Inside our IPA conference photography: four days in Orlando
Updated: 6 days ago
For IPAVision 2024 at the Conrad in Orlando, our photography schedule stretched across four days. It started with an afternoon assignment on Monday and finished with a shorter Thursday morning. In between, Wednesday called for coverage from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Together, the booked schedule came to 25½ hours of photography. That gives a clearer picture of this project than simply calling it “conference coverage.” It also leaves out the work around those hours: conversations before the event, reviewing the shot list, preparing for the schedule, and selecting and editing photographs afterward.
Nichole handled the photography for Clanton Media. Before the conference, she worked with IPA’s marketing team to understand what they needed from the images and how the different parts of the event fitted together.
Preparing for four different days
The first inquiry arrived in July for the September 23–26 event. By August, Nichole was following up to arrange a conversation about the overview and photography priorities. In September, the team shared a detailed shot list.
That preparation gave the assignment a shape. We were planning for education sessions, keynote speakers, networking events, and receptions. Each needed a different kind of attention: the speaker at the front of the room, the audience listening, and the conversations happening between sessions.
The daily schedule mattered, too. A late afternoon reception and an early morning session require different preparation. Nichole asked about staying on site specifically to allow time for setup and accommodate last-minute photography requests. IPA arranged the accommodation.
For someone planning a similar conference, this is a useful part of the discussion to have early. The published agenda tells you when attendees need to be somewhere. A photography plan also needs to account for being ready before that moment begins.
Looking beyond the main stage
IPA’s brief included 28 categories of photographs. Alongside speakers and panels, it called for registration, audience participation, breakout sessions, sponsor booths, networking, branding, and details around the venue.
IPA’s own recap helps explain the range of that brief. IPAVision 2024 brought the alternative investments industry together at Conrad Orlando for education, networking and recognition. Its Innovators and Integrators Expo added another part of the story: technology and service providers meeting attendees beyond the main stage.
That range explains why a conference gallery needs more than a collection of speaker portraits. A wide photograph can show the room and the setting. A closer frame can bring attention to a speaker’s expression or a conversation. Together, those images help someone who was not there understand what the event involved.
Sponsor coverage was another specific priority in the brief. The team wanted recognizable branding, booth views, and interactions with attendees. Those photographs serve a different purpose from a keynote image, so they deserve their own place in the coverage plan.
Planning images for the places they would be used
One particularly useful detail in IPA’s shot list was the distinction between website photography and social content. For the website, the brief prioritized wide, professional photographs that showed the event’s scale. For social media, it called for engaging, candid images that could tell a story in one frame.
That is the kind of conversation we want to have before a conference. Knowing where a photograph is going helps shape what needs to be captured. A website banner, a speaker feature, and a social update may come from the same event, but each has a different job to do.
Across our IPA conference work, quick-turnaround content for social posts has been an important part of the brief. The marketing team needs useful material while the event is still relevant, alongside the fuller collection that follows. That makes the delivery conversation part of planning the coverage, rather than something left until the last session.
For a similar assignment, we discuss which moments need priority, who will receive the files and what formats the team needs. A small selection for a timely update has a different purpose from the complete edited gallery. Agreeing those priorities helps us plan the work around both the conference agenda and the communications schedule.
The specific turnaround is agreed for each project. A four-day conference, a single-day program and an assignment involving several venues each need their own coverage and delivery plan.
What the full assignment involved
The four-day schedule is only one part of this story. The advance coordination and the variety of requested images show how much needs to be considered when an event brings together speakers, attendees, sponsors, and a marketing team with different priorities.
For us, the useful starting point was understanding those priorities before the first session. It gave the photography plan something concrete to work toward: images that could represent the conference as a whole while also supporting the individual stories within it.
Planning a conference of your own? Tell us about the agenda, the people and moments you need covered, and when your team needs the first images. We can build the photography coverage and delivery plan around those needs.
