Photo Studio
Whether you need a photo studio for a few hours, a few days a month, or you want to start your own photo studio for your photography business, As a portrait photographer, I’ve navigated all of the above and I’d love to share my thoughts to help out fellow photographers.
The Free Photo Studio
When I was in-between moves from Las Vegas to Vancouver, WA (a suburb of Portland, OR), I needed a place to shoot new clients for a month. I specialize in headshots and shoot predominantly on studio backgrounds, so I needed to find a solution.
A home studio would be the best free option, I’ve shot from home for years, without any issues. I’ve even offered coming to them at no extra charge, or a small charge for a conference room rental (for headshots) and still 97% of clients will still come to you. A lot of new photographers are reluctant about this, worrying about “it’s not as professional,” but I don’t think that’s true. In fact, a lot of the popular NYC photographers shoot from their apartment. And things have changed… remember when people said they’d never jump in a strangers car? Now everyone does it with Uber.
But after my lease ended, I was temporarily staying in an AirBnB for a month that simply wasn’t big enough, and I was in a less than ideal part of town.
My first option was to offer to shoot at my clients home or office, even though most clients would rather come to you versus shooting in their home/office, it’s a good option if you have portable background and lighting.
It can be a hassle though lugging all that equipment, luckily for me, I found the perfect spot for a good variety of headshots and portraits…
My free solution: Find studio backgrounds that are outdoors
An outdoor photo studio that costs nada
And the beauty of outdoor shoots, you can add a variety of shots including:
Outdoor Portrait Photography Shoot
Cheap Photo Studio Rental Options
Connect with local photographers on Facebook groups – Asking photographers on your local Facebook or Meetup.com group is a great way to start your search, and many photographers who don’t advertise their studio space for rent might be willing to cut you more of a deal.
Studio Space Rental Websites – It might be location dependent, but popular photo studio rental sites near me are Peerspace.com and Avvay.com. There’s also the TheStorefront.com, but they’re just operating in a handful of major cities.
Negotiate with local photographers / studios – Do a Google search for “photo studio rental near me” and find the photographers who list their space for rent. Most should be around that $50/hr mark, you could potentially negotiate if you know you’re going to need their space for X number of hours. For example, you could negotiate $450 for 10 hours ($45/hr) every month. Or you could find out when they use the studio the least and offer to book those days/hours at a discount. For example, Sundays, or Tuesdays from 9AM-1PM, etc. I personally offer a returning customer discount for my photo studio rental.
Co-Working Spaces – The most popular nationwide are Regus and WeWork, but there should be plenty in any decently sized city. I’ve found conference room rentals for as low as $25/hr, some co-working studios even have a video production / photo studios included.
Finding a Lease/Rental for your own Photo Studio
Flex Spaces – The cheapest spaces I found were flex spaces. Some are a little industrial, some are in office buildings, you could find whatever works for you. The best deal I found was ReadySpaces, it came to about a $1.25/SF (cheap in Portland, OR) for 450SF. It had a rollup door for natural light and free access to conference rooms.
Tips for Finding Your Own Studio – Head over to LoopNet or the “Office / Commercial” section in Craigslist and start filtering down for your search. Try older offices in your downtown area, I found some with beautiful exposed brick and since they’re older – they’re cheaper! Also try driving around looking for “For Rent / Lease” signs, I’ve found a lot that were not posted on LoopNet or Craigslist.
For my first studio in the Vancouver, WA / Portland, OR area, finding a perfect spot was a little tough. We’re only going to be here for 6 months before moving to Maui, Hawaii (and landlords prefer long term tenants) and I needed to find a space that worked for my girlfriend who is a personal trainer.
The photo studio space ended up being about 250SF, perfect for my needs though in the future I would shoot for something around 500SF.