Event Booth Setups

I searched and searched and could not find many posts or threads that had pictures of booth setups. We are trying to get everything ready for our softball tournament and was curious what everyone else's looked like. I did find a couple posts that had some very, very nice trailers. Obviously out of our league at this point. I think it would be neat to see some of the various event booth setups that people have. So please a picture (or two) of your event setups. As soon as we have our first one I will post ours. Thanks everyone !!!!

Nobody has any pictures? Someone surely had a camera handy.

I was at a local street fair yesterday, and while I don't have any pictures of them, most people had those four-legged tents that just have the top. Then they put walls on three sides with photos displayed on them. Also, they usually had a table in the middle with matted prints. Hope that helps some.

Nope, sorry. While I'm pretty sure have some photos somewhere that include our onsite printing setup in the background, I really don't know where to begin looking for them and you wouldn't be able to see anything of much use. When I'm at events I'm pretty busy shooting other things, usually not our booth setup unless it happens to find it's way into the background.

I collaborate with another photographer on larger events, when it's a big enough event we will offer onsite printing. Her husband often helps with that printing, but on occasion we've hired others to help too.

We simply use one of those 10x10 popup tents when we aren't able to set up under cover of something else.

If you get one of these tents, I'd suggest it be a white, grey or black one, since any color will tint the screen of your computer as you try to print, as well as the prints themselves. Out tent is green, and I hate it. That makes getting a neutral print pretty tricky. Wasn't my choice, though, so I just live with it.

Our tent has "walls" that we can attach or not, optionally. These are mesh to keep out bugs, but allow in plenty of fresh air. The primary reason we use them is to control traffic flow and direct customers to one side of the tent. It also gives a small measure of security to our camera equipment inside, when zipped closed. Not that someone serious about it couldn't steal something if they tried hard enough. So, we try to keep a close eye on things and stash equipment inside bins that slide under the tables, out of sight, when it's not in use.

Also get a large banner printed with the words "Event Photography" or something like that. Hang it on the awning of the tent or front of the table. Weight it or tie it down to keep it from flapping in the wind. I had an 18" tall, 5 foot long banner printed by Staples for $60.

We use three or four folding tables and have a couple chairs for ourselves and more out front for customers to sit down while reviewing photos.

You'll need all the usual stuff to be organized: pens & pencils, forms, maybe a few portable drawers to store things in (printing paper, inks, etc.), some of those large plastic containers to pack stuff up and move it, extension cords, staplers, receipt book calculator, etc., etc. Heck, it's your mobile office.

We have table cloths to help hide all the stuff we are storing under the tables. Go to the hardware store and get a bunch of clamps to keep them secure from the breeze, if you use table cloths.

We bring coolers, since at some events there are no food and drink. Even the ones with a food vendor, several times they've run out before we got a chance to take a break.

Often out in 70 to 100 degrees F all day long shooting, we have plenty of liquids, sunscreen, hats and long-sleeve shirts or light jackets handy.

I have a number of sample images, too, matted and in frames. These show sizes for people to compare (just 4x6, 5x7 and 8x10, since those are the only sizes we offer on site) and include special items we offer like photo montages. Displaying 4x6 samples alongside 5x7 and 8x10 samples really helps you upsell to the larger sizes! Our pricing is also framed and on display this way.

Smaller size frames should have a built in easel to stand up on a table top. Larger framed images can be leaned against something. Try to keep anything framed out of direct sunshine, as it can cause fading and/or condensation. Try to choose plastic or light metal frames and acrylic instead of glass, if you do this.

Plenty of business cards with our website URL, and a brochure of service, another with online sizes, products and prices (there's far, far more to choose from online, and it's even a little cheaper).

Overall, just plan to deal with wind and sun, and perhaps - but hopefully not - rain.

We currently work with one portable computer, printed thumbnail catalogs and an inkjet printer. If we did more onsite sales, I'd like to upgrade to a dye sub printer and viewing screens running off a networked server, to make the whole process a little smoother, a lot faster and more cost efficient. (In fact we've picked up some used computers and monitors with this in mind). But, there's a lot of cost to doing this. So, we make do for now and really don't print onsite a lot of the time.

