1. Portfolio is your tool for work. The more diverse and high quality it is, the closer the “top” prefix is to you. By quality we mean covers/photo shoots for famous magazines and brands.
2. You can start working without a portfolio, but these are isolated cases with very successful photographs and tests. In other cases, it will have to be created.
3. A portfolio is not a couple of photos from tests or TFP, it’s 1-2 photos from each photo shoot. It is advisable that these are from international trips. Catalogues, magazines, prints, campaigns, tests with famous photographers, lookbooks… The cooler pictures, the better. Every year the portfolio and composite must be updated.
4. At first, some models must invest in their portfolio to make it work for them in the future. Mother agencies are doing this less and less for new faces, explaining that there are cases when newly made models leave with the portfolio they paid for to others.
5. A few years ago, the portfolio was in printed form – models carried huge folders with A4 photographs, 20-30 pieces in each, to castings. Sometimes such folders weighed 2.5 kilograms. Now the portfolio is completely electronic. You can show it on a tablet, or agencies themselves send photos to clients electronically.
6. Photos in the portfolio are compiled by your parent agency or the foreign agency where you come to work. Often this point is even discussed in the contract since models like to choose photos to their liking and argue with bookers about the beauty of the composite. This is unprofessional. Bookers and agents know better which photos will “work” for you in your portfolio and comcards.
7. After several trips, the models have enough photos to fill several portfolios. Typically, parent agencies select the best from each country and form a portfolio from them, rather than sending everything to foreign agencies.
