How to Prepare for Executive Headshots: A Checklist for Lawyers and Real Estate Agents

Most preparation headshots advice is about clothes. Clothes matter, but they're the easy part. The harder part is walking in knowing what the photo has to do, because a headshot for a litigator and a headshot for a listing agent do different jobs. Neither job gets done by hoping the photographer will figure it out.

The Short Answer: Decide where the photo will be used, bring two or three solid-color outfits you've already worn, sleep well the night before, and arrive knowing the one impression you want to give. At Argento, the Executive Signature session ($495) runs 90 minutes, includes a pre-shoot brand consultation and three outfit changes, and every selected image gets 30 minutes of retouching.

Why does showing up unprepared go wrong for lawyers and agents?

You're probably in one of two situations. You're a lawyer whose firm bio photo is years old, or was taken by whoever had a camera the day the website launched. Or you're a real estate agent whose face has to work on a yard sign, a listing page, a business card, an email signature and a social profile, and the photo you have was cropped from something else.

In both cases, your face does work before you do. A prospective client reads it before they read your bio, your reviews or your sold list. They decide something, and they decide it fast.

That isn't a figure of speech. In a 2006 paper in Psychological Science, Janine Willis and Alexander Todorov found that a 100-millisecond look at a face was enough for people to form judgments about traits such as trustworthiness and competence. Giving people more time mostly made them more confident in the judgment they had already made. A different study from Todorov and colleagues, published in Science in 2005, showed people pairs of faces of candidates in U.S. elections. Judgments of which face looked more competent predicted the winner in 71.6 percent of Senate races.

Those are laboratory findings about strangers and elections, not about legal clients or home sellers. But the point carries over. A potential client is making a quick call about you, and the photo is the only thing they have to go on. Lawyers and agents both sell trust. Both are chosen by people who are nervous about the decision. The photo has to say "capable" and "easy to talk to" at the same time, and it has to say it small, on a phone screen.

Showing up unprepared makes that harder in predictable ways. You arrive in the wrong jacket and spend the first twenty minutes worried about it. You haven't decided what the photo is for, so you can't tell the photographer. You're tired, you've never thought about your hands, and you're bracing for a result you already expect to dislike. None of that is a character flaw. It's what happens when nobody has told you what to do.

Why the usual advice falls short

Most checklists online cover the same ground: wear solid colors, get a haircut, drink water, be yourself. It's all fine advice. It just doesn't reach the actual problem.

Take "be yourself." It sounds kind, and it's useless in front of a lens. Once someone points a camera at you, you start watching yourself being watched. You manage your face instead of wearing it. People who say they hate being photographed usually aren't unphotogenic. They've been asked to act natural by people who never showed them how.

Outfit lists have a different limit. They tell you what to wear but not how to sit, where to put your hands, or how far to turn your shoulders. A perfectly chosen navy jacket still looks stiff on someone who has been left to guess.

The friend with a good camera is the third common fix. A friend will make you comfortable, which counts for something. But a friend doesn't know how a jaw angle reads on a thumbnail, or what a litigator's face needs to say that a residential agent's doesn't. That's how so many people end up with a photo they quietly dislike.

Then there's the fast, cheap studio. It solves scheduling and ignores the person. A photo factory is built for throughput, so the subject is expected to arrive knowing how to be photographed. If you don't, you get a handful of frames and a quick goodbye.

One more habit is worth naming: practicing expressions in the mirror the night before. It feels like preparation. In practice it builds the exact thing that makes people stiff, a face you're performing instead of a face you have.

What actually changes the result?

Two things, and they work together. The first is a few decisions you make before the session. The second is direction during it.

The decisions are simple. Where will the photo live? What one impression should it give? What have you worn that fits well and that you feel good in? A photographer can only build a session around answers you've already worked out. When you arrive with them, the first part of the session moves faster, and more of your time goes to the part that matters.

The direction is what separates a good headshot from a stiff one. Stiff has three common causes, and each one has a fix.

The first cause is that nobody tells you what to do with your hands, jaw or eyes. The fix is explicit instruction at every moment, so you never guess. The second is bracing against the result. You already expect to hate the photo, so you tense before the shutter moves. The fix is seeing the images live on a large monitor, which takes the dread out of the room because you can see what's actually happening. The third is performing naturalness. The fix is to find your face instead of a pose, by reading your personality first and directing your expression second.