Heck, I've thought there might even be a viable business in building up an event trailer and leasing it and my printing services out to other event photographers, when not busy with my own events. Perhaps it could be based on a flat per-print fee (built into the price charged the print buyers), and perhaps something to cover the cost of DVDs burned with the images after the fact, or travel time/expense. Might even lead to hosting galleries online, etc. I dunno. Might work. Still thinkin' about it. Hey, if I do, and it works well enough, maybe I'll franchise the idea!

I posted this several times, but here's my booth and my vendors...

I only take landscape/nature stuff. I sell to local Art's and Craft shows, although I haven't been able to go for almost a year because of my surgery problems. I also have some framed works at a local book store.

Here's my list of my vendors:

Prints - Mpix
Greeting Cards - Photograper's Edge
Card Display - Card Display
Mats, Frames, Clear Bags - http://www.documounts.​com/content/home[/URL
Print Racks - Jerry's Artarama
Canopy (10 x 10) - Caravan
Mesh Walls (pricey, but worth it) - Flourish

Here's my booth:

When I do a softball tournament, (usually 12u-18u) I bring a 10x10 tent preferrably with sides. 2 6 foot tables and 3 chairs. Arrange them to suit your needs and traffic flow. I also bring a laptop card reader and a 32inch computer monitor with a home made sun shade. Plus all my sales propaganda (collection of some great pictures for whatever type of event it is, cards, price signs, web site address signs) First day I shoot while my wife uploads as I bring her cards and runs a slide show. I take orders there and get paid or direct them to site. What has really helped alot is I carry a walkie talkie and my wife has one. She will book players for me to shoot, the parent tells her all the vital info she relays to me and I make sure I am at the correct field at the correct time. Second day I may brings 5x7's of some great shots to display from this event and sell them as oppurtunity arises.

About the walkie talkies now this helps for a couple of reasons. I charge $20 to specifically shoot their child. They receive a $20 coupon for prints. So its a guaranteed sale. They also rush over and tell the other parents who will either approach me (and I tell them I will try but can't promise anything because I have people who have resrved my time, in which case...) or they go to my wife and pay $20. At least once a tournament I will collect almost the whole team $200+ this is all guaranteed money and they will still order more than $20 of pictures.

I would say eye catching displays and your bet work proudly displayed really is your best friend at these events. A remarkable play on a large print draws attention. We don't print at events would love to hear from those who do about how it works out for you.

Thanks

Wow, some great response's. Thanks so much for all the detail. What do you do if it's a multi day tournament? Do you break down each night? For example at a ball park for softball or baseball tourney?

I have really enjoyed read this thread and seeing how everyone sets up and operates. I am also wanting to do a booth, however, I want to photograph in the booth, download via usb cable to my laptop for viewing and then print on site or burn cds. I am scheduled to do a pet portrait booth soon and feel I have everything I need, but was wondering if any of you do this as well and have ideas.

Maybe I'm not searching for the right terms to find info in the forums, but since this is real close to what I am doing I thought I'd ask.

Thanks for any help!

Hi Kristil,

I'm glad I came back here to see what was going on...

For pet photography, this guy rocks!

www.chanan.com

I met and chatted with him, during a rare pause in the action, at last year's Cat Fanciers of America (CFA) show in San Francisco. He was single-handedly blowing away the primary competition: A team of 5 or 6 that had a booth 3X as large. He had people lined up and waiting, while they were sending out "trolls" to try to talk people into coming over to get their cat's photos taken.

Both had neat location lighting setups, digital rigs and computers.

But there were a few things that set Rich (Chanan) apart.

He had his setup under a fully enclosed tent (the other photographers didn't) that was about 8x8. The cat and the owner go inside with him, there's less danger of the animal escaping, there are minimal distractions and he can completely control lighting. He spent about 10 minutes with most, and probably made about 50 to 100 shots of each.

Next to the "shooting tent", he had a simple table set up, with a laptop where folks could browse the images just taken, and forms for them to fill out their orders, calculate the total and write him a check. All the while, he just keeps shooting, occasionally poking his head out or stopping between shoots to deal with a quick question. Every so often he pops the CF card out of his camera and plugs it into his computer to download automatically. I'm not sure what software he was using, there were customers browsing to see their photos the whole time I was there! He later prints the photos himself and sends them out, well after the show. It says right on his order form to please allow three weeks for delivery. He also posts galleries of thumbnails on his website, and I think you can order there.

