4. What To Wear For Real Estate Headshots
Everyone’s style of dress is different, but sticking with simple guidelines will make choosing your outfit a breeze. I personally recommend that my clients bring three to fourprofessional business outfitsso they have more photos to choose from. Ask your photographer what they recommend for your outfit.
Choose outfits that make you feel confident in your photo. When you feel confident in your clothes, that feeling can translate into your pictures through your expression.
What is the best color to wear for aprofessional headshot? Stick with solid colors, and avoid heavy patterns or prints. That’s right, paisley and stripes don’t work in your favor in headshots. If your clients are focused on your clothing or your jewelry instead of your face, they won’t be connecting with who you are.
Keep your jewelry simple, minimal or avoid it completely. Your real estate headshot serves a purpose of connecting you with your future customers. Make sure nothing is distracting from that connection in your portraits. Your photography is part of your branding and your headshot will likely be the first thing people see.
Shoes don’t often make the cut in your headshot, but if a pair of heels makes you feel more confident, they are worth wearing. If you are walking around to get the photo in your session, consider comfortable shoes.
Your real estate headshot should be an extension of branding in your industry. Don’t wear something overly professional in your portraits if that’s not your brand. Don’t look for inspirational photography to help you choose outfits if the photos don’t align. Wear an outfit you’d wear to meet with your clients. It builds trust.
It might be a good idea to take the weather into consideration if you’re shooting your headshot outside. Places like Virginia or Washington feel very different from Texas and LA, and looking cold in your headshot isn’t ideal.
If you’re shooting in a professional studio, you can choose any colors for you picture. Shoot outside and the grass or leaves can create a green color cast in camera. Ask your photographer for advice.
Hair And Makeup For Pictures
Generally when you’re planning to have your hair and makeup done for your headshot, you don’t want to stray too far from the truth. Your headshot should look like you.
Wearing over the top makeup in your photo can take away from your credibility if you don’t normally look that way. I tell my clients to keep their makeup simple in their headshot. Fake lashes and lash extensions can really open up your eyes in your photo, but you need to make sure you’re not getting lashes that are too thick or glam.
A professional makeup artist will know what to do when they work with a headshot photographer. If you want to do your own makeup, it will be a realistic and simple version of you in your photo.
Makeup done correctly can make you look like the polished version of your every day without making you look like someone else.
Avoiding red/Blood-Shot Eyes
A detail that many people don’t take into consideration is the whites of their eyes. It can make or break your image if you’ve got red eyes and your photographer can’t edit it out. My go-to solution is aspecific brand ofeye drops called Lumifythat not only whiten the whites of your eyes for the shoot, but they also lighten the red areas of skin around your eyes. Sounds crazy, but I use this for my own shoots all the time.
It actually makes your eyes look incredibly clear, and because it lightens redness around your eyes, it allows your eyes to look much bigger.
If you’re interested in getting them, you can find them on Amazon and get it before your session. These are soothing and useful eyedrops.
Getting Rid Of Flyaways
As a photographer, I have a few tricks up my sleeve to save myself a ton of time after the session editing things that I could have avoided by making changes during the shoot. If you have dark hair or really light hair, there’s a fair chance that your hair will have flyaways in your pictures.
Fortunately there is a very cheap little trick that will save you. There are very few photographers that know how to edit out all of your flyaways out of an images, so to avoid that, buy thisclear eyebrow gel.
The trick here is just to lightly run the eyebrow gel over your flyaways and it pushes them down without weighing them down. You only need to do it once, right before you step in front of the camera, and you will have zero flyaways in your images.
5. Day Of Photoshoot Tips for your professional profile Photo
Getting a portrait that you love putting out in the world requires a little forethought and time. Professional headshots for realtors require that you use these tips to look perfect on the day of your photo shoot. You want to look your best in your real estate headshot.
The day before your session, make sure you stay out of the sun. If you’re planning on sporting a fake tan, just make sure that you’ve tried it before, and know what you’re getting into.
Get enough sleep the night before your photo shoot so that you look well rested.
Prepare your clothing well in advance. A great way to avoid showing up to the shoot stressed out, is to get all of your clothes ironed and on hangers days before your professional headshot. Wearing a dress or a blouse always looks great in photos. If you don’t believe your brand message aligns with a dress, stick to what you know. The colors should compliment your skin tone and the environment you’re in. Aim to dress in one outfit before you arrive at the photo shoot.
Smile in all of your photos. Studies show that smiling conveys warmth, approachability and competence to your viewers. This in turn makes it more likely that your clients will be confident reaching out to you. Practice your smile in the mirror. One quick suggestion for working on your smile is to give a silent fake laugh. This will ensure that your smile seems more authentic. Another tip is to take your smile away and bring it back as needed. A tired smile doesn’t look real. As a business it’s a good idea to always be friendly in your photos.
Know your good side. If you prefer portraits taken on one side, make sure to communicate that to your photographer before the photo shoot. It is more likely that you will love your photography if you do. There is evidence that people do have a better side and that even parting your hair in a different way can change perceptions of the photos.
Get multiple poses in multiple outfits. Even if you plan to use one real estate headshot across all of your marketing, it makes sense to get multiple outfits so that you can choose the one that photographed best.
Stand up straight. Having great posture and a head held high signals the confidence and competence that your potential clients are likely looking for in a real estate agent.
Get rid of a double chin. This technique is used by professional headshot photographers, but may be strange when you first practice it yourself. Pushing your head slightly forward and down not only makes you look more confident, it also defined your jawline to make you look more attractive. Practice this in a mirror to see it for yourself.
Relax and trust your photographer. If you’ve hired a photographer that has portraits and photography you love, it’s likely because they know how to light and pose their subject. If you walk into a shoot ready to be coached, you will take the pressure off yourself and end up with a more relaxed headshot.
Posing For Your Pictures:
When you have the right photographer they will coach you on how to pose and walk you through poses that will flatter you and your brand. Getting a professional headshot means you can’t look stiff or awkward. People won’t feel attracted to your business if you have a stand offish pose. Ask your headshot photographer if they coach you on the day of the session. Look at the poses they have used in any photo they have to make sure their subject looks comfortable and approachable.
Don’t push your arms against your body as that can make your arms look bigger.
If you want your professional headshot to look professional, you can’t be slouching or too laid back. Poses with a straight back tend to show how confident you are. Poses where you lean slightly towards the camera help the photos to appear more approachable. Each pose should communicate success every time.
A pose with your arms crossed can feel uninviting unless you have a big smile on your face. Professionals should aim to smile in every pose so that people look forward to hiring you.
