Headshot Highlight: Actor Headshots with Michael

Although interior shoots are my main jam, I also offer headshots in my little home studio. The studio space is perfect for shooting headshots, whether you're an actor/model, a content creator, an estate agent, a creative, or part of any other professional industry. Having an up-to-date headshot is crucial for your personal and professional branding for too many reasons to go into here - I hope to do a full-length post to discuss this in the future!

Mike & Rachael's Old Flat

Michael - Mike - came to me looking to book his first-ever headshot session. As it happens, almost a year earlier, I had met Mike's partner Rachael, while shooting their apartment near Sefton Park. It was a lovely place and a pleasure to shoot!

We booked the headshot session for a weekday evening. Looking to get into acting & modelling work, the high-contrast style headshots Mike was looking for meant natural light was substituted for studio lighting, so we were able to shoot late on a February evening.

Rachael tagged along for the shoot, and after a brief meet & greet we had a quick chat about the kinds of shots Mike was after and the intended purpose of the shots. With Rachael chillin' on the studio sofa, we got to work. I positioned Mike on a stool pulled out in front of a white backdrop. We tested out the white & black backdrops but as Mike was wearing a black shirt, the white worked better, with more separation. With tweaks to the position of both the subject and lighting, I chose to make the white appear grey for a moodier aesthetic. The flexibility of a white backdrop is amazing!

With the right technique & know-how, white backdrops can be presented as clean and bright, like when shooting e-commerce style product photography, soft and dreamy for baby & family portraits, or deep and high contrast for headshots such as this.

(I've said it once and I'll say it again - pay your photographers what they deserve !).

As this was Mike's first photo shoot, I gave him guidance on how to hold his body and micro-expressions. Subtle chin tilts, relaxing his jaw, adjusting the position of his head, and softening his eyes were familiar prompts to him by the end of the session. For a newbie, he was great at taking directions and doing so in a subtle way - all about those subtle micro-expressions with headshots!

The eyes should be deliciously crisp and the centre of attention in any headshot.

Mike has very piercing eyes so I wanted to capture their depth in sharp focus and ensure he was really interacting with the camera, looking straight down the barrel of the lens. This can make or break a headshot and he definitely understood the assignment!

We stuck with the classic black t-shirt so as not to distract with any bold colours, and we played around with Mike's hair & glasses on/off (he was an absolute pro at whipping out his contact lenses!). The black background as shown below was a little stark and all-consuming and didn't provide the separation we were after. It does however highlight Mike's features for a more striking shot.

Take a look at the final edited images. And if you would like to book your own headshot session - get in touch. I would love to work with you!