Lynnwood has changed fast. The Lynnwood City Center light rail station opened in 2024 and put downtown Seattle a train ride away, the blocks around Alderwood keep filling in with apartments and offices, and many people who live here work for companies whose first impression of them is a profile photo. If yours is a cropped wedding picture or a selfie from the car, this guide covers the fix: what to wear, studio or on-location, how team sessions work, and what a headshot costs.
Who Needs a Current Headshot
Almost anyone whose name shows up in a search result, on a team page or in an email signature. The people we photograph most often:
- Anyone on LinkedIn or changing jobs. A recruiter sees your photo before your resume. A current one is the cheapest upgrade you can make.
- Realtors, loan officers and insurance agents. Your face is on the yard sign, the postcard and the listing. It needs to match the person who shows up at the door.
- Healthcare and clinic staff. Patients pick a provider partly from the "meet the team" page.
- Tech commuters. If you ride the Link into Seattle or drive to the Eastside, your directory, Slack and LinkedIn all show the same image.
- Actors and performers. Auditions start with the headshot. Casting wants honest light, a neutral background and very little retouching.
- Small business owners. When you are the brand, your headshot sits on the website, Google Business Profile, Instagram and the flyer at the counter, and it anchors everything in our social media content guide for Snohomish County businesses.
- Students and new graduates. Edmonds College students heading into internships need a LinkedIn photo that is not a graduation selfie.
What to Wear for a Headshot
Clothing matters more in a headshot than in almost any other photo because there is nothing else in the frame. The camera sees your face, your shoulders and your top. Keep it simple:
- Solid mid-tones. Navy, charcoal, forest green, burgundy and warm neutrals keep attention on your face. Pure white blows out under studio light, and pure black loses its shape against a dark backdrop.
- Skip fine patterns and logos. Thin stripes and small checks shimmer on screen, and a logo dates the image and pulls the eye away from you.
- Think about the backdrop. Against a grey or neutral studio backdrop, a mid-tone jacket or sweater separates you cleanly. Outdoors, avoid greens that blend into the trees.
- Bring two tops. Professional and Branding sessions include an outfit change. A structured layer (blazer, cardigan, button-up) plus a softer knit covers both a formal directory and a friendlier social profile.
- Fit over fashion. Anything that gapes, wrinkles or rides up will show. Steam it the night before and bring it on a hanger.
- Keep jewelry minimal. Anything that catches the light becomes a bright spot next to your face.
Grooming, Glasses and the Small Stuff
Get a haircut a week before, not the day before, so it settles. Shape facial hair the morning of. Wear the makeup you would on a normal workday, slightly more matte than usual; shine on the forehead and nose is the first thing retouching has to fix. Drink water the day before and skip the late night, because puffy eyes are hard to retouch without it showing.
If you wear glasses, wear them; people should recognize you. We angle the lights and tilt the frames a few degrees to kill the glare, and a pair with an anti-reflective coating helps. Bring a lint roller, a comb and lip balm, and arrive five minutes early so you are not photographed the moment you walk in.
Studio or On-Location in Lynnwood
Both work. The right choice depends on where the photo will live.
Studio. A grey, white or neutral backdrop with controlled lighting is the classic professional look: predictable, consistent and easy to match later. It is the right call for a corporate directory, LinkedIn, and anywhere your photo sits in a grid next to other people's. Our studio is in Lake Stevens, a straightforward drive from Lynnwood.
On-location. We bring the lights to you. That can be your office near Lynnwood City Center or in the Alderwood area, your storefront, or an outdoor spot. Scriber Lake Park has boardwalks and soft, shaded light for most of the day; the plazas around the Link station give clean architectural backgrounds; and Edmonds, a few minutes west, adds the waterfront. On-location suits realtors, founders, coaches and anyone whose brand benefits from context.
Natural light or lit. Window light and open shade give a softer, editorial feel that suits personal branding. When the sky is flat and grey, which in Lynnwood is most of the year, we add a light to keep your eyes bright and skin tones accurate. A simple rule: for a team page or directory, go studio-style for consistency; for your own website and social channels, on-location gives you more variety from one session. Our headshots page describes both setups.
Team Headshot Days and Department Consistency
For a department or a whole company, the hard part is not the photography. It is getting twenty busy people photographed so the results look like one set. We bring a portable studio to your office (Lynnwood, Mill Creek, Edmonds, anywhere in Snohomish County, or the Eastside), set one backdrop and one lighting setup, and photograph everyone at the same distance and height. Short scheduled slots keep people at their desks until their turn. New hires are photographed later against the same setup and drop straight into the team page.
Per-person rates depend on team size, so text us the headcount and we will quote it. If your company also needs photos of the office and the work itself, our corporate photography guide for Everett covers what to shoot beyond headshots, and our corporate video post for Bothell explains how to pair a headshot day with short video while everyone is already dressed for it.
Retouching That Still Looks Like You
Every session includes professional retouching, and the goal is that nobody can tell. We remove temporary things: a blemish, a stray hair, shine, lint on a jacket, tired eyes. We leave permanent things: laugh lines, the shape of your face, a scar you want kept. Heavy skin smoothing looks like a filter and undermines the trust a headshot is supposed to build, especially once someone meets you in person. If you want more or less than our default, say so before we edit.
Use One Headshot Everywhere
A headshot does more work when people see the same face in every place they find you. Once your gallery arrives:
- Use the same image on LinkedIn, your company directory, your email signature, Google Business Profile, Zoom and Slack, and any speaker or author bio.
- Crop for each platform from the full-resolution file, not from a screenshot. Most profile photos display as a circle, so keep your head centered with a little room above it.
- Save a square, a 4:5 vertical and a horizontal crop in one folder so you can find them a year from now.
How Often to Update
Every two to three years is a reasonable baseline, sooner if something meaningful changed: a new role, a new hairstyle, glasses to no glasses, a beard that came or went. The test is whether someone who only knows your profile photo would recognize you in the lobby. If there is any hesitation, it is time. An Express session fits in a lunch break.
What It Costs
Our headshot pricing is flat and published, so you can budget before you text us:
- Express, $99: a 15-minute session with 2 retouched images. One look, one background. Right for a LinkedIn refresh or a new hire who needs a directory photo this week.
- Professional, $250: 30 minutes with 5 retouched images, two looks or backgrounds and one outfit change. The most common choice for realtors, clinicians and anyone who wants a formal and a relaxed option.
- Branding, $450: a one-hour session with 10 retouched images, multiple looks and backgrounds, outfit changes and a delivery set sized for web and social. For founders, coaches, authors and anyone building a personal brand.
Every tier includes professional retouching, a private online gallery for downloading and sharing, and a commercial-use release so the images can run on your website, in ads and in marketing. Sessions are available in studio or on-location, for individuals or teams. Full details are on the headshots page.
Where We Fit
We're Sunny and Tina, a husband-and-wife photo and video team based in Lake Stevens. We photograph headshots in our studio and on-location across Snohomish County, including Lynnwood, Edmonds and Mill Creek, and we travel to the Eastside for team bookings. If your business needs more than headshots, our Commercial page covers monthly content days, and our guide to a content day for Lake Stevens and Marysville businesses walks through a shoot day.
For headshots alone, text us what you need at (708) 677-7136, email sunny@sunnytproductions.com, or send a note through our contact page. We reply within the hour, 7 days a week.