But, mainly he just charges a "sitting fee". It varies a little between about $40 and $56, but that includes a few prints. He hammers out as many as 5 or 6 sittings an hour. Not bad, but it doesn't really take into account all the reprints and extra prints I saw being ordered!

Now, all this goes sort of goes against a lot of the "rules" of event photography. But it works for him, and darned well too!

Why? Well, there are several reasons:

He's very well known in the cat breeding industry. He's been doing this a long time now, and his photos appear in Cat Fancy magazine regularly. So people know and trust him, that he will get good shots and deliver good prints to them in a timely manner. They are comfortable writing him a check and waiting for their prints to be delivered.

He also takes twelve or thirteen of his "best" photos each year to compile a calendar, which is printed in large quantity and sold as a fund raiser for CFA. He donates all the profits to the organization. The calendar sells for $15 apiece. Everyone hopes their cat will be among those chosen for the calendar, of course, out of the hundreds he photographs each year. What a great gimmick. It ends up costing him nothing and insures even more of his photos are in front of even more potential customers every single day of the coming year! And he's a hero to the CFA, to boot!

The enclosed tent is also critical to his success. It really tells me and everyone else that he knows cats and precisely how easily they can escape! It hadn't occurred to me before that, but what a simple solution. Inside there's a raised stand to put the cat on, each of the three walls (besides the entry) is a different color backdrop, and there are interchangeable matching cloths for the stand, too. You can see the results on his web site.

Rich is "the man" when it comes to show cats. He's made it his specialty, stuck with it for 30 years and is darned good at it. Look at his list of shows on his website. Good grief! If I'm ever that busy, I'll have a heart attack.

But, dig around a little on Rich's website and you might be surprised to see his statement that he barely breaks even taking those photos for those sitting fees and selling prints. He's also got to have one of the largest collections of cat photography around. Every person who fills out a "sitting form" is also signing a property release that allows him to sell the photos for commercial use, which is where his real income comes from. Nothing sneaky about this, he says right up front and gives people the option of not signing the release, but their sitting fees and print prices will be 10X to 20X as much!

Now I went to that big CFA show last year to see a friend who was showing her cats, primarily, but also to gauge if there might be some potential business in it for an event photographer like me. I was unaware of Rich. After seeing him at work and just how solidly he's got the business locked up, I decided to look to expand elsewhere! (I'm also a bit allergic to cats anyway, but that doesn't stop me from having one at home!)

Cheers!

Wow Alan, I am glad you checked in here as well!!! That is exactly what I had in mind!!!

I already have a 10x10 pop up tent, no sides yet but there are mesh sides available for this model, private and secure while letting in some air. I just got a portable generator in case I need power. I was planning to shoot tethered to my laptop, but popping out the CF card to download would work just as well.

I love the idea of having a back drop on each wall so simply changing direction would be so much easier than being stationery and dropping down, another backdrop.

Do you remember if he was on a tripod or hand held. It has been my experience so far that hand held works well with animals as you have more flexibility and can move with them if they are fidgety.

Was he using portrait lighting? I have a set of hot lights until I make enough to get strobes (soon I hope if I can get enough business).

His website is a wealth of information and I can't thank you enough for sharing. I found lots of info from his links to shows (I had not thought this far through and wasn't thinking about the various cat and dog club shows). Seems most of the shows I've found in my area aren't until the fall, but would give me extra time to get prepared, make contacts etc.

In two weeks I am doing the charity pet portrait event (which will be inside and I won't need the tent) and is a relatively small event (according to their website about 40 people attended last year- their first year for it).

I was kind of getting the pre-event jitters but now reading how he was doing it and what I have in mind I think I can pull this off just fine.

I am doing this mostly for the exposure (however I love the charity as well...helps people get vet care for serious conditions when they cannot afford it otherwise).

Thank you, thank you!! Any other advise and suggestions greatly appreciated and welcomed!!

