LGBTQ sports team photographer London

Three days before a team shoot last September, the club secretary sent me a list of shirt numbers. Nine of them. She didn’t explain it in the email and I didn’t ask over text, because I already knew what the list was.

Those nine players weren’t out at work. They wanted to be in the team photo. They didn’t want to be in the version that went on the website.

Every queer sports club in London has a version of that list, and it decides how the shoot gets built.

The list that arrives before the shoot

People assume a team photo is the simple job on a photographer’s calendar. Everybody lines up, tallest at the back, done in ten minutes.

For an LGBTQ sports team photographer in London the complication isn’t technical, it’s that a squad photo is a public document, and being in it means being out in whatever room the photo ends up in. That includes a league website, a sponsor’s social account and a local paper if the season goes well.

So the club sends a list, or worse, doesn’t send one and hopes it comes up on the day.

Shooting a second version

The fix is boring and it works. We shoot the full squad first, everyone in, and that image belongs to the club for its own walls and its own private channels.

Then a handful of players step out and we shoot it again. That second image is the one cleared for anything public.

It costs about four minutes. The alternative is a player quietly deciding not to turn up on photo day at all, which is what happens at clubs that never offer the option, and you lose them from both versions.

Queer clubs are older than most people assume

Stonewall FC was founded in September 1991 and was the first all-LGBT+ football club in the UK. Kings Cross Steelers formed on 1 November 1995, after a group met in a pub near King’s Cross, and became the world’s first gay rugby club.

Both are still going. Both have thirty-odd years of squad photos behind them, which is a genuine archive.

Worth knowing if you run a newer club: whoever photographs your season is contributing to the same kind of record whether they think about it that way or not.

Book it before the season starts

Most London leagues kick off in September. So every club in the city wants photos at once, in late August.

Registration headshots get needed first, then the squad photo, then the sponsor requests arrive about a fortnight into the season when somebody realises the badge isn’t legible in anything.

Book the squad shoot for a Saturday in daylight rather than tacking it onto a Tuesday training session. Floodlights are survivable and daylight is free.

What the light actually does to a team photo

Floodlit 3G pitches are the hardest version of this job. To freeze a row of twenty-two people who are cold and fidgeting you need a fast shutter, and a fast shutter under floodlights pushes the ISO somewhere unpleasant.

An hour earlier and none of that applies.

Ask your photographer what time they want you there and then trust the answer, because the difference between six and eight in the evening in October is the whole picture.

What clubs use the photos for

The squad image does the least work of everything shot on the day. It goes on a wall, and into the league programme, and then nobody looks at it again until somebody leaves the club.

Everything else earns its keep harder. Individual headshots go on registration forms and player profiles, action shots get used all season by whoever runs the club’s socials, and the awards night photos are what people actually print.

Tell the photographer what the season needs before they arrive. A shoot planned around a website is a different shoot from one planned around a wall.

Nobody asks. Everybody should.

Where in London this happens

Hackney Marshes still carries more Saturday football than anywhere else in the city, and a fair amount of it is queer clubs now. Rugby sides train around Regent’s Park and the pitches out towards Wandsworth.

Indoor sports change the problem completely. Sports halls in Camden and around Elephant and Castle tend to have lighting that photographs badly and no room to back up, so a squad photo there gets shot with a wider lens than anyone would choose.

A photographer who has already shot in Hackney in November knows to bring a light and not to promise anything about the mud.

What it costs

Sessions on queer.photo start at around £500. A squad shoot with individual headshots usually runs two to three hours and sits near that starting figure, and every photographer on the roster publishes their own rate on their profile, so you can check the number before you make contact.

Clubs often split it across the squad, which puts it at roughly the price of a round for most sides. Season-long coverage is priced separately and it’s worth asking about if you want somebody at more than one fixture.

Picking a photographer for the club

Ask one question: what do you do about players who don’t want to appear publicly? A photographer who has worked with queer clubs will answer it immediately, because they’ve done the two-version shoot before and it’s routine to them.

Somebody hearing it for the first time will say something reassuring and vague, and that vagueness is what ends with nine people missing from photo day.

Everyone on the roster is queer or works mainly with queer clients, which is why that question tends to land better here than it does with the photographer your league recommends.

Common questions

Can players be left out of a team photo used publicly?

Yes, and a good photographer will offer it before you have to ask. The usual approach is to shoot the full squad for the club’s own use, then reshoot with those players stepped out for anything going on a website or social media. It adds about four minutes to the day.

When should a London club book its team photos?

Late August or the first week of September, before the league season starts. That is also when every other club is booking, so getting the date in during the summer is sensible.

How much does a sports team photographer in London cost?

Sessions start at around £500, and a squad shoot with individual headshots takes two to three hours so it usually sits near that figure. Each photographer on queer.photo sets and publishes their own rate on their profile. Many clubs split the cost across the squad.

Do we need daylight for a squad photo?

It makes a real difference. Floodlights force a high ISO once you need a shutter fast enough to keep twenty-two shivering people sharp, so a Saturday afternoon slot beats a Tuesday evening training session every time.

Do you photograph matches as well as squad photos?

Most photographers on the roster do both, and clubs get more use out of match photos across a season than they do out of the squad image. Ask about season coverage rather than booking each fixture separately, since it usually works out cheaper.

Are there LGBTQ sports clubs in London to join?

Plenty. Stonewall FC has been running since 1991 and Kings Cross Steelers since 1995, and there are now queer teams across football, rugby, netball, swimming and roller derby in the city. Most run open training sessions for newcomers.

Ready when you are. See portrait options, or find a photographer.