Austin, Texas

The camera can tell when you are pretending.

Character headshots, directed like scenes, by a photographer who has sat on the other side of the casting table. Twelve years in LA, now in Austin.

See the work

Casandra

The Work

Every actor here walked in with a type and walked out with a range. Neutral backgrounds, tight crops, and an expression that reads from across the room. That is the whole brand.

Cat

Johann

Marie

David

Nicole

Harry

Whitney

Heather

Jeffrey

Cat

Jennifer

Linzi

Also on the wall: the corporate side

Executives, founders, and full teams. Same direction, different wardrobe.

Studio

On location

One session. Every version of you.

All five of these are Cat, from one afternoon. Same face, same light. The only thing that changed was the direction. That is the point of the session: you leave with four to six castable characters, not one safe smile.

Cat as a serious executive in a black blazer and white blouse, level direct gaze — 01Corner Office

Cat as a warm medical professional in a white lab coat over blue scrubs, big genuine smile — 02Bedside Manner

Cat in a black leather jacket over a gray turtleneck, tight crop, hard direct stare — 03The Antagonist

Cat with hair in a bun and a bright open smile, black blazer, commercial energy — 04National Spot

Cat with a warm three-quarter smile, hair over one shoulder, black blazer and white blouse — 05The Confidante

Kind Words

Straight from clients, on camera, unscripted.

“He’s so great at directing you. He would take the picture and that was just perfect, because you were in the moment.”
Marie, actor

Marie on being directed into character, and staying there

Cat on her session and the finished set of looks

On Set

No assembly line. One actor, one camera tethered to a big screen, and direction running the whole session.

Nineteen seconds on set with Whitney

Behind the scenes at the tethered laptop, the client smiling as his new frame comes up on screen — The tethered review. The frame lands on screen and he sees it first

The finished frame from that session

Studio setup with tethered laptop, v-flat, and an actor mid-session — Tethered, so the actor sees what the casting office will see

Black and white photo of the photographer shooting between softboxes — Between the lights

The photographer on a Los Angeles rooftop, checking his camera — S, on a Hollywood rooftop

The Story

Call me S.

I have spent my working life inside this industry. Producing, directing, acting, developing projects, and sitting in casting rooms watching hundreds of actors walk in with headshots that undersold them.

So I started shooting headshots the way I would direct a scene. You do not pose for me. I give you a moment to play, the shutter catches you inside it, and the frame that comes out reads like a still from a show you have not booked yet.

Twelve years of that work happened in Los Angeles. Actors booked from these photos. That is the only metric this page cares about.

These days I am based in Austin, a short drive from Houston, Dallas-Fort Worth, and San Antonio, and I still fly back to LA for projects.

Most of my energy now goes into building an AI headshot tool that puts this same direction craft into software. The wall of faces above is where it all started.