Hi again Kristil,

The cat photographer was shooting handheld and with a zoom lens. I am not 100% certain his lighting arrangement (it was inside the tent and hidden from view), but it was definitely strobes.

By putting the cats on the stand (or pedestal), it limits their movement quite a bit. These are show cats who are pretty accustomed to being handled. Domestic pets may not be so easily handled or cooperative.

He uses (or has the owner use) a string toy or something similar to attract the animal's attention and get a lot of the poses you see on his website. Last time I did an event like you are planning, I borrowed about a dozen of my cat's toys (she had plenty others to ignore) to help grab the animals' attention. Some noise makers work, too. (We were photographing dogs, cats, rats, gerbils and guinea pigs, even some reptiles! Horses and chickens outside, too!)

It's very important to have a means of either cleaning the surface you place the animal on, or changing it out entirely between each. At a cat show, for example, you will see the judge use sanitary wipes on their hands and to clean the surface they place them on (usually Formica or something like that) between each and every animal. This is to prevent any chance of spreading illnesses, of course.

If working indoors, a closed room will do. Smaller is better than larger, if possible. Only yourself and the owner in there with the animal is the best arrangement. Even so, some will be shy and difficult. The more constrained the space is, up to a point, the better. Obviously you still need room to move around and take your shots. There should be room for the pet owner to stand behind you, too, to attract the animal's attention toward the camera. The less clutter and "hiding places", the better.

As I said, the cat photographer was using strobes. I would not want to be inside his small tent setup with a set of hot lights for very long! That would be miserable for everyone. I'd consider the newer cool lights, if they packed enough power. Continuous lighting is ideal, especially with animals that have seldom been photographed.

At that cat show, it was interesting the difference between breeders and handlers. Some were paranoid about me and my camera, saying that flash really upset their animal. But, IMHO, that's sort of short-sighted and perhaps a bit unprofessional on their part. Some other, probably more experienced, breeders & trainers were actually deliberately popping a camera flash near a young animal to help get it accustomed, so it would be cooperative when being photographed.

I run across the same thing with horse owners, too. Some ask me not to use flash, and I comply. Others say "Please do, he's a show horse and needs to get used to it. Might as well work on that a little right now!" (Note, certain types of competition, flash cannot be used with horses... such as dressage, which requires concentration by both horse and rider.)

Strobes do upset some animals, but many others just ignore them. I've used both portable flash and stucio strobes a lot without problems, but have had to resort to using just modeling lights with certain animals (easy to do with a custom white balance on a digital camera).

The "pop" noise of the strobes seems the biggest scare.But some react to the whine of the strobes recharging. A few just don't like the burst of light. Outdoor animals usually tend to ignore the flash of strobes, but not always the noise. I think because they see flashes of lightning and other specular glints, such as of windows or cars.

I do use umbrellas or a soft box to diffuse and spread the light from strobes, so it's not overwhelming to the animals.

Hope this helps.

Hi Alan,

Thanks again for all the info. Continuous lighting is all I have to work with at this time, so I'll have to see how it goes. I have 750 watts total, 250 each light with the 3rd a back light. I have umbrellas for the key and fill light.

I had to send my speedlite back to the company I purchased it from as it worked when I tested it out and then went to shoot with it and it would not power up. Not sure if it was the light itself or the digital module that came with it, but sent both back. I am hoping they get the replacement back to me quickly otherwise I only have my on camera flash. GRRR!

The portrait booth isn't until the 7th of June so I still have some time to prepare. I am working on getting a stable table to pose the pets on. And I am working on some type of online viewing gallery. Not really satisfied with most of the free sites I am seeing. Some don't work with Macs. Can't afford the paid sites right now.

The packages will be prepaid at the event to the charity organization. They will just need to pick the pictures they want. Thinking of just adding a page to my web site (done by me in Dreamweaver) and they can call or email me with the pose numbers. But need to set up something long term for all the jobs yet to come. I am thinking of printing myself at local printer so I can gauge the results since this is something to get my name out there and I want them to be representative of my work.

Wow, so much to do, my head is spinning. I am sure it will all work out and my husband thinks I am over thinking it, but can't help myself!!

Thanks for all your help!