If you're a professional photographer, staying productive while working from home can be challenging. In between at-home photoshoots and long editing sessions, you may find yourself struggling to stay on task and complete your goals.
Fortunately, there are ways around this. Here are some productivity tips that every photographer should keep in mind when working from home.
1. Establish Boundaries
You might think that you can still be productive while working from your bed or in your living room. However, that's not quite true; playing Netflix while you work or having a friend drop by isn't going to help with your productivity as a photographer.
Designating a distraction-free space for your work can help ensure your productivity. If you want to get creative, you can design your ideal workstation using apps like Planner 5d, HomeByMe, and Roomstyler.
2. Choose the Right Software for the Job
You may be dependent on Adobe Photoshop for your photo editing projects, but using it for simple touch-ups can be overkill. For simple tasks, focus on using photo editing programs that are easy to use.
Try choosing an editing software that automates as many editing tasks as possible. Luminar, PaintShop Pro, Canva, Pixlr, and Aurora HDR are some simple photo editing apps that you can use without any difficulty.
3. Take a Break Whenever You Need One
Despite knowing that working for long, uninterrupted periods of time can slow your productivity, you might be guilty of working without breaks anyway. Plus, working from home means that you're confined to one space, which can cause additional boredom.
Make sure to take a break when you want to rejuvenate your mind and body. Use the Pomodoro Technique, which encourages you to take a five-minute break after every 25 minutes of work. There are many free timer apps that can help you follow the Pomodoro Technique, like the PomoDoneApp, TomatoTimer, and Pomofocus. Don't forget to stretch out your muscles during your breaks too.
4. Eliminate Any Distractions
Checking social media or visiting distracting websites can be detrimental to your productivity. Apart from that, getting distracted by smartphone notifications can also negatively impact your work. You need to keep these distracting things at bay for better performance in photoshoots and post-production.
Use a social media app blocker like Freedom and Flipd. You might also want to use website blocking apps like WasteNoTime, LeechBlock, and Cold Turkey to block any unproductive websites.
5. Have Fixed Working Hours
Creative professions like photography often demand flexibility in terms of time. But to become more productive, you need to remove some flexibility from it and get into a routine. Set your working hours to when you're the most productive and highly motivated.
If you're not sure about your most productive hours, use apps like Toggl and Clockify. These apps will keep track of the time you take to complete any task. You can decide upon your most fruitful hours by checking which tasks you complete the fastest, and at what time of day you completed them.
6. Focus on the Hardest Task First
If you have the habit of doing the simplest task first and leaving the toughest work for last, stop doing that. As difficult tasks need more effort, you should start working on them with a fresh and productive mind—usually at the beginning of your working hours.
Tackling the hardest tasks first will also give you sufficient time to complete them. Add all of your pending tasks to a project management app like Todoist, nTask, Asana, or ClickUp. From your list of pending tasks, find the most difficult one and complete it first.
7. Continue Networking
Networking is one of the most productive things you can do for your photography business. If there is not enough work at the moment, why not invest your time in networking? This low-cost marketing strategy can really pay off in the end.
Join communities like Meetup and Discord to stay informed about what your fellow photographers are up to. Also, interact with business owners and local artist groups to stay updated about any potential networking events.
8. Create Your Own Content
If you're struggling to find your next photography gig, that doesn't mean you have to sit idly. You can share photography tips and tricks with wannabe photographers through your own YouTube channel.
This doesn't have to be an expensive endeavor—you can use free software like Shotcut and Lightworks to edit your videos. If the audience likes your videos, you can eventually earn passive income from your channel.
9. Create Reminders for Your Goals
To stay motivated and productive, you need to set concrete goals and focus on them. It's easy to accomplish your goals when you're constantly reminded of them. Apps like Lifetick allow you to set goals and track your progress, and also serve as a reminder of what you need to accomplish.
10. Keep Photography Tools and Equipment Handy
As a photographer, productivity means not wasting your time looking for your equipment. When you have your lenses, tripods, memory cards, etc., in designated areas of your workspace, you won't have to waste time searching for the things you need.
Your photography tools aren't the only things you should keep organized, however. Make sure you also have all the office necessities like your laptop, notebook, pens, highlighters, printing paper, rulers, and required cables organized and easy to find.
11. Get Creative With At-Home Photoshoots
As a photographer, you can capture great images no matter where you are. If you fully utilize your creativity, you can find photogenic material without traveling to far-off locations.
Don’t make working from home take away your productivity and creativity. You can take some minimalistic photos of your backyard, workstation, or kitchen that tell some convincing stories.
12. Perform Tasks in Batches
Doing the same type of tasks in one go is helpful for productivity, as you don’t have to switch your attention between multiple tasks. For that, you need to categorize your tasks and choose to work on one category on a particular day.
For example, work on marketing on Tuesdays and networking on Fridays. You can use apps like MeisterTask, Trello, Airtable, and Notion to easily categorize your tasks.
Become a More Productive Photographer
Productivity is the key to accomplishing your goals. Although it can be tough to remove distractions and stay on task when working from home, improving your productivity will only boost your success as a photographer.