Ariel, who founded Argento, learned this over years of photographing musicians for labels including Sony Music, BMG and EMI. Musicians are not models. The job was to help self-conscious people look like the most compelling version of themselves, on deadline. A headshot for an attorney or a real estate agent is the same job.

So your preparation has one real purpose: to get you to the chair rested, clear about the goal, and ready to be directed. Everything on the checklist below serves that.

Preparation headshots checklist: what to do before the session

Here is the sequence that works, from two weeks out to the morning of your session.

Two weeks before

Make a list of every place the photo will appear. For a lawyer, that usually means the firm website, LinkedIn, a bar association or directory profile, speaker bios, and pitch materials. For a real estate agent, it means yard signs, listing pages, business cards, an email signature, social profiles and sometimes print ads or a bus bench. The list tells the photographer which crops you need. A vertical image for a sign and a horizontal one for a website banner are different frames.

Then write one sentence about the impression you want. Make it short and specific. "Calm and direct" is one. "Warm, local and easy to call" is another. Bring that sentence to your pre-shoot consultation. It's the most useful thing you can hand over, because it lets the session be built around you and not around a template.

Look at your current photo and say plainly what's wrong with it. Too dark? Too old? Too posed? Does it look like someone else's idea of a professional? Being specific about what you dislike is a faster route to what you want than being vague about both.

Also check whether your firm or brokerage has any style requirements. Some firms want matching backgrounds across every attorney. Some brokerages require a certain look on signage. It's better to know before the session than to retake a shot afterward.

One week before

Choose your outfits and try them on, all the way through. Sit down in them. Raise your arms. Check the collar, the shoulders, and how the jacket closes when you're seated. Clothes that fit while standing often bunch or gape when you sit, and a headshot is almost always taken sitting or leaning. Our guide to what to wear for professional headshots goes deeper on color and fabric. The short version: solid mid-tones, no small tight patterns, no visible logos, and nothing you've never worn before.

Bring more than you plan to use. If you're booked for the Executive Signature session, you have three outfit changes, so bring four options and let the photographer help narrow them down. Get anything that needs it cleaned, pressed or tailored now, not the night before.

If you wear glasses every day, bring them and wear them. People often take their glasses off for a photo and then look slightly unlike themselves in every frame. Mention them in the consultation so the lighting can be set to handle glare.

Time your haircut for three to five days before the session. That's long enough for it to settle and short enough that it still looks fresh. A haircut the morning of is a gamble.

Two days before

Don't try anything new. No new facial, no new skincare product, no experiment with a razor or a color. A reaction or a breakout you didn't plan on is a problem you can't undo in the studio, and no amount of retouching should be asked to solve it.

Retouching is meant to remove a bad night's sleep, not a decade. Every selected image at Argento gets 30 minutes of it, and it's designed to leave you looking like yourself. But it works best when you start from rested skin and ordinary grooming. Sleep and water do more than you'd expect. Go easy on alcohol the night before, since it tends to show around the eyes.

And skip the mirror practice. If you want to do something useful with your nerves, take a short walk instead.

The morning of the session

Eat something. A hungry, anxious person has a tight face. Arrive ten minutes early so you can settle in, look around the space, and talk before the camera comes out. Bring your outfits on hangers, a lint roller if you have one, and the list of where the photos will be used.

Silence your phone. You'll have our full, undivided attention for the length of the session, and the session goes better if you give yours back. This isn't a hurried photo factory. There's one client in the studio at a time.

Finally, tell the photographer if you're nervous. Nervous is normal, and it's useful information. It helps us decide how to start.

If you're booking a whole team

Offices have a different problem: the awkward colleague. The partner who dreads the camera is usually the one who decides how the whole set turns out, because one stiff photo in a gallery of good ones is the one visitors remember.

Send the team a short note a week ahead with the same clothing guidance and the schedule. Tell them what the photos are for, and tell them the process is directed, so nobody has to know how to pose. Our breakdown of corporate headshot costs by team size will help you plan the budget and the day.

How should lawyers and real estate agents prepare differently?

The checklist above covers both professions. The differences come down to what the photo has to communicate and where it will be seen.

For lawyers

Your practice area shapes the target. A trial lawyer needs authority and steadiness. A family law attorney needs the same competence plus visible warmth, because clients arrive in a hard moment. A transactional lawyer may want something quieter and more precise. Tell the photographer which one you are, and the expression gets directed toward it.

