The Headshot Doctor’s Spot My Photos Settings for High Volume Headshots

When I do a high volume headshot shoot I always use SpotMyPhotos to easily distribute my images.  Using the power of AI facial recognition, it automatically creates private galleries for each of the people I photograph and a gallery with all the images for me to give to the event organizer so they have all the shots.  I absolutely adore it.  

I’m able to give my clients the option of real time delivery of the un-retouched images, I can use SpotMyPhotos instant Auto-Optimize feature which decreases a bit of under eye circles and whitens teeth a bit, or I can do in-person image selection with each person and can then retouch the images and have them show up in their personalized galleries when I am ready to have them sent out.  Generally I prefer the real time delivery because it produces such a WOW factor.  They can select their favorites to be retouched within their private online gallery too.

So you want to give it a try? Here’s how I set up my camera and lights for high volume shoots. 

The first choice you need to make is your lighting setup. When I am in my studio I normally shoot using one of Peter Hurley’s signature lighting setups. These involve the lights being very tight on the subject and in the frame. After the shoot is done I remove the lights in the frame in photoshop. When doing a high volume shoot with real time delivery I don’t want the lights to show up in the end product the subjects are receiving in their personalized galleries. To accomplish this there are a few workarounds. The first is to change up your lighting setup. Clamshell lighting with a light above the subject and an arc reflector below can work well, but it yields a distinctly different lighting look than Peter’s triangle lighting produces. Another option is to make your triangle a little wider and to shoot a square crop in camera. That’s the way I prefer to do it as most of my clients book me for the distinct lighting pattern the triangle setup generates.

If the subjects are signing up for sessions in advance I give them a link that allows themself to “self-spot” by taking a simple selfie when prompted by the SpotMyPhotos platform so it will recognize them for me.  At the shoot I have a QR code printed up that also takes people to that same self-registration page in case they forgot to do it in advance and can do it while they are waiting in line for their turn.  And if all else fails I can just spot them…right on the spot.  

I set my shutter speed to 1/160th, my aperture to 4.5 and my ISO is at 200.  I then adjust the power output of the lights as necessary.  If I have a subject with eyes that are very sensitive to the lights I will increase my ISO and lower the power on the lights.  I get the lights in position so they are JUST out of frame for the square crop.  The closer the lights are to the subject the more painted on the light will feel.  I shoot tethered to my laptop through Capture One and shoot RAW.  You could shoot JPG images too and have them go straight up into SpotMyPhotos, but I prefer to have CaptureOne do some adjustments to the color, contrast, and saturation that I like to have in my images.  I have those settings created as a CaptureOne style.  That style is applied as soon as the image is imported through the tether.  When I am done photographing that person, I select all their images and then press command+D.  This automatically exports those images to the hot folder which the SpotMyPhotos uploader app watches and uploads to the platform as soon as it sees a new file in the folder.   I keep the RAW images just in case someone wants retouching on their image afterwards.  If you are only shooting in JPG be sure to choose a picture style that you like, portrait is usually a good choice, but on most cameras you can even create your own custom picture style that will be applied when your camera processes the JPG image for you. The picture style will determine the amount of saturation and contrast the image has.  Dial in the correct White Balance for the room and adjust the tint as necessary on your camera.  This is extremely important if the client is not receiving straight out of the camera in real time.   By the time we are done taking the hand full of photos I ask the subject to check their phone for a text message.  To their astonishment a text message saying they have been spotted has already been delivered and all they have to do is click on the link to retrieve their images.