We're not just another photo studio offering headshots. We come from 20 years of photographing the most famous people in the world on Hollywood's biggest sound stages.

• Our founder Jeremy Cowart has worked with Taylor Swift multiple times, the Kardashians, Presidents and was even Britney Spears personal photographer on a world tour. As well as endless other celebrities. We're bringing the celebrity approach to you.

• Jeremy's work was featured in a London museum in 2022 alongside Andy Warhol, Annie Leibovitz, Ansel Adams, Richard Avedon and 25 more of the greatest artists that have ever lived.

• One of Jeremy's works is currently listed online for a sale price of $10,000,000.

• There's not a single other creative process like The Portrait Lab. Everything you'll experience has been invented ground up.

Our founder, Jeremy Cowart, has spent the last 20 years in the Factory in Franklin, TN inventing everything about our process. During your 60-second shoot, we will photograph you with over 8 rotating lighting setups (at our last count). This means, you’ll get flattering beauty light, overhead dramatic light, side rembrandt lighting (both sides), back light moody lighting and more. ALL AT ONCE. This multi-light process is already one of a kind.

To take the chaos a step further, Jeremy has personally created over 200 backdrops (using both AI and his own physical artwork) that will magically sync with the lighting behind you on a $100,000 state-of-the-art 10x11 foot LED wall.

THEN, Jeremy has invented a wicked fast system where all your portraits get edited differently too. Some might be black and white and the rest will have various color overlays, contrast, and tone. Some will feel like they’re straight out of an indie film, some will have a modern day higher contrast feel and everything in between.

To put the icing on the cake, Jeremy uses various glass, prisms and foreground elements to give every portrait their own fingerprint, making any one image literally impossible to reproduce, thus stamping each portrait as it’s own work of art.

We can’t highlight this fact enough: we’re not aware of ANY photo studio on planet earth offering a similar creative process.  

So when we combine the art of YOU with OUR world-class creative process, the results are…… extraordinary.

Yes and no.

We are NOT going to direct you during the shoot itself.

This is a very intentional decision. After directing literally over 2,000 of these photoshoots ourselves, we realized that all the shoots looked too similar because we were directing people the same way. 

This isn’t about us. It’s about you.

But don't worry, once you book your portrait, you'll receive a long email from us and a video from our founder Jeremy Cowart, giving you all the tips and inspiration you'll need for your shoot.

Congrats! That makes you normal and human. We know you’ve likely never done this before, you’re not a model and you feel awkward in front of the camera. Literally everyone says these things when they come in. It's just an awkward thing to stand with a camera pointed at your face. We recommend practicing at home in front of the bathroom mirror with your phone. Not kidding. It helps, trust us.

Most likely, yes. But we can't guarantee it. The Portrait Lab will be open 6 days a week and Jeremy cannot be available all the time. He's juggling other careers, 4 children and so much more.

But Jeremy's personally trained and trusted photographer friends will take great care of you if he's not there.

Think of it like a Wolfgang Puck restaurant. These are all Jeremy's recipes that he's spent years creating. It’s his lighting, direction, editing, backgrounds, workflow and process. But he can’t personally cook every meal aka do every photoshoot.

But don’t worry, we’ll take great care of you no matter who is capturing you.

For better or worse, yes. You will see literally every photo we take. Even the bad ones. We used to cull every photoshoot and get rid of the images that don't work. (Btw we realized that on average, one qaurter of every shoot is worthy of deleting).

But with the high volume that we'll now be shooting every day, this is simply not possible. So you will receive a gallery of literally everything.

We are not a headshot studio. We don’t even like the word headshot. There are endless other places around town you can go to get a headshot. BUT. We can still do your headshot in the first few seconds if that’s really what you want. Then we’ll use the rest of your minute to go deeper and get a timeless portrait of you.

A headshot is something you throw up temporarily on Linkedin or for your acting career. 

A portrait stands the test of time because it marks this current chapter in your life.

Yes, we love props and highly encourage it. Most people don’t bring props, which is fine. But we’ve seen some really cool results with good props.

You can wear whatever you’d like. Remember, these photos are for you to have forever. So we don’t want to sway you one way or another.

Yes, it's your minute to do whatever you'd like. But we cannot pause the timer once we start shooting. We have a very tight shooting schedule we have to stay on so keep this in mind. If anything, it's easy to do things like quickly take off a hat or glasses or jacket, etc. Anything you can do in 2-3 seconds is recommended.

The only thing we'd say regarding makeup is get rid of that shine. Don't look too oily or sweaty. We've realized over the course of thousands of photoshoots that we prefer a matte look with all our flashing lights.

Yes! We have already photographed a lot of kids for this process and kids are doing great. What ages? It entirely depends on the kid and their willingness to do it. But in theory, ages 3 and up are workable from what we’ve experienced so far. Just keep in mind, we're on a timer. 60 seconds is all we've got to work with.

The Portrait Lab is located in The Factory in Franklin, TN. We’ll send you very specific instructions once you book a portrait.

Absolutely not. These shoots are for all ages, body shapes and sizes, old and young. All are welcome. If you’re a model however, these are great shoots for your modeling portfolio.

You can use them however you’d like with a few commercial use exceptions. Book covers or album covers or general advertising would be negotiated separately. But please use them for headshots, social media, general publicity and whatever else you’d like.

Up to 8 people max. The LED screen can’t fit more people than that.

Yes, we do this often. In fact, it's some of our favorite shoots. Just email us at hello @ the portrait lab .co to let us know the dates you're thinking and how many are in your party.

We frequently have people just not show up to their appointments. This is incredibly inconsiderate because sometimes we'll stay in the studio for a long time, only for the person to not show up. We have lives too. Be respectful. If you have to cancel or reschedule, simply do so with the click of one button in your confirmation email. It's free. : )