How to Brief a Photographer (And Actually Get What You Pictured)

The gap between a good shoot and a disappointing one is almost never talent. It’s the brief.

A vague brief gets you beautiful photos of the wrong things. A good photography brief gets you a set of images that slot straight into the places you needed to fill. Same photographer, same day, wildly different value.

Here’s what actually needs to be in one.

Start with where the photos are going

Not “we need some new content.” Where, specifically?

Website hero. Instagram grid. Menu. Google Business Profile. A printed brochure. An ad campaign. Each of those has different demands — orientation, crop, negative space for text, resolution.

If you tell your photographer the hero image needs to work at 16:9 with room for a headline on the left, you’ll get that. If you don’t, you’ll get a gorgeous vertical shot that can’t be used where you needed it most.

This one line — here is the list of slots I’m filling — improves a brief more than anything else.

Say what the brand is, in plain language

Three or four adjectives, and an honest sentence about who your customer is.

“Relaxed, sun-bleached, a bit rough around the edges — young couples and surfers” produces a completely different day to “polished, quiet, considered — older guests who’ve been travelling a long time.”

Photographers are translating a feeling into light and framing. Give them the feeling.

Bring references — and say why

A small set of images you like is worth a thousand words. Six to ten is plenty. More than that and you’re just showing your taste, not directing a shoot.

The crucial part everybody skips: say what you like about each one. “This one — the way the light is blown out behind them.” “This — the plate is off-centre and it feels less staged.”

Without the why, references are a guessing game. With it, they’re a spec.

Say what you don’t want too. That’s often faster. “No dark moody food shots” saves half a day.

Write the shot list, and rank it

The shot list is where a brief becomes useful. Be specific:

• Hero exterior at golden hour, wide
• Six signature dishes, overhead and three-quarter
• Two bar shots with people, natural
• Interior, empty, for the website
• Staff portraits, four people
• Detail shots — glassware, textures, menu

Then rank them. Must-have, should-have, nice-to-have. Days run over, light disappears, the kitchen falls behind. When something has to give, you want the photographer cutting from the bottom of your list, not guessing.

If you want a specific number of usable images, say the number. “Around forty final edits” is a real brief. “Some good photos” isn’t.

Deal with the logistics honestly

The unglamorous section, and the one that ruins shoots when it’s missing:

Timings and light. Sunset is a hard deadline, not a preference. Work backwards from it.

Access. When can the space be empty? Is the kitchen willing to fire dishes at 3pm? Who’s the contact on the day if a door’s locked?

People. Are staff being photographed? Have they been asked, are they rostered on, and do they know what to wear? Are you using models or real customers? Get permission sorted before, not on the day.

Food. Who’s plating, and is it the real chef? Do you have backup ingredients? Food photography burns product — a dish looks good for about four minutes.

Props and dressing. Flowers, linen, glassware, a set table. Somebody needs to own this and it usually isn’t the photographer.

Be clear about usage and delivery

Two things to agree in writing before the shoot, not after:

Usage. Where can you use the images, for how long, and does that include paid advertising? This is standard and negotiable — it just needs to be explicit. We wrote a fuller piece on image rights and usage because it catches people out.

Delivery. How many final images, in what formats and sizes, by when, and how many rounds of revisions. “Web-optimised JPEGs plus full-resolution files, forty images, within ten working days” is a brief. “Send them over when you can” is a future argument.

Then get out of the way

The best briefs are tight on what and loose on how. You’re hiring someone for their eye. Tell them what the images need to achieve and where they’re going; don’t stand behind them describing the composition.

The good stuff on any shoot day comes from the twenty minutes after the list is done, when the photographer’s had time to look around and try something. Leave room for that.

The one-page test

If your brief doesn’t fit on a page, it’s probably a wish list rather than a brief. If it fits on a page and covers goals, feel, references, a ranked shot list, logistics and deliverables — you’re going to get what you pictured.

If you’d rather talk it through than write it down, that works too. Half our best shoots started as a coffee and a list on the back of a napkin.