Winters Little League Team Portraits
In 2021 the Winters Jr. Warrior Football program trusted us to capture their team portraits. It is an opportunity my dad and I had been hoping for. We researched, practiced and did everything we could to prepare for the Jr. Warrior Picture day and while there was definitely room for improvement it was a successful event and opened up other opportunities for us to grow and share our talents and expertise.
This one opportunity lead to a referral to a local Christian school in Dixon, CA and local Preschool in Winters, CA. Our dream was finally starting to become a reality.
This year we were asked to take the team photos for Winters Little League. HOLY HECKIN BOB!! While our other team and school picture days had been successful, we knew we would need to streamline a few things to help make our lives and workflow a little easier. The Winters Little League program had four times the kids compared to the other programs and we wanted to make the experience as seamless as possible for everyone involved.
If you are a photographers looking into getting into team and school portraits here three tips to help you get started:
- I highly recommend starting with one or two teams or a smaller league or school before taking on a larger job. I am so thankful that my dad and I were able to focus on the 150 athletes that we worked with for our first team portrait job before taking on our most recent job where we were blessed to photograph just under 500 athletes.
- Set up a practice shoot! Before each shoot we did a practice run to not only give parents a visual of what they could expect but the test shoot also gave us an exact idea of what pose we wanted, the amount of time it would take for each child and what we should expect in terms of lighting.
- Out source your workflow and sales!!! After spending HOURS and I mean HOURS going through customer emails, sorting individual payment forms, inputting orders being sent to the lab, handpicking each order and then rechecking against order forms I knew I needed to make some changes for the Winters Little League team portraits. After extensive research I decided to trust GotPhoto with all that backend work that was costing me so much valuable time. They are affordable, user friendly and their support team is one of the best I have worked with. Here is my referral link if you are interested in learning more about GotPhoto.
It was definitely intimidating at first, especially going from 150 athletes to just under 500 athletes, but my dad and I knew our capabilities and prepared as much as we could. Parents were able to preorder, we hired help to keep things moving, we created a QR code for our website, had extra packets on hand and tried to accommodate whatever requests we could.
My dad and I are also so fortunate that the community, parents and athletes in Winters are so supportive of small and locally owned businesses. Everyone was so kind and patient all day. It was such a blessing and answer to our prayers. I can only hope that other photographers following their dreams and stepping outside their comfort zones are just as fortunate.
If you are a photographer who stumbled across this article looking for answers...I hope this helped!! Please don't hesitate to reach out if you have other questions for me.
If you are one of our dedicated supporters that have shown us patience and grace...THANK YOU!! Your kindness and support means the world to us.
-Your Friend and Photographer,
Sydney Andrade
