Tips on Portrait Studio Design
mntlevy
looking for advise on appropriate lighting for picture display and album
viewing as well as colors that work well with photo display.
Phil Tobias
looking for advise on appropriate lighting for picture display and album
viewing as well as colors that work well with photo display.
Some photographers favor a design that imitates a client's living room, as
that makes it easy for the prospect to envision a large portrait hanging there.
Others simply pick a look (modern, traditional, whatever) that appeals to them.
Track lighting can make photos look elegant. Does the studio space have
windows or daylight streaming in? Your location's circumstances may help
determine the prevailing lighting, which you can then augment.
To complement the greatest number of photos and picture frames, a neutral
wall color generally works best.
My studio usually had white walls, so frames in any color of wood, gold or
silver metal, blue or gray, etc., would look equally good. But if you're going
with some overriding design theme, you might pick some other color.
I would recommend visiting all the other studios in your marketing area, and
beyond. See what you like, then improve on it.
Good luck. ...pt
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www.philiptobias.com
means Business/Communications
zeitgeist
> Can anyone give me some advise regarding studio reception area design? I am
> looking for advise on appropriate lighting for picture display and album
> viewing as well as colors that work well with photo display.
What is your business focus?
Many people base their layout on the doctor's office system. Its just a
holding area for people before they are allowed into the inner sanctum,
a counter to pass orders across.
I've always wondered how many people are expected per hour or even per
day? The doctor's office model works for businesses that have a
constant flow of people, or walk in traffic.
The model I've prefered is the open gallery space, make the studio do
double duty as your gallery.
I shared a space with another photog, we had a storefront that operated
as a gallery, literally, we had shows up every other month with an
openning party listed in the datebook section of the paper. Our desks
were in the back, when we had to shoot we set up and tore down and
stored in the walled in porch behind the back.
Some photogs that are trying to appeal to the upper middle class hire
interior decorators, to study colors and textures that appeal to their
target market. Location is almost everything, but like the decore of a
restaurant clues you to what you should expect in food quality and
prices, so does the look of your business, and yourself for that
matter.
this reply has been echoed to the z-prophoto mailing list at
yahoogroups.com
zeitgeist
> Can anyone give me some advise regarding studio reception area design? I am
> looking for advise on appropriate lighting for picture display and album
> viewing as well as colors that work well with photo display.
But, to actually reply to the question that you asked...
The most amazing lighting I've seen for a studio reception are these
projector lamps that you insert shims to sharply limit the coverage and
avoid spillage, so when you light a print, it glows like a transparency
on a light box, a way cool effect.
Colors, instinct would suggest that a medium to light gray, but actually
the choice of color places you like the choice of colors that other
businesses use, look at colors that top salons and boutiques use. The
muted tones instead of primaries, the layering of color, etc are tones
used by expensive places.
make the area like a livingroom, to set off how images should be used,
to make folks comfortable.
Greg
capitalise and work with in your chosen social economic environment. You
may find that a studio done out nicely to suit the artistic tastes of the
more affluent areas may well be lost on the more basic tastes and
expenditure habits of the more humble areas of town. You need to keep your
pricing in tune with the style portrayed, don't annihilate the 'poor' whilst
on the other hand inhibit the more middle class from dealing with you. What
I am trying to say is pick your target market and decorate and market
accordingly. It's very hard to do both.
--
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Freedom is a state of mind -- Greg. -- gre...@ozemail.com.au