Solo Travel: How to Pick a Photo Tour
You’ve taken painstaking care in picking out a travel wardrobe that matches fashion with function, and after hitting the most Insta-worthy spots you come home with no great photos of yourself. At best you have some awkward-angle selfies that only capture you from the neck up.
The solution: a photo shoot tour.
Be a model for the day while a professional captures amazing travel photos. Here’s just a few reasons why a photo shoot tour is a great idea:
Good photos… obvi
A professional knows the best spots in the city to make sure your photo album is filled with iconic shots
Tips from a professional on how to look better in front of the camera.
Tips from a local for restaurant and tourism recommendations
What do you need to know to plan and execute a great photo tour
1. Find the Right Photographer
This is obvious, but it’s the most challenging part. Before you start searching, know have to what you’re wanting to accomplish.
Are you on a mission to capture an elaborate eye makeup ook? You need a bomb portrait photographer. Is it all about the outfit, find a fashion photographer that captures full body shots without excessive background space, bonus points for a little background blur. If you’re all about highlighting the destination, you want to look for someone who nails landscape and architecture photography.
Once you decide what you’re trying to capture, you need to start perusing portfolios. Personally, Airbnb Experiences has never failed me, and they provide a sampling of the photographer’s work. In this sampling, I consider if the photos they’re showing align with what I’m wanting. Equally important, I read review to see if the photog is good with posing subjects. I’m by no means a professional model and rely heavily on the person behind the camera directing me.
I’m just going to put it out there, you’re not going to find a talented artist who is friendly and engaging for $50. The range of $75-$200 for a 1-2 hour group or private tour should place you with someone who knows what they’re doing. In a photo session, you get what you pay for.
2. Communication
In Tulum, Mexico, one of the most Instagramable locations in the world, I completed a grueling photo shoot and have no IG worthy photos to show for it. Why? Because when in a preliminary conversation with the photographer, he asked what kind of photos I wanted (portrait, urban, etc) I got flustered not knowing what to ask for and just said, “umm yeah, urban”.
We ended up meeting in the downtown of Tulum for the tour, far from the white sand beaches. If I could hop into a delorean, I’d definitely go back to Tulum and shamelessly respond to that initial email, “I don’t know the technical words to describe what I want, but I know I want the IG Tulum experience. Here are some inspiration photos that I’d like to recreate.”
Photographers want to deliver work that you will love, and the best way to do that is for you be clear about your objectives.
3. Location
Most travel photographers have a set route they follow. This is where private versus group tours make a huge difference. When you book a private tour, it gives you a bit more freedom to deviate from their traditional route.
I took an amazing private photo tour in Dublin. After hitting some iconic Dublin spots, we were walking by the Long Room at Trinity College, featured in at least 19 movies according to IMDB. I asked if we could add that as a stop and was delighted to have some beautiful photos to show for it.
For a private photo tour in Chicago, I listed notable spots in the city I wanted to capture, and the photographer was about to determine a route that would allow us to stop at as many as possible in a two hour period.
4. Timing's Everything
My Tulum tour had a lot working against it. Aside from picking the worst location, I was giving midday, unpowdered sweaty looks. I’d bypassed shine and went straight to greasy and wet. Annie Leibovitz wouldn’t have been able to produce a workable image with what I was serving.
But that all came down to poor timing. The best pictures are taken during the golden hour, the period of daytime shortly after sunrise or before sunset. When the sun is close to the horizon it casts a warm, ethereal glow on everything.
The midday sun, in contrast is harsh, unforgiving, and hot. As in, beads of sweat dripping down your face, sweat rings on your shirt, hot. Tours after 10am and before 4:30pm are a recipe for dull photos.
I know it’s your vacation, and you want nothing more than to start everyday with a leisurely sleep in. But the early bird gets the worm and the early model gets the golden glow.
5. Outfit Requirements
A major component of a photo tour is walking from one destination to the next for multiple backdrops. And like any other walking tour, comfortable shoes are fundamental. Unless you strut in stilettos on the regular, this might not be the time to introduce a pair of unbroken-in heels. This isn’t to say you have to be in ortho-walkers, unless that’s your thing, but wedges, block heels, and stylish sneakers are key to balance style and comfort.
Pro-tip: layers are key. You don’t want every single great photo from an entire vacation to be in the same outfit. In cooler weather, packing two hat options and a stylish jacket gives you a lot of leeway.
In the humid Chicago heat, a jacket was not an option, but stashing a second shirt and lipstick change totally gave the illusion of a whole new outfit. Don’t sleep on accessories, a necklace and pair of earrings can change the whole dynamic of an outfit.
Attitude
When planning a photo shoot for non-professional reasons, there’s a certain amount of shamelessness that must be accepted. These tours are not taking place at a photo studio built for comfort and privacy. Instead you’ll be standing in front of some of the most photographed locations in the world with tourists and locals swirling around you. And in that in environment, it’s easy to get lost in self consciousness. What has always helped me is that even if I look goofy trying to strike a model pose as strangers pass by, they’re strangers, and I will never have to see them again. Plus, the only person who spent money on that tour is me, and if they didn’t pay for it, then they’re not dictating the outcome of the photos.
