, location shot in natural light or anything else; same pricing.

What will be different is our premium offering; I’ll be meeting with a hair and make-up artist in a day or so. If all goes well, we will soon introduce a package to include hair, makeup and extended retouching. Watch this space for a fantastic high-end photography offering.

If you’d like to be notified when we’re up an running with this new service, please comment on this post or get in touch.

No surprise in that headline – but rather than using a wooly phrase like that, let’s look at some hard data.

We’ve begun researching exactly how people’s perception is altered by a professional photograph. We took the two photographs of chairs seen in our last entry. We asked members of the public to put a value on each chair – making sure the order they were seen was random to avoid bias.

It’s very early days, but results are encouraging… so far, the average perceived value of the chair in the professional photograph is £196.56 against £177.67 for the non-professional photograph.

Interestingly, the chair in question is on sale for £199, so the professional photo appears to be pretty much bang on the money!

So, on current data, a professional photograph could earn you £18.89 (or 20.6%) more than your previous shots. At those rates, it won’t take many sales to pay for the small amount of additional photo kit and a training session from us. And after that it’s all profit for you with no extra work.

Product Photography Training

Sometimes we tell a potential client that they don’t need us to take any photographs for them. It’s one of those cases where the cost of photography would outweigh any benefits they gain from the improved image, and we’re always happy to admit that.

However in some cases, like a meeting we had last week, we identify that yes, the client would be better off taking their own photographs but they would benefit greatly from some training on how to do so more effectively.

We travelled to Home Office Furniture today, where Mick, the business owner, is looking to really take his business to the next level. He felt that his photographs were letting him down especially since they rely strongly on eCommerce. The quandry was that their furniture, and particularly their chairs really are excellent quality. While they command premium prices, the photos they have taken of them don’t convey that fact at all.

In just a few short hours of training, working over each important detail; and detail really is the watchword here; Mick and his team were taking photos like a professional.

Don’t take my word for it… see the before and after shots below…

There are wise people who say “Treat your client how you would like to be treated.”

There are still wiser people who say “Treat your client how they would like to be treated.”

The Business Portrait Company does its best to follow the latter path. That involves an engagement with our clients, and in the absence of guidance we employ equal measures of inspiration and guesswork.

We believe we offer the very best service available to business photography clients, and this is backed up by client feedback – 70% of clients responding to our survey say they are “Very Likely” to recommend The Business Portrait Company. The remaining 30% say they already have!

Naturally, though, we can’t please everybody and there are sure to be some details we’ve missed; things that maybe don’t seem important to us, but are vitally important to you.

So the floor is open… What do you wish photographers would do? How do you want to be treated? What little things would raise service to turn a satisfied customer into a “raving fan”? Please leave a comment…

Staff Boards – GP Surgeries, Medical Centres

Our latest product is perfect for GP’s surgeries. The short video above introduces our staff boards.

A staff board will help build trust and confidence from your patients; they will also feel more included and more looked-after if your team are on show, rather than hiding behind closed doors.

To discuss staff board requirements, please give us a ring on 01509 808 689 or get in touch via our contact page!

Tips for Interior Photography

While our specialism is in portrait photograpy, we also provide interior photography for clients. Here are a few tips on successful interior photography.

The name of the game in interior photography is precision. The photographer is looking for a clean image, with lines and angles working in harmony with the edges of the image frame.

Kit

Until you wish to move into really high-end interior photography, there is very little kit required for a decent shot:

1. Camera with a very wide-angle lens. Typically 17mm on a full-frame camera. This enables a large part of the scene to be captured even in a small space.

2. Tripod. For precision of perspective correction to avoid convergence (see below). A tripod also allows long-exposures to be taken, allowing high-quality images to be produced in relatively low light.

3. Flash. A flash can be used to pick out specific highlights in a room, or lift areas in dark shade. Under no circumstances should an on-camera flash be used on an automatic setting – this is the best way to remove all atmosphere and character from an interior shot.

Considerations

There are three main factors to watch out for in interior photography; clutter, colour and convergence. If they are not carefully considered, your photographs can turn out lacking a certain something.

1. Clutter – The first thing to watch out for is clutter. Unless the room you’re photographing is very minimalist, you will want to remove a lot of items from the area you’re focussing on.

Start thinking from a bare room containing only furniture, and figure out which fruit bowls, trinkets, ornaments and so on will actually add value to the shot. You want something in there to add life and character, but this is definitely a case where less is more.

2. Colour – Invariably (unless your room has no natural light) there will be mixed light sources in your photograph. The human eye is good at balancing these out and seeing “white”. The camera is not so clever.

All lighting has a ‘colour’ to it, even if it appears white. Incandescent light bulbs appear orange compared to daylight. Daylight appears blue compared to light bulbs. Fluorescent lights add a green tint to everything they light.

The aim here is to balance those lights as much as possible. If you can’t balance the artificial lights and daylight, try turning the room lights off and using only daylight to light the scene. This is where your tripod will come in handy; you will need a long exposure.

If colours can’t be balanced in-camera, there are tricks in postprocessing that can reduce the effects of mixed colour balances.

3. Convergence – Because you’re using a wide-angle lens, a particular problem that appears is ‘convergence’. This is where the vertical lines do not appear vertical, and appear to lean inwards or outwards. Many architectural and interior shots are ruined by this problem.

Looking through your viewfinder with a wide-angle lens attached, point the camera upwards and downwards gently. You will see the vertical lines at the edge of the frame leaning in (pointing up) and out (pointing down) as you move. The aim is to have the camera absolutely level so that the verticals appear truly vertical.

The precision of interior photography means that some correction is required in post-processing for perspective and lens distortion. However, it is well worth getting it as close as possible in-camera.

Planning or Reacting

Like the question of conventional or challenging photography, another aspect of the photographer’s art is whether images are planned or reactive. Many photographers thrive on one or the other of these working styles, a few thrive on both.

Here at The Business Portrait Company, we thrive on planned photography. That’s part of the reason we always offer a consultation before a shoot at no charge; to identify the important aspects of the shoot before getting on-site and bringing the correct order to the scene to tell the required story.

There are a number of services we provide. Though we only generally talk about our speciality—business portraits—we also provide other planned photography such as product shots, food photography and interior photography.

What sets this work apart from, for example, an awards ceremony is the time taken to compose a precise shot. To get it just right in the camera. An awards ceremony gives a few short seconds to compose, focus, shoot and the person moves on for the next one to come along.

Even our standard, simple headshots take around ten minutes per person. The reason is that to really get someone’s character across into the lens a period of warming-up is required. The sitter must be comfortable with the camera. The photographer makes conversation with the sitter, and looks for the areas their life—in work, or outside—that make them most proud… that make them sit up an inch taller, when the chin lifts very slightly, when the eyes exude confidence.

You can never fully plan a photograph; there is always scope for the lighting to suddenly change, or something to suddenly happen that affects the shot. However, by planning as much as possible, the very best results are achieved.

“Planned” does not have to mean “stuffy”. It’s possible to plan to be dynamic, plan to look lively, plan to look natural. Without a plan, the photographer merely reacts to their surroundings; an enviable skill indeed, but not necessarily one suitable for formal portrait photography.