How To Have Brand Photography That is Actually Effective

Most businesses overlook and disregard this avenue when it comes to the branding process.

Brand photography is one of those tools that sets the top 0.1% of brands apart from everyone else because they realize how important it is for their brand and strategy.

“But what if my business doesn’t need brand photography or use brand photography?”

If you have a brand and you care about it, brand photography should be at the top of your to-do list. At some point in your business, you will need to use brand photography and you don’t wanna be caught without it. Especially in today’s highly competitive business environment, you are bringing wet noodles to a tank fight. 

Why would a business need brand photography?

It doesn’t matter how well designed your graphics and/or illustrations are. Having a well designed photography style, gives a personal touch and grounds your business in reality with your viewers. It is the best medium to drive emotion, if done correctly (a picture is worth a 1000 words for a reason).

Quality and Visual Aesthetic

Having good brand photography isn’t just about photos that look good, (like everything else about your brand) it is about having a unique visual style that drives connection to your viewers  and expresses your brand. 

The uniqueness could be from the way the photos are:

• Composed 

  •  For example, your subject always near the bottom of the photo giving a lot of space in the subject

• Edit or grading 

  • The way the photos are edited can be unique to you. Using a certain visual style and/or a colour  palette to each of the photos

Create a visual aesthetic and drive emotion

Our biggest tip for creating aesthetic and emotion is that: the look and feel doesn’t come from the subject of the photo but what is around it. It really does matter what you are shooting but if you want a specific identity it all comes from how the surrounding elements (or lack of element) compliment the subject. 

When it comes to creating a visual identity, your brand photography still needs to stay within the consistency of your brand identity.

Don’t just go with what looks nice. It is only effective if your brand throughout your content is consistent and coherent. 

The use of stock photos 

Depending on the resources of the business, using stock photos may be the only option. Now there's nothing wrong with using stock photos if you keep the aesthetic consistent with your brand. 

But what we have noticed is that it is a lot harder to find stock photos that match a certain identity consistently.  Also, the chances of another business using the same stock photos is quite high so you don’t wanna be using the same content everyone else is using. 

It's an option but not the greatest one. 

If done right, brand photography can be your brand’s best tool in creating a winning brand and an emotional connection with your audience. 

‘It's not about selling, it's about connecting.’