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Events Photography

“Every pro photographer needs clients by definition, and most are lovely – but oh, can they be a ballache”

Ariane Sherine

28 September 2025

Clients: you can’t be a pro without them. But as I’ve learned from my first year on the job, they’re often a source of woe

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(Image credit: Ariane Sherine)

Every pro photographer needs clients by definition, and most are lovely – but oh, can they be a ballache. They don’t know how to talk about what they want. ‘I want candid photos,’ said one, and that’s what he got – only for me to discover that he actually wanted posed photos. ‘Why isn’t anyone looking at the camera?!’ he moaned.

Another insisted she wanted candid photos, but actually wanted group shots of the entire room, which she later used to advertise her club night instead of my intimate portraits. ‘Candid’, to many clients, is a term they know photographers use, so they try to impress us by using it too, not understanding what it actually means in terms of the photos they’ll get. Let me say this candidly: it’s a massive annoyance.
Clients’ inability to accurately describe what they’re after can make my job very difficult. One of my first clients insisted she wanted to be retouched to the max – ‘I know you’re not a miracle worker, but please get rid of my wrinkles and eye bags!’ she asked. I duly did as requested, only for her to say, ‘I look too young – I don’t look like myself anymore.’ I can just imagine the news headline: Woman in ‘lack of wrinkles makes her look younger’ shocker!

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One way of mitigating this situation is to retouch a single photo and then ask the client whether they’re happy with it, but even that can elicit bizarre requests. ‘Can you adjust my eyelids?’ asked a recent client. Adjust them how? Turn them inside out?! ‘I want to look glamorous but also natural,’ she also told me, unaware that these were two ends of a spectrum. Eventually I gave up and turned down the promised future shoots with her, because her endless baffling edit requests became too much. These days, to avoid this, I tell clients that one round of edits is included in the price, and any further edits will incur charges. I do less editing as a result.

(Image credit: Ariane Sherine)
I have always insisted on being paid before I deliver the photos, and I’ve never had a client not pay me yet – though there’s always a first time. Nor have I had an argument with a client, though I have had plenty of clients post my photos on Instagram without crediting me, despite me saying ‘a credit would be appreciated’. Life’s too short for bust-ups and they’re bad business practice.
In my second year of pro photography, I’m moving into weddings, which I’m expecting to be more stressful as they’re high-stakes and there’s more pressure. You can recreate a portrait shoot if something goes terribly wrong, but you can’t recreate a wedding. I’m envisaging more drama for starters, so it’s a move I’m making with some trepidation.
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Check our guide to the best cameras for portrait photography and the best camera for wedding photography.

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Ariane Sherine

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Author and journalist

Ariane Sherine is a photographer, journalist, and singer-songwriter (under the artist name Ariane X). She has written for the Guardian, Sunday Times, and Esquire, among others.
She is also a comedy writer with credits for the BBC and others, as well as the brilliant (if dark) novel Shitcom.
Check Ariane Sherine Photography.

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