Wardrobe tends to be easier for lawyers, since a well-fitted dark suit or a clean blazer is the baseline. The trouble is usually the sameness. If every attorney at the firm wears the same navy suit against the same grey backdrop with the same flat expression, none of them looks like a person. That's where the generic corporate look comes from. Our guide on executive headshots that don't read as stock photos covers how to avoid it. Bring one outfit that's your standard and one that's slightly softer, such as an open collar or a knit under a jacket, and see which one reads as you.

If your firm has a style guide, bring it. If the photos have to match across twelve people, say so up front.

For real estate agents

Your photo gets used smaller and in more places than almost anyone else's. It sits on a sign across a street, on a phone beside a listing, on a mailer. That means your face needs to read from a distance. Strong, simple clothing works better than busy patterns, and a color that matches your brand helps the whole kit hang together.

Approachability is the main job. People choosing an agent are asking, quietly, "Will this person be easy to work with?" A smile that looks held in place defeats that. The best frames usually come from a moment when you stop posing, and that's a direction problem, not a wardrobe one.

Ask for several crops and frames at the consultation. You'll want a vertical, a horizontal and a tight version for social profiles. Having them from the same session keeps your brand consistent across everything you send.

Agents who work in teams have the same issue offices do. Dave Knight Real Estate Team is a multi-year repeat client, and described its sessions as "efficient, relaxed, and thoughtfully guided," which "made even our most camera-shy team members feel comfortable and confident." That's the result to aim for with your own team: nobody dreading the day, and a set of photos that all look like they belong together.

What happens during the session

It helps to know the shape of the day, because uncertainty is one of the things that makes people tense. Here is how a session at the Silver Lake studio runs.

It starts with the consultation. You tell us where the photos will go, what impression you want, and what you've disliked about past photos. This is where your preparation pays off, because the work that follows is built on it.

Then the shoot begins, and the studio's large windows, with blackout shades, give us consistent, controlled light. You're directed through every frame: where your chin goes, how your shoulders sit, what your hands do, where your eyes land. You never have to guess. The images appear on a large monitor as we shoot, so you see what's happening in real time. Most people relax within the first few minutes once they see that the frames look better than they feared.

Between outfit changes, we look at what's working. We'll often find that one expression carries across every look, and we build on it.

After the session, you choose your images together with us. Each selected image gets 30 minutes of retouching. The goal is natural-looking results that leave you looking like yourself, just your best self. Standard delivery takes 48 to 72 hours. Executive Signature clients get 48-hour priority delivery, which helps if you have a launch, a pitch or a listing going live.

For a fuller walkthrough of the day, see what actually happens at a headshot session.

Book a session that starts with direction

If your headshot is overdue and you're not looking forward to it, you're the person this studio was built for. You're not unphotogenic. You've just never been directed.

The Executive Signature session is the most popular choice for lawyers and agents: 90 minutes, a pre-shoot brand consultation, three outfit changes, four retouched images and 48-hour priority delivery. The Professional Essential session ($295, 45 minutes, two retouched images) works when you only need a clean update. You can see every option and what's included on our pricing page, and you can book from there.

Frequently asked questions

How far ahead should I start preparation for a headshot session?

Two weeks is comfortable. That gives you time to decide where the photo will be used, choose and fit your outfits, and time a haircut. Good preparation headshots work doesn't need more than that, but it does need some lead time, so don't start the night before.

What should a lawyer wear to a headshot session?

Start with a well-fitted suit or blazer in a solid color, and bring one softer option, such as an open collar or a knit under a jacket. Avoid small tight patterns and visible logos. Try everything on while sitting, since fit can change when you're seated.

What should a real estate agent wear for a headshot?

Choose simple, solid clothing that reads from a distance, because your photo will often appear small on signs and phones. A color that matches your brand helps. Bring a few options, and the photographer can help you narrow down what suits you.

Do I need to practice smiling or posing beforehand?

No. Practicing in the mirror tends to make a face look performed. Your photographer's job is to direct you through each frame, so arriving rested and clear on your goal is better preparation for headshots than any rehearsal.

Can I use one session for my whole office or team?

Yes, and it's often the best way to keep a consistent look across everyone. Send the team the same clothing guidance and schedule in advance, and let them know the session is directed so nobody has to know how to pose. For costs and timing by group size, see our guide to corporate headshot pricing.

How long until I get my photos back?

Standard delivery is 48 to 72 hours, and rush delivery is available. Executive Signature sessions include 48-hour priority delivery. Every selected image gets 30 minutes of retouching before it's sent to you.