Identity card photos

[Col_M]

Hi guys,

I've done a quick search on here but not seen anything that fits what I want to know so thought I'd ask :)

My company is looking at introducing photo identity cards to it's approx. 300 employees. My boss is the one who has been tasked with this and I flippantly said there is a possibility that I could do the photos, for a fee of course :p

As they are only ID cards I'm not really bothered about copyright and once I have set up location and lighting as good as possible to minimise PP snap away. Hopefully the photos aren't going to need much PP work at all just a crop to passport size maybe a bit of levels. I'll provide my company with a DVD of the images. The images are then going to be sent electronically to the card manufacturer (I'll have to find out image requirements).

I'm planning on tethering the camera to a PC, adjusting for lighting and WB, setting the image size to small and blatting away with someone making a note of the file name and employee name. Then doing the PP at home in my own time.

How would you recommend working out a price? per image? day rate?

Anything stupid or obvious that I missed and need to consider?

Cheers guys :D

[Dream Merchant]

Sounds like you have it quite well planned out ... however, I would suggest having a few thins on hand - nothing to do with equipment or techniques, but may assist greatly: Translucent MATT powder in 3 different shades, extra application pads and a soft face brush, oil blotters and perhaps even a generic blusher/eye-liner kit. The last item is not really necessary but the others can be quite useful. Also hair spray and a water bottle spray for those with fine, fly-away hair.

Some people, not matter how good your lighting, will always have an oily or shiny looking face. That's where the oil blotters and matt powder comes in handy as a very quick 10-sec fix instead of added 2 mins of post work per person. The make-up kit is for anyone needing an instant 'lift' or accents or colours. Not all the ladies may have their handbags and make-up kits while standing in line to be shot. Some may come totally unprepared.

An adjustable stool or chair would be useful. Have you worked out the lighting and considered seggregating all those wearing spectacles and those not wearing and shooting in batches?

Also, I've noticed with some suppliers that once they convert the files you give them, the final product comes out either a little washed out or too dark and/or over-saturated. Might be a good idea to liaise with the card manufacturer and run a few test files of different lightness/darkness, and colour saturation if your company is doing the cards in colour, if not B&W conversions with different tonal ranges.

Now, I really hope that this would not be taken as any form of prejudice or racism because it is not, but there may be some very dark skinned or very light skinned employees. You have to factor these in as well as their pictures would likely come out too washed out, or too blocked-up to see any details in that tiny ID card picture. Again, I would suggest speaking with the manufacturers and run a few test files. Also, if you do have a large number of extremes, you might want to consider batches. One great way to make permanent enemies in your own company is to make your fellow colleagues look bad in their ID cards - seriously.

I can't think of anything else off the top of my head, but hopefully other members could add on.

Hope that helped a bit. CHEERS!

[ryant35]

I would be careful with your shooting so you don't have to post process 300 photographs.

[Col_M]

Thanks Dream Merchant a comprehensive reply there :)

For the time being I'm just trying to figure out what would be involved and how much I could realistically charge. I'll deal with the details a little later once I've had a talk with my boss and MD to see what they want.

I also understand that the price very much depends on the going rate in my area, so rather than an actual price I hope someone can tell me the best way to calculate or work out the price for something like this.

I agree with everything you've said there and there are lots of good points. We do have a large mix of nationalities and skin colours from the fairest of Northern Europeans to the darkest of Africans. I think shooting tethered is sounding an even better idea in that I can have a momentary glance to see all is well before moving on.

ryant35, that is my intention, like you say a few extra minutes setting up would potentially save hours in PP :)

[ryant35]

As long as your WB is set up and you compose it right, and of course low res. you shouldn't have PP at all. I personally wouldn't even bother with Photo Shop.

[Col_M]

Very true, I was just planning on setting up an action to crop them to the correct passport dimensions in photoshop. I have the focussing screen with grid lines and was planning to get the face in the same position and hopefully the crop action would do most of the work for me.

[rhys]

Set your camera to produce VGA JPEGs and that'll save you a ton of problems.

[Binning]

Having been photographed several times for ID business photos.... what I experienced was the Sears photo setup... sit down, the shot is taken, that's the end of it. No post processing. It's not a portrait shoot. Get your settings right, then run the cattle call to pose in your measured lighting and background.

[bwolford]

Why isn't the firm investing in a kit to produce the pictures and cards? There are turn key solutions for this. Seems like you are going to go to a lot of trouble and then when more people are hired, they are going to have to wait until you create more ID cards.

Are you planning on printing then laminating? How are you printing these images? Are you sure the medium will withstand laminating?

[lostdoggy]

I agree w/ bwolford on the turn key system. With 300+ employees it doesn't seem to make sense in taking photos and then sending them out to be printed. They make dedicate printers that will print it directly to the ID card along w/ all necessary personal info (eg name and title). They also usually come w/ a dedicated badge reader for those that need special electronic access keys. This can all be done on a computer that will store the picture and all other necessary info.

I understand that this would be of interest to you financially but after the first 50 you sure you want to continue snapping those boring dreaded ID photo.

[Col_M]

Why isn't the firm investing in a kit to produce the pictures and cards? There are turn key solutions for this. Seems like you are going to go to a lot of trouble and then when more people are hired, they are going to have to wait until you create more ID cards.

Are you planning on printing then laminating? How are you printing these images? Are you sure the medium will withstand laminating?

To be honest I'm not sure what the company wants to do with regards getting the cards made, our parent company has some way of making the cards apparently but it's not my job to arrange that so I'll leave them to it :)

I'll just take the photos, crop them and let the powers that be get on with it. I've already learnt that at work it's always best to keep your nose out of things that you haven't been asked to do, if you don't you'll always end up with more work for yourself ;)

Believe me I'm planning to do the minimum amout of work I physically can.

[Pete]

Don't forget you may need to take more than one picture per employee, you're bound to get people blinking.

Having a fairly bright light will help your exposure, and also cut down on red-eye.

[GTriever]

It's an ID card, not a portrait... :) Cheap and dirty, as long as the pic's in focus. When our peole come around doing ID cards, it's one snap and "Next!"