The cure for "empty house" blues
Regardless of the size of the audience
You can still walk away from an event with valuable photos from the stage
How many times has this happened to you:
You’re booked for a speaking engagement, and are told that there is going to be a HUGE crowd in attendance.
You know what that means? Photo time! :)
As a result, you book a photographer to capture you in front of this massive audience so you can proudly share these images everywhere. Oh, how magical will this be!
Fast-forward to show day.
As the doors to the ballroom open up to a massive wave of people flooding the room, you notice that the wave isn’t as big as you thought it would be - it’s pretty small, actually.
A lot of chairs are left unoccupied - in fact, there are way more empty chairs than occupied ones.
If your photographer too wide shots of the entire space with all those empty chairs visible, the photos would look terrible.
Ugh.
While it’s certainly a disappointment, it’s not the end of the world.
Why?
You don’t need every stage photo you share online to be filled with throngs of attendees lapping up your every word.
Would a couple be nice to use as an above-the-fold banner image on your website homepage and speaker page? Sure, they work nicely in that instance, as well as the occasional social post image, too.
But, too much of the same thing gets boring very quickly, regardless of how big the crowd is.
With that in mind while staring at a sparse crowd, make chicken salad out of chicken shit by instructing your photographer to focus on capturing candid images of you on stage.
Straight on. From the sides. In between attendees' heads in wide, medium and closeup photos.
Create as much visual variety as possible given the circumstances. And avoid shooting the empty chairs, at all costs!
While these photos might not have the WOW factor of a bursting-at-the-seems crowd, it does capture you looking like the superhero that you are when you’re in front of the room.
These stage photos are visually powerful as they draw all of the attention to your expression, body language and delivery.
They offer a variety of emotions across the spectrum - joy, vulnerability, and everything in between.
They each offer an opportunity to be used in tandem with a story or lesson you share with your audience that shares the same emotional sentiment.
Use these photos in your online content to visually punctuate every story you tell your audience.
At the end of the day, having photos of you delivering your magic to a packed house are important for many reasons. But, it’s not the end-all, be-all of your live event photo portfolio.
Candid, close-up shots are vital assets, as well.
They allow your audience to truly see how passionate you are from the stage, and helps them to visualize sitting in that audience learning from you.
It’s worth turning a chicken shit scenario into chicken salad :)
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