Career Fair Business Portraits - Headshots for Success
Norquest College in Edmonton recently held their annual Career Fair for students and alumni. Participants were able to visit with dozens of local employers, get resume reviews, and learn how to make the best impression when looking for a job. We were pleased to be asked for the second time to provide professional business portraits (aka headshots) to the attendees.
The Challenge
Norquest College wanted to provide complimentary headshots to anyone who wanted them so they could use them in their job search. How can we photograph hundreds of people in one day, keep track of everyone, and deliver each person’s finished portraits privately and securely? On top of that, the portraits should be ones they genuinely like and would actually use!
How We Delivered
Rather than making people stand in line for hours, guests were able to join a virtual queue so they knew when to come back for their photo session. Once they returned at their assigned time, they were given a card with a unique password to use when downloading their portraits. Their name and email was registered along with their password, which was printed on their card with a barcode.
Next, they were welcomed to one of two portrait stations where their photographer scanned their barcode to uniquely identify their portraits. Our photographers then captured several poses with an emphasis on warm, approachable expressions. Since this is the first time most of the guests were being photographed professionally, we understand it can be stressful and uncomfortable. We take special care to relax and calm our guests to capture genuine looks that show their personality.
Once we return to the studio, the post processing begins. The first step is to back up all the images for safekeeping. Next, we go through and remove the obvious rejects like blinks or lighting misfires. Next, each image is gently retouched by ai to smooth skin and balance tones. (In a high volume process like this, we aren’t able to manually retouch each image to correct for things like wrinkled clothing, flyaway hair, balancing eye size, etc., but this is an optional service that’s available on request). Final checks are made verifying all images look great, the images are uploaded to our online delivery site. An email goes out to each participant with instructions to download their new portraits!
The Results
This was our most productive day at Norquest’s Career Fairs yet, with two portrait photographers simultaneously shooting throughout the career fair. We photographed 294 people in just under 7 hours – for a combined average of 1 minute and 20 seconds per person! After the behind-the-scenes work was finished and all checks were complete, an email went out inviting each person to download their portraits less than 48 hours after the event ended!
Are you looking for high volume business portrait services?
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