Conference & Event Photographer Leicester - East Midlands

Conference & Event Photographer Leicester - East Midlands

Marketing & Branding photographer Pete Martin

It’s that time of year again where business start holding conferences and other associated events.

It’s always good to photograph these as the images are not only a good keepsake, but a usefull marketing tool. The images can be shared on your social media channels, newsletters, website and in various print media to show existing and prospective clients your companies culture.

I pride myself in being an excellent conference photographer, let me tell you about the recent Mclarens conference I shot at the Hilton East Midlands..

I arrived onsite at 9:30am and got to work setting up my mobile headshot studio and a corridor next to the main room. These clients were have individual portraits taken in the conference scheduled breaks. This is a brilliant idea and a very effective way of capturing every members of staff in one day.

Delegates started to arrive at 10am, and my studio way busy with the first of the 82 people. 10:30am and the conference starts with a welcome speech from the CEO followed by the first presenter. I captured all of this using my second camera as to not disturb the studio set up.. this could remain in place for the next wave of people to have their portrait taken.

Conference Photographer Pete Martin

I had a break in the early evening where I grabbed some food and got to work editing the days photos. I managed to get every shot edited and started the upload, the client received the download link the next morning.

Editing on location, event photographer Pete Martin

Food whilst Editing on Location - COnference Photography by Pete Martin

What a service!

Here’s 5 reasons why having me at your event is a great idea…

Professional Image: Having a photographer at your business conference ensures that high-quality images are captured, portraying your event in a professional light.

• Marketing Material: The photos taken during the conference can be utilized for marketing purposes, promoting future events and showcasing the success of past conferences.

• Documentation: Photography provides a visual record of the conference, preserving key moments, speakers, and activities for archival and informational purposes.

• Social Media Presence: Engaging photos from the conference can be shared on social media platforms, increasing your brand's visibility and engagement with attendees and followers.

• Memories for Attendees: Offering attendees access to event photos allows them to reminisce about the experience and serves as a token of appreciation for their participation.

East Midlands Event Photographer

Leicester & East Midlands Event Photographer

Professional Event Photographer covering Leicester, Nottingham, Birmingham, Northampton (East Midlands)

A few weeks ago I had two events back to back, Menphys sports club and the Real Entrepreneurs Dinner. 

Menphys Sports Club is done of my favourite events to photogrtaph, all of the guests are great and the speakers are brilliant. The events are always really well attended and there’s so much to capture. 

Gear wise on these events I like to keep it quite simple, One Camera and a 28-75mm zoom lens. This allows me to capture people right in front of me and up to around 8-10m away. Over the winter months when the ambient light is lower I also use an on camera flash unit to help light the scene. During the summer months I often ditch the flash and zoom lens and go for a 24mm & 50mm prime and shoot more ‘wide open’ to get a slightly different look. 

When I photograph the speaker being interviewed on stage I’m often at the back of the room to try and keep out of the way of the guests, I don’t want my job to spoil their enjoyment of the event. For this reason I switch lens to the awesome 135mm f/1.8. It gives me ample reach to the stage area while staying on the sidelines. 

Menphys also have a ‘media board, this a branded fabric banner which at the end the guests can have a professional photo with the speaker. For this I set up a studio flash with a soft box on a stand, It really makes people look their best. Check out what a camera phone captures compared to my set up… very different!

An iPhone 13 Pro photo from the event

My photo from the professional equipment

Take a look at a few images from this event.

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Next up was the Real Entrepreneurs Dinner at Winstanley House. I don’t get the shoot many of these events as they have a regular photographer, a very good friend of mine. He was shooting another event so the organisers ‘Cross Productions’ got in touch with me again. 

The theme of the the evening is very similar to Menphys, open networking and drinks on arrival, a sit down meal followed by an excellent speaker 

Gear wise, it was exactly the same as Menphys… One camera with zoom lens and a flash, then change lens to capture the speaker.

Here are a few examples from the evening.

Both of these events were edited and delivered the very next morning, so the organisers could create social media posts and send out to the attendees. 

Mars Pawtraits

Leicester Photographer Pet Portraits

Late last year I was asked to photograph some staff pets at the local Mars Petcare Office.

The shoot would take place in a nearby village hall, and each person would get a 15 minute time slot for me to capture some amazing portraits (Pawtraits??!) of their pet, and sometimes with their owners too.

The set up was big, white backdrops (two over both days as they get marked) two lights on the background and two lighting the pets. My camera was tethered to my laptop, and there was a digi tech there editing the photos as they were being captured..

Overall the two days went very well, sadly there was only one cat present, the rest were dogs… but thats ok!

BTS of Mars Petcare Pawtraits

London Corporate Headshots

London Corporate Headshots

Leicester Portrait Photographer Location Headshots

For the last 6yrs I’ve been photographing the wonderful people of Mars Petcare UK. I’ve been to Melton, Nottingham, Bury St Edmond’s, Battersea Park amongst others. Previous work has mainly been events, the odd portrait at said event and a few warehouse/factory jobs for internal marketing.

Earlier this year I was asked to photograph their Global Sustainability Summit. This was the first face to face meeting of the global leaders where they were discussing all aspects of planet, food and crop sustainability. I actually found it fascinating! It was also nice to grab a quick chat with none other than Frank Mars, a truly dedicated man… and the 21st richest person in the world! Quite surprising that he was still using an iPhone 10, in 2023.

Part of this summit was to capture a professional portrait of each delegate, for the email signature, Linkedin profile and other marketing.

Now, with this taking place in a Sofitel in London, and I’d be travelling there by train, tube and foot.. my kit had to be scaled down size and weight wise. But I had to get the same (or at least similar) to my previous work. A new collapsible softbox was purchased, along with a small lightweight light stand, and a carbon fibre tripod.

I did lighting and set  up tests with this new equipment to make sure it was all up to the job, and it was. One thing I didn’t scale down was my studio light, I kept the faithful 300w strobe.

Travelling for the job was a struggle, even having a member of the design team with me to carry a lighting bag.. the camera backpack, tripod and softbox still weighed me down with the various tube stations and 15 min walk to the hotel.

The setup went well, we chose a dark purple wall in the hotel corridor. Same as all my headshot sessions, the clients can see the shots in real time on my laptop. this made the session run to time, and everyone picked their favourite image to be edited.

3 hours later and we were on the train on the way home.

What do you think of the images taken during the session?

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