Editorial Photography Online Portfolio Website

Editorial Photography Online Portfolio Website

Building an editorial photography website is a key factor for your success. Start building your editorial photography portfolio and showcase your work to the public. We’ll show you have you can get started and start growing your business today.

Creativity, story-telling, and an eye for aesthetics—if this sounds like you, then you’re probably ideally suited for editorial photography. But, as with most styles of photography, you’ll find it very challenging to grow your photography business without first setting up a professional, well-organized editorial photography portfolio website.

Perhaps you already know this, or maybe you’re hearing it for the first time. Regardless, it is absolutely essential that we’re all on the same page about setting up our websites to house our editorial photography. It’s the perfect place to showcase your creativity and expand your clientele.

If you’re nodding your head along with us, it’s time to dive deep into the editorial photography portfolio. Let’s do this.

Starting an Editorial Photography Business

If you’ve done some initial research into setting up a successful photography business, then you should know that having a photography “niche” or “specialty” can give you an edge that helps you stand out amongst the sea of other aspiring photographers.

In other words, having a specialty and playing to your strengths as a photographer can help you market yourself to the right audience (i.e. targeted marketing means more clients which mean more profit for you).

Getting published in magazines is a huge part of editorial photography. Having your images featured is a huge success and achievement for any photographer. But building an editorial photography business takes time.

First, you will need to begin putting together your portfolio and website to showcase your work. Whether you have images published in magazines and newspapers or not, it’s important to display your eye for editorial photography. A website will house all of your creative work, and help promote your work and get discovered by potential clients.

Once you’ve set up a website, make sure you network and get your name out there. Create and build relationships with industry professionals, especially those who work in publishing companies. Reach out to acquaintances or connect with individuals on LinkedIn. You may want to connect with other creative professionals too and see if there are opportunities and possible gigs to build your editorial portfolio.

Don’t forget to submit your photography to publications as well. If you haven’t been published, this is a good way to get your foot in the door. With your portfolio website ready and live, you can pitch ideas to magazines and share your work with them. Get noticed by the magazines and start building the relationship for a chance to get published.

How To Make an Editorial Photography Portfolio

Putting together an editorial photography portfolio can be overwhelming. This is something that many aspiring editorial photographers struggle with, but luckily, just because you don’t have experience doesn’t mean it’s impossible to start your career—everyone has to start somewhere.

When you’re putting together your online portfolio website, here are some tips to putting it together:

  • Look for images that show off your ability to tell a story or capture a moment. Editorial photography generally elicits some kind of emotion, so steer clear of rigid or overly posed images.
  • If you’re interested in fashion editorial photography—a popular sub-genre of editorial photography—try to find images that are styled. If you don’t have anything that shows this off, create something. Ask a friend for help, find a beautiful location, raid your closet, and get shooting.
  • Select images that have a specific style or feel. Even if you don’t have published pieces of editorial work yet, as a photographer, your work should still have a distinct feeling or style.
  • Because editorial photography can be so wide-ranging, you want to select images that all seem to fit within one sub-genre, i.e. baby editorial photography or fine art editorial photography. Categorize them in your portfolio to showcase your range of expertise.
  • No matter what images you select, be sure that they are professional. Everything you show in your portfolio should be something you would be willing to share with your dream client. Your portfolio is your visual resume—make sure this shows!

While not all images chosen may be editorial photography, they can still highlight your skills and aptitude for this style, so don’t be discouraged if you don’t have that professional experience under your belt yet.

Just remember, as you get published by reputable clients (i.e. magazines and newspapers), start including these images ASAP, and be sure that they’re organized in a way that makes them front and center. Potential clients shouldn’t have to sift through your irrelevant images in order to get to those newly published images which are super relevant.

In fact, as your portfolio becomes more substantial, you’ll want to start removing some of those less relevant images. You don’t need them anymore to show off your skillset. Instead, start listing and showcasing your published work.

Editorial Portfolio Templates: Which One To Use?

If you’re just starting out on this journey to building your portfolio, before getting overwhelmed by the wide range of templates we have available, we recommend taking a deep breath and realizing your portfolio likely won’t be perfect right from the start.

The key here is that you start somewhere. These are some of our favorite website templates on Format and a great way to showcase your editorial photography.

Frame

A beautiful website template that makes it easy to navigate through your photography. It provides an overview glance at your editorial photography. Clients are able to click open the smaller thumbnails to get a closer look at your photography.

Gloss

Gloss is clean and fully customizable. The slideshow homepage gives clients a great way to click through your work. With a left-hand menu and captions to add context, Gloss is easy to navigate and incredibly intuitive.

Lightbox

Classic, beautiful, and sophisticated. Lightbox highlights your editorial photography in a slideshow format, allowing your potential clients to focus on one image at a time. This is a perfect way to let visitors see your work in detail while scrolling through them quickly and easily.

Editorial Photography Portfolio FAQs

Editorial photography is often found in publications and is often used to tell a story, which can be placed beside a group of text or without text. These editorial images can be found in print or online publications.

Editorial photography, as mentioned, accompanies written copy and often assists in conveying a story. 

Commercial photography is similar in the sense that it does tell a story, but with commercial photography, the image assists in telling the story of a brand. For instance, taking images for print advertisements or images for a billboard. 

Both styles of photography can show off creativity and the ability to tell a story, which means if you do have experience as a commercial photographer, it’s worth considering adding these images to your editorial portfolio.

As an editorial photographer, you will most likely be taking photos that accompany a story of some sort. These stories can appear in a magazine, a blog, a newspaper, or any piece of media where both copy and images are presented together.

In some cases, you may be shooting images of models dressed in designer outfits for a fashion magazine editorial shoot (i.e. Vogue editorial photography). In other cases, you might be covering the opening of a new restaurant in your city. The subject matter in editorial photography is wide-ranging.

Editorial use of a photo can be used for education or sharing a newsworthy event, but can not be used commercially (i.e. being used to sell a product or advertise a brand).

As with any style of photography, highlighting your experience and skills by way of your portfolio is one of the strongest indicating factors for success. 

You need to show potential clients your skills, ability, and unique style. This way, they can quickly identify you as the right candidate for the job. 

Other important steps to take in your journey to becoming an editorial photographer include honing your craft and networking. But, at the end of the day, having that professional portfolio set up is your golden ticket to success as an editorial photographer. 

Build an Editorial Portfolio With Format

Start building your editorial photography business and get discovered by potential clients and magazines with your editorial photography portfolio.

Try Format for free and explore the different website templates and tools to help you grow your business.

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