How to Prepare for a Professional Headshot Session
A good headshot session takes less than an hour, but the preparation that leads up to it makes the biggest difference in how the final photos turn out. Here's exactly what to do in the days before your session, so you walk in ready and walk out with images you'll actually want to use.
A Few Days Before
Get a haircut at least a week ahead, not the day before. Fresh haircuts can look slightly stiff or unnatural on camera for the first few days. A week gives your hair time to settle into its normal look.
Choose your outfits and try them on in advance. Pick 2-3 options rather than committing to just one — you may want a more formal look and a slightly more relaxed one, especially if the photos will be used across different platforms (a corporate bio versus a LinkedIn profile, for example).
Steam or iron your clothes ahead of time. Wrinkles are far more visible on camera than in person, especially under professional lighting. Do this the night before, not the morning of, when you're likely to be rushed.
Drink plenty of water in the days leading up to your session. Hydration genuinely affects how skin looks on camera — it's a small thing, but it adds up.
What to Wear
Solid colors generally photograph better than busy patterns. Stripes, small checks, and busy prints can create distracting visual noise on camera, and can sometimes even cause a distortion effect called moiré, especially on video. Solid, muted tones tend to keep the focus on your face.
Avoid pure white and pure black if possible. Both can be difficult to expose correctly — white can blow out under bright lighting, and black can lose all detail and definition. Rich, mid-tone colors (navy, burgundy, forest green, charcoal) photograph more reliably.
Think about where the photo will actually be used. A headshot for a conservative corporate bio calls for a different look than one for a creative portfolio or a speaker page. If you're not sure, err toward simple and classic — it ages better and works across more contexts.
Avoid anything brand new. New clothes can look stiff, and you want to feel physically comfortable, not distracted by an unfamiliar fit, during your session.
The Night Before
Get a full night's sleep. This affects everything, under-eye appearance, overall energy, how relaxed you look on camera. It matters more than almost anything else on this list.
Avoid alcohol and excessive salt the night before. Both can contribute to visible puffiness, particularly around the eyes.
Lay out your outfit and any accessories so the morning of your session isn't rushed. Feeling calm and unhurried going into a shoot genuinely shows on camera.
The Morning Of
Eat something light beforehand. Being hungry or low-energy shows up as fatigue in photos more than people expect.
Do your hair and light makeup as you normally would, not dramatically different. A headshot should look like a polished version of you, not a different person. If you don't typically wear much makeup, a session isn't the time to test something entirely new.
Arrive a few minutes early, not rushed. Walking in stressed or out of breath takes time to shake off once the camera starts, and it eats into your actual shooting time.
Bring a small touch-up kit if you want one. A bit of powder to manage shine, a lip product, a small brush — useful for a quick refresh between outfit changes if your session includes more than one look.
During the Session
Trust your photographer's direction. A good headshot photographer will guide your posture, chin angle, and expression actively — this works far better than trying to "look natural" on your own, which often produces a stiffer result than following specific, small adjustments.
Take breaks between outfit changes or angles. A minute to relax your face and reset genuinely improves the next set of shots — a session that feels rushed tends to show that tension in the final images.
Don't judge individual shots as you go. It's common to see a photo mid-session on a small screen and feel unsure — full context, proper editing, and seeing the full range of options afterward almost always changes that initial impression.
After the Session
Ask about turnaround time and how many final images you'll receive. This varies by photographer, so it's worth confirming before you leave rather than assuming.
Request a range of crops and formats if you'll need the photo in multiple places. A square crop for social media, a vertical crop for a website bio, and a wider crop for other uses are all genuinely different needs, worth asking for during editing rather than trying to crop a single image yourself afterward.
The Bottom Line
The technical work of a headshot session is the photographer's job. Your job is showing up rested, comfortable in what you're wearing, and unrushed — those three things affect the final result more than almost anything else within your control, and they cost nothing but a little planning ahead of time.
Booking a headshot or personal branding session?
Parish Mandhan Productions creates polished, natural headshots and personal branding photography for professionals, authors, and speakers. Get in touch to plan your session.
