Yearbook photo: tips on how to promote your sessions on the web
Within the portrait sessions, we find the photographing of orlas, a very productive sector that is very little talked about. In this type of images in which a frontal image of each student is captured and then, in post-production, a composition is created with the whole student body, they are increasingly in demand in schools, colleges and universities.
If you want to get involved in the photographing of orlas, don’t miss out on the following tips and how you can promote this type of reportage so that other schools take notice of your work.
Discover all the aspects you need to take into account to sell photography on your photography website.
Contenido
What does the photography of orlas consist of?
The aim of the photographing of orlas class is to photograph them in a formal and uniform way. The purpose of this type of portrait is to preserve a memory of an academic stage of the classmates and, on many occasions, of the teaching staff.
When these portraits first appeared many years ago, they usually focused on students in the final year of university courses, but nowadays they have become very fashionable in the first stages of school, where children finish the infant education cycle and move on to primary school.
These types of images also extend to other schools, high schools and vocational training, so the range of a photographer’s range has increased over the years.
Working methodology when creating border images
Although in principle they can be very simple portraits to take, when organising this type of photo session it is important that you take into account a series of questions, such as, for example:
- Planning and organisation.
- Packs.
- Technical team.
- Props and accessories.
- Poses and direction of the models.
- Retouching.
- Composition of the borders.
- Customer acquisition and loyalty.
- Etc.
Let’s take a closer look at all these points in order to organise a really cost-effective wedding band photography session.
Organisation of school sessions
When planning and preparing a report of this kind, it is important that there is fluid communication between the school or institution, the photographer and the families or university students. The idea is that, in a few days, you will be able to take, if not all, at least most of the portraits of the students. In this way you will avoid having to visit the school, college or university again to take part of these portrait images.
Before the day of the photographic sessions, it is essential that you agree with the centre on a series of issues, such as: timetable and organisation of the students, finding a suitable location within the centre for the photographs, etc.
It is also important to communicate to students, or if they are minors, to their parents about appropriate dress, hairstyle and make-up for such images.
Creation of school photo packages
Before going to the photo shoot, it is important that you stop to think about the different packs that you can offer to the families. Here the ideas are many and varied. We are going to give you some of them so that you can add them to your own packages, if they seem interesting to you:
- Delivery of printed speeches (students and teachers) and individual photographs also printed in various sizes and formats (colour, black and white, sepia, etc.).
- Delivery of a package of printed photos and the individual image of each student in digital format.
- Delivery of printed photos and/or in digital format and the possibility of personalising a product, such as photos printed on canvas, HD metal print, mouse pad, calendar, etc.
- Possibility of doing a mini photo session in the student’s studio with the family to be included later with the rest of the photos of the portfolio.
- Option to attend the official diploma ceremony and then include part of these photos in the pack chosen by the parents.
- Possibility of individual photo sessions in the photo studio.
- Etc.
Preparation of the technical team
As it is a photo shoot that you are going to do indoors but in a location other than your photo studio, it is important that you plan in advance and, above all, depending on the type of location where you will be taking the photographs, the type of material that you are going to have to transport on the day. Some ideas are:
- Camera.
- Fixed focal length lenses.
- Lighting equipment: diffusers, reflectors
- Neutral background in white, grey or light blue.
- Etc.
Organisation of props and accessories for the pupils
In this type of image, it is important to have a number of props and accessories available, such as a biretta, a diploman, a sash, a tunic or simply a white shirt.
Some characteristic elements of each centre, such as the sash with the institution’s coat of arms, will have to be provided by those in charge of each centre, but others, it is important that you wear them on the day of the report to avoid students forgetting them, such as a white shirt, tie, if necessary, etc.
The more prepared you are on the appointed day for the border photography, the better chance you have of not having to come back to the centre on another day.
Direct the poses of the pupils
On the day of the photo shoot, you will have to repeat the same instructions many times and if you have to photograph 6 year olds, be prepared to be patient. That’s why it’s important that you give them very concise and simple instructions and that the mini sessions are as short as possible. If you can, the ideal thing to do is to take an assistant with you on those days so that, while you take care of the photography, he or she can help the little ones with the poses, the cap, the sash and all the aesthetics in general.
This type of indications, with university students, will be much easier and more dynamic, but it does not mean that many of them will feel a certain embarrassment and you will have to take several shots with each one of them until you manage to get the most natural images possible.
Photo retouching and postproduction
Once the photo shoot is over, you will need to make a series of very subtle adjustments and retouches to each of the students’ images in the studio. In order to sell more of your own photographs, you can also create a black and white image to offer in the packs you create.
