I attended my first photography retreat in 2012 when I won a spot at an incredible workshop at Lake Tahoe. I learned a ton and had fun meeting other photographers, but I came home with no images I could use in my own portfolio, even though we had 4 or 5 styled shoots that week.

The retreat was geared towards wedding and family photographers. Even in the infancy of my business, I knew that my heart was set on photographing girls and horses! So beautiful babies and epic engagement sessions weren’t going to go far in attracting my target client. I had great images in my archives with no place to use them.

That is when I first learned some lessons about attending styled shoots. First and foremost, I discovered that for my portfolio building I would need to orchestrate the session myself to have control over every detail. I loved group shoots for the friendships and connections to new people/places/material, but understood that I would need more control over the session to get the content I wanted to use in my own marketing.

STYLED GROUP SHOOTS

PRO: Attending a styled shoot is less expensive than putting together a shoot on your own. Because you are attending with other photographers, it is more cost-effective to share the costs.

PRO: You get to meet incredible photographers at a styled shoot, who will likely become great friends of yours. I always love to support local photographers near me by attending styled shoots to meet photographers and vendors (florists, make-up artists, models, etc!). Connections like these within the industry can be invaluable.

PRO: It is infinitely LESS WORK to attend a styled shoot than it is to put together portfolio work on your own. Before the shoot, all planning/prepping is delegated to the host, but it is also less work at the actual set because models and locations will most likely be directed for you. It is the perfect opportunity to arrive with no stress, and learn a few new tricks while you are there!

PERSONAL WORK

PRO: You get to create the exact images you need for your portfolio or marketing material. Because you are hiring the right models, styling specific outfits, and booking strategic locations, the final product is a curated gallery of images that will reflect your brand to perfection.

PRO: The work you produce is exclusive to you and strengthens the identity of your brand when your images can become recognizable.

PRO: Images can be licensed to brands or editorial outlets. Sometimes group styled shoots restrict what can be done with the resulting images. When you produce the session yourself, you have full control of the end result.

In the end, I love attending styled group shoots for connections and introductions, but the images are rarely used for my marketing materials.

In either case, I find it is often needed to take a step away from paid client work and have the freedom to be creative! Want to learn about all of the ways I benefit from unpaid work? Check out this blog post.