Studio Spotlight: Headshots with RAWD
Towards the end of last year, we had the pleasure of working with RAWD, a disabled-led theatre company based right here in Liverpool. Their tagline is "Disabled Voices, Turned Up" - which we definitely saw across our time with them!
RAWD have been going for fifteen years now, creating radical, fearless performance work led by disabled artists. They came to us needing some quick headshots of their members to use for promotional materials. Although we had some time limits we still wanted to capture their personalities. As a headshot photographer in Liverpool, that's always the goal, but with this group it felt especially important to get it right.
The challenge was a fun one. With a lot of people to get through and roughly ten minutes per person, we had to work quickly and build a connection fast. There was no time for long warm-ups or endless adjustments - just a quick chat, a bit of direction, and then letting their personalities do the rest. What surprised me was how little coaxing most of them needed. Some people walked in front of the camera and just owned it from the off.
The energy in the room across both sessions was great. People were laughing, pulling poses and throwing shapes. It made the whole thing feel less like a portrait session and more like a celebration. That kind of atmosphere tends to show up in the images, and I think you can see it here.
We used two different coloured backdrops across the two sessions - a bold pink and a soft blue - which gave us some nice variety across the set and matched the boldness of the group perfectly.
What I've taken away from this project is a reminder that good headshot photography isn't really about technical perfection - it's about making people feel comfortable enough to be themselves. Ten minutes is tight, but when someone feels seen and at ease, you'd be amazed what you can get in that time.
A huge thank you to everyone at RAWD for trusting us with their portraits. This was one of those projects that reminds you why you got into photography in the first place. If you want to find out more about the incredible work RAWD are doing for disabled artists in Liverpool, head over to their website - and if you're feeling generous, they're currently running a campaign called 15 for 15 to raise £15,000 to support disabled artists for the next fifteen years.
