What a portrait session actually looks like
Most of the portrait photographers you will find in Salt Lake City shoot families and seniors in the fall foliage up Big Cottonwood. That is real work and some of them are very good at it. It is not what I do. I photograph one person at a time, usually against something plain, usually in black and white, and I try to make a picture that still looks like you in twenty years.
We start with a phone call or a coffee. I want to know why you want the photographs, where they will live (a wall, a book cover, a dating profile, your mother's mantel) and what you hate about pictures of yourself. Everyone has an answer to that last one. Knowing it saves an hour on set.
The session itself runs two to three hours. That sounds long. It is not. The first forty minutes are usually throwaway while you stop performing for the camera. The good frames come after. I shoot in the studio in Salt Lake City or on location: the west side rail yards, the foothills above the Avenues, the alley behind your own building. Light matters more than the place.
Why black and white
Colour tells you what someone was wearing. Black and white tells you what they were thinking. Strip the colour out and you are left with shape, light and expression, which are the only three things a portrait is really made of. It also ages better. A colour portrait from 2012 looks like 2012. A black and white one just looks like a person. I write more about this in the journal if you want the longer argument.
That said, if you want colour, ask. I shoot RAW and every file exists in both. I just lead with monochrome because that is where I am strongest.
Who books portraits with me
Writers who need an author photo that does not look like a LinkedIn headshot. Musicians in the Salt Lake scene who need press images. People marking something: a birthday with a zero in it, the end of chemo, a divorce, a new name. Couples, occasionally, though I photograph them as two individuals who happen to be in the same frame. And a fair number of people who simply have never had a good photograph of themselves and have decided that is a shame.
If you are looking for a clean corporate headshot that is a separate, shorter session. If you want something more revealing than a portrait, look at the fine art nude work. Plenty of people book a portrait first and come back for that later.
What you get
A private online gallery of the strongest frames from the session, normally 30 to 60 images depending on how the day goes. From those you choose the ones you want finished. Finished means I retouch them by hand: skin cleaned up without being plasticised, stray hairs, dust, tonal work, a print-ready file and a web-sized version of each. I do not hand over 400 unedited files and call it a gallery. Nobody needs 400 photographs of themselves.
Prints and framing are available through a lab I have used for years. I will tell you honestly whether an image wants to be 8x10 or 40 inches wide.
Where I shoot in Salt Lake City
Studio sessions are in the city. Location sessions I have shot lately: the Granary District at dusk, the Marmalade stairs, the salt marsh boardwalk out at Farmington Bay, a client's own kitchen with the blinds half down. I keep a running list of places around Salt Lake that photograph well, with notes on light, parking and whether anyone will bother you. Out-of-town sessions are welcome; I travel often and the statewide page covers how that works.
Cost
Portrait sessions are quoted individually because a two-hour studio session and a full afternoon on the salt flats are not the same job. The pricing page explains how I build a quote and gives honest ranges so you know roughly what you are walking into before you email.
Questions I get asked
Two to three hours for a single person. I would rather have too much time than rush the part where you finally relax.
No. I direct every frame: where to look, what to do with your hands, when to breathe out. You just need to show up and be willing to be a little bored for the first half hour.
Yes, for a portrait session. Bring one person, not four. A crowd makes people perform.
Every file exists in colour and I will deliver colour on request. I lead with black and white because it is what I am known for and, frankly, what I am best at.
I work with two makeup artists in Salt Lake City and can add one to your session. For black and white portraits I usually suggest light makeup or none; the camera sees texture, not colour.
The proof gallery is ready within a week. Retouched finals are delivered two to three weeks after you make your selection.
