Website Photography in St. Louis
Most people do not go looking for a photographer. They go looking because the new site is three weeks out and the pages are still full of placeholder faces. This is the shoot that fills them: team page, about page, hero images, careers, done in one day and delivered ready to drop in.
A website is the reason most of this work gets booked. Someone approves a redesign, the build starts, and then the photography turns out to be the piece nobody scoped. Stock does not survive an about page. Old headshots from four different years do not survive a team page. So we shoot the whole set at once: leadership, staff, the workspace, and the wide frames a hero band needs, all lit the same way on the same day so the pages match each other when they go live. You get files sized for web, named so a developer can find them, and a set that still looks right when someone joins in six months and needs to match. We work across the St. Louis metro and travel for teams that are spread across offices.
Team Page Photography
The team page is where a stranger decides whether you are real. It fails in a specific way: half the roster was photographed in 2019 against a gray wall, a few sent phone selfies, one is still a gray silhouette. The fix is not better individual photos, it is one consistent set. We photograph everybody in a single setup, same light, same background, same crop, so the grid reads as one company instead of a collection of strangers. New hires get matched to that same setup later rather than starting the drift over again.
- One lighting setup across the whole roster, so the grid is even
- Consistent crop and headroom for a uniform layout
- A documented setup so future hires match instead of drift
- Files named and sized for whoever is building the page
About Page Photos and Hero Images
A hero band and an about page ask for something a headshot cannot do. They need width, negative space for text to sit in, and some sense of where you actually work. We shoot those deliberately: wide frames with room for a headline, environmental portraits in your own space, and detail shots that give a long page something to breathe with. Shooting them the same day as the headshots is what keeps the finished site feeling like one place rather than a collage.
- Wide frames with deliberate space for headline text
- Environmental portraits shot in your actual workspace
- Detail and texture frames to break up long pages
- Vertical and horizontal crops of one setup for responsive layouts
Careers Page Photography
A careers page is a sales page pointed at people you have not hired yet, and it is usually the emptiest page on the site. Candidates read it looking for evidence the place is worth a week of interviews. Culture photography answers that faster than the copy does: the room, the people in it, what a normal day looks like. RubinBrown runs this kind of work on their careers and culture pages, and you can see it on their live site further down this page.
- Workspace and culture coverage, not staged stock
- Candid team frames that survive close reading
- Coverage planned around the slots a recruiting page actually has
Redesigns: What Actually Needs Reshooting
On a redesign, not everything has to go. The usual answer is that the headshots go, because the new layout crops differently and the old set was never consistent to begin with, and the hero imagery goes, because the new grid wants different proportions. Product and facility work often survives untouched. Send the new design or a staging link before the shoot and we will build the shot list against the actual layout, so you are not paying for frames the template cannot use.
Send us the new layoutWebsite Photography Across the St. Louis Metro
We shoot on location across St. Louis County and St. Charles County, including Clayton, Chesterfield, Creve Coeur, Ladue, Kirkwood, Webster Groves, Town and Country, Maryland Heights, St. Charles, and O Fallon, and we bring a complete portable studio so a conference room becomes a clean backdrop for the day. There is no address to visit. For companies with people in several offices we travel and hold the same setup at each one, so the finished team page never betrays which location somebody sits in.
Where the work ends up
Not a gallery. Client sites, live right now, running the photography we delivered.
Michel Perchin
Product and light-painting photography for the luxury pen house, running across the brand's own storefront.
Read the case study
Precision Skin Care Dermatology
Physician portraits and practice photography for a dermatology group's rebrand, delivered into a new site and a new logo.
Read the case study
RubinBrown
Culture and team photography for a national accounting and advisory firm, running on the careers pages recruiting reads first.
Read the case studyAnd sometimes the whole thing
Occasionally a client needs the site itself, not just the pictures that go in it.
Sparks-Holmes for Missouri
Photography, design, and buildA campaign site built end to end, from the portrait session through the design and the finished, launched site.
People ask, so it is worth saying plainly: I design and build websites, and I do the search work that goes with them. The site you are reading is my own build. If you would rather not hand the photographs to one person and the site to another, tell me what you are launching and we can talk it through.
Why Teams Book This Before a Launch
One Day, Not Six Scheduling Threads
Leadership, staff, workspace, and hero frames all come from the same visit, so the launch is not waiting on four separate shoots to finish.
Files a Developer Can Actually Use
Web-sized, sensibly named, and delivered in the crops the layout needs, rather than one square everybody downstream has to re-cut.
Proofs in 24 Hours
Launch dates do not move because photography ran late. The first proof pass lands inside a day.
A Set That Survives New Hires
The setup is documented, so the person who starts in March still matches the page that went live in January.
What’s Included
Frequently Asked Questions
What photos does a website need?
At minimum: a consistent headshot for every person who appears on the site, one or two wide hero frames with space for headline text, and enough environmental or workspace coverage to fill an about page without repeating the same picture twice. Most sites also want culture frames for a careers page and detail shots to break up long scrolling pages. The honest answer depends on the layout, which is why we ask to see the design before the shoot instead of guessing and overshooting.
How many photos do I need for a website?
For a small team site, usually one headshot per person plus eight to twelve supporting frames. For a larger company site with a careers section, plan on the full roster plus twenty-five to forty supporting images so no page has to reuse the same photo. Rather than quote a number cold, send the sitemap or the designs and we will count the slots the layout actually has.
Do I need new headshots for a website redesign?
Usually yes, and the reason is crop rather than vanity. New templates almost always crop differently than the old one, so existing files get cut awkwardly or upscaled past what they can hold. The bigger issue is consistency: most existing sets were assembled over several years by several photographers, and a new grid layout puts that inconsistency side by side where everyone can see it. Reshooting the roster in one setup is what makes a redesign look finished.
Can you work to our launch date?
Yes, and it helps to tell us the date early. Proofs land within 24 hours and final retouched files in a few business days, so photography is rarely what moves a launch. What does cause delays is discovering the shoot is needed three weeks out with fifty people left to schedule. If you know the launch window, book the shoot against it now and we will build the day around your roster.
Can you work with our web designer or agency?
Regularly. Send us the designer contact and the layouts and we deliver against their specs, including crop ratios, file naming, and dimensions. Agencies tend to like this arrangement because they stop having to chase clients for photography that never arrives in a usable form.
Who takes photos for websites?
For a business site, a commercial or corporate photographer rather than a portrait studio, because the job is a consistent set built to a layout rather than one flattering picture. A practical test when you are hiring: ask to see a team page they shot in full, not a highlight reel of individual frames. Consistency across a roster is the hard part, and a highlight reel is exactly what hides it.
Are you a St. Louis website photographer?
Yes. We work on location across the St. Louis metro, including Clayton, Chesterfield, Creve Coeur, Ladue, Kirkwood, Webster Groves, and St. Charles, and bring a complete portable studio so we can set up inside your office. There is no walk-in address. For companies with staff in more than one city we travel and repeat the same setup at each office, so the finished site reads as one company.
Launching a New Site?
Send the launch date and the page designs, or just a link to the site you are replacing. We will come back with a shot list built against the actual layout.