Creation of the borders
Another task that you will have to carry out in your studio once you have finished retouching each image, is the creation of a ribbon with all the students and teachers. To do this it is important that you have already created several designs for the school’s coat of arms, add the images of each student/teacher and write down their names.
Customer acquisition and loyalty
What tends to happen with photographers who take photographing of orlas is that they usually reach certain agreements with schools, institutes and universities so that they are the ones who take the photos of this type of event every year. For this reason, in this type of reportage, attracting clients (in this case educational centres) is very important. To expand your client portfolio you can use different methods:
- Go in person to schools offering your services.
- Contact them by email or telephone.
- Offer them special rates and/or services.
- Explain to them the other services you can provide for their students, such as: photographic and video reports at end-of-year festivals, images of students at the beginning of the school year, Christmas mini-sessions, etc.
And as for parents, especially when the pupils are in the 3rd year of infant school, as soon as you provide them with their school graduation photographs, you can also offer them your other services (studio reports, outdoor reports, etc.) at a special price.
Ideas for selling more school pictures
When planning how to sell more graduation photography, as well as creating different packs to make the range of possibilities even wider, you can use different strategies, for example:
- Create a private gallery of images so that families can choose different extra formats.
- When it comes to taking photographs of each student, create several types of images, one to be included in the certificate and others with the diploma in hand, with the teacher or even some of small groups of friends.
- In addition to submitting the class photo as the class image, you can also create a series of group photos showing all students together with the teachers.
- As we have mentioned above, you can offer families the possibility of coming to your photo studio to have a family photo taken. These images, especially when a student finishes his or her degree, are usually very popular with parents.
- You can also extend the type of clients for this type of reporting to sports teams.
- Etc.
Photographers in Arcadina who take photographs of ornaments
We know that nowadays, even though the photography of orlas is a very profitable business, there are hardly any photographers who dedicate themselves exclusively to this type of reportage. But even if it is not your main service, it is important that you include on your website some information about these reports, or at least a series of private galleries so that families can access the photographs of their children.
Here we are going to share with you a small compilation of photographers who do photographing of orlas.
1# Colectiva Fotografía
colectivafotografia.arcadina.com
We begin to introduce you to several professionals who carry out photography with a studio that is located in Castellón, it is the photographic studio of Colectiva Fotografía where, among other photo sessions, they do portraits, family photography, weddings, communions, pregnancies, patron saint festivals, galas, school photographs and graduations.
In their business area, the photographers who run this studio have created a private space for their clients where they can view their photographs, select them, download them and buy more images both in print and digital format without having to visit them in their photographic studio.
2# Antonio Siles Fotógrafo
Antonio Siles is a photographer from Almeria who offers his clients all kinds of photo shoots: weddings, children’s photography, studio reports, book, photography for professionals, product photography, pets, ID photos and ornaments.
On one of his service pages, this photographer explains to the families what this type of report consists of and offers the possibility of coming to his photographic studio to have it done.
3# Hoyos Foto Estudio
The Hoyos Foto Estudio photography studio is located in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, a space where you will be offered a series of photographic sessions, such as: adult birthday parties, portraits, event photography and ornaments.
One of the best tools for the different families of each promotion to access their images is the private client area, where, from this space, they will be able to access their photos, buy extra images, etc.
4# Compra tus Fotos
As the name of the website indicates, Compra tus Fotos is an online photo shop with a studio in Madrid where customers will be able to easily access the images of their photo sessions through the Internet.
Currently in their private client area, the people in charge of this photographic studio are beginning to upload, privately, some of the graduation sessions they have done. In this way they will avoid many hours of work attending to customers and families will not have to meet in person to access the graduation photos of their children.
5# Alpino Foto
And we finish with this small sample of photography with the website of Alpino Foto, a very familiar photography studio located in Chubut (Argentina) and which is dedicated to making and offering all kinds of social reports, such as weddings, children’s reports, couples, etc.
In this studio, they also take photographs of ornaments and a sample of this is in their online shop, where customers will be able to privately access the school photo sessions.
Start promoting photographing of orlas on your website today!
Photographing of orlas is a great way to earn extra, recurring income each year if you can build relationships with schools, colleges and universities in your area.
In Arcadina you can find all kinds of business solutions that will help you to promote the photography of your graduation photos and, more interestingly, offer your customers the convenience of accessing their photos through a private gallery where they will be able to view, select, download and purchase all the graduation photos they want. You can try our services for free for 14 days.
This time we are going to share with you the interview of one of the photographers we have presented to you today, Antonio Siles.
>> Meet Antonio Siles, children’s and family photographer
And finally, we would like to know: have you ever thought about offering photographing of orlas on your website? We’ll read you in the comments.
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