Back To Work: Corporate Headshots, Events, Office Lifestyle

It will be of no surprise to you that the Covid-19 pandemic had a serious negative effect on my business as a corporate photographer in London. My job has always been reliant on people being at work in offices, so the lockdowns were not good for business. But there were little bits of work, here and there, which helped me make it through, and I’ve come out the other side of the pandemic with all guns blazing. It’s been a super busy year so far, dominated by headshots but with an increasing number of corporate events happening again since the easing of restrictions.

It was such a great relief to be busy again, visiting my clients’ offices to shoot an enormous number of headshots because so many people have changed jobs in the last two years. I’ve met loads and loads of people doing that, and I’ve been really enjoying getting back into the swing of things. Events have come back into full force, and I’ve been loving getting creative again to help my clients’ events look outstanding.

Probably the best thing to come out of the pandemic is the new approach to working that the majority of businesses and society have adopted. Businesses realised that many employees are more productive when they work at home because there are fewer distractions. Less time is wasted commuting back and forth to the office each day, less time is used up moving between meetings because they are all lined up back to back on Zoom or Teams.

But people really missed being in the office; the atmosphere, the company, the interaction and environment. There are some meetings and work that are best done face to face, in the flesh. It’s the interaction and atmosphere in the office that often attracts people to work for a particular business. So office lifestyle photography is as important as ever; photos and imagery that showcases what it’s like to work for an organisation.

It’s so good to be busy again in London taking photos of events and people again. Here is a selection of some of my favourite images since the pandemic eased towards the end of 2021.

Office Documentary vs Office Lifestyle Photography

In the last little while, I have had various enquiries from people asking for me to take photos of people at work in their office. I love doing this kind of work, but I found myself, a few times, repeating a similar explanation, which is the difference between documentary photography and lifestyle photography.

Office Documentary Photography

Documentary photography, in its purest sense, is photography that captures the truest sense of what is happening. Nothing is posed or set up. It simply involves me wandering around an office with my camera, capturing what I see happening in the most creative way I can. If there is lots of activity in the office, that will show in the photos, but if people are just sat at their desks tapping away at a key, then the photos perhaps won’t look terribly dynamic. The other challenge with office documentary photos is that of light. Office lighting is often not very flattering, unless the office is filled with plenty of natural light.

Office Lifestyle Photography

Office lifestyle photography is a slower and deliberate process, where each shot, or series of shots, is planned out a little and lit with proper lighting. For example, we might set up a shot where two people are having an informal meeting in a breakout area, and we will light it so that the people look great, and then I will snap a series of images of that meeting. We might do the same thing with a slightly large group of 3 or 4 people in a meeting room. These photos take a little longer to set up because of the lighting, and they require willing participants from the client’s team, which isn’t always easy. The upshot is that they look more professional and slick than office documentary photos which are a little more ‘raw’.

Documentary or Lifestyle Photography: What’s Right For Us?

So what is the right approach for your business? I would suggest you make a decision based on what kind of image you want to portray. There may be different uses for both types of photography. For example, office lifestyle photos might be best for the career section of your website or even the homepage, whereas office documentary photos may work well for social media or other comms channels your business uses. Have a look at some of the examples above to help inform your decision, and hit the contact button above to get in touch if you’d like to ask for a quote or to discuss your requirements.

Headshots Looking Off Camera

From time to time I am asked by my clients to take headshots of their team where they aren’t looking into the camera. For some, the reason is that their staff feel more comfortable having their photo taken like that. For others, it’s a decision made because it allows more personality to come across in the photo. I enjoy taking these photos because it’s a good challenge to get the right expression from people. The aim is usually for people to look engaged, interested and approachable. One way to so it is by having the subject talk to someone just to the side of the camera, but sometimes when people talk, their mouths and faces make all kinds of funny expressions, so I tend to find it better for the subject to listen, engage, smile or even laugh at the person just off-camera.

YFM Equity Partners asked me to photograph their staff in London and Manchester in the aforementioned style, and I had a great time meeting their team. The challenge, during Covid times, was to manage these kind of photos without a third person in the room with whom the subject could interact. I would talk and engage with each person whilst they fixed their eyes on an imaginary character sat down in the same meeting room.

I think the results came out great, have a look for yourself.

The Photography Gear I Use

For the past couple of years, I’ve been using Sony cameras, and in short, I love them. My camera of choice is the Sony A7III, which is a great little camera. I actually wrote a full review of the camera that you can see on ExpertPhotography.com

The camera isn’t everything though. There is a joke amongst professional photographers that people often comment on their photos and say, '“great photos, you must have a brilliant camera”. Whilst the modern technology in the latest cameras does make some things easier, there is so much more that goes into taking a great photograph. Much of that is skill, some of which can be learned in a moment, but lots of which is only learned through experience. Having the right equipment does help, though!

If you’re interested in learning more about the gear I use to take the photos seen on my website and Instagram profile, check out this post I wrote for Shotkit, which is a great website that features the gear used by lots of top photographers from around the world.