Have you ever wondered what a day in the life of a shoot producer looks like, or wanted to know what it is a producer does in their role? 

We asked Izzy, one of our in-house shoot producers to give us an insight into her role and what the role means to her. 

It’s hard to describe the day in the life of a producer because no two days are the same. Every day poses an exciting new challenge and as a producer, you must be like a chameleon and ready for anything. We are the vital link behind concept and production. Behind the scenes of a shoot, and sometimes months in advance, producers work away to unite all the ideas, concepts, and creatives that make a shoot come together.

In the beginning...

It all starts with a brief. This is our jumping-off point, the creative vision being handed over to the practical hands of a producer. It’s exciting to work closely with a brand's creative process, from the initial concept and briefing stage right up to the finished product.

Here at East Coast Locations, we have some amazing resources at our fingertips. We have the most beautiful shoot locations scouted by our in-house team, a superb pool of creative crew who we can call on and of course, we work with Sandra Reynolds Model Agency who always have the best talent!  Once we know the vision our client has, we use all these resources to put forward options, colouring in the blanks of the brief.

After the selection process and the magical and arduous alignment of schedules, things start coming together. You can plan your shot list and shape the finer details of the shoot. We can confirm our talent, crew, and location and ensure we have accommodation, transport, and catering sorted. Some shoots might throw extra elements into the mix, like working with animals or children or finding the right vintage car. There aren’t really any limitations on what could be thrown your way, but a shoot producer’s job is to find whatever the client needs - on brief, on time, and on budget.

On the shoot day...

On the day of the shoot, the producer’s job is not over, you must ensure things are still getting done. Keeping the schedule running, ensuring people are where they need to be when they need to be there, checking off the shot list, and most importantly making sure the client is happy.

Even if you’re the most competent and well organised producer there is always room for something out of your control to go wrong. Your photographer gets ill, it starts to rain on your Spring/Summer shoot in October, the olive-green Land Rover Defender you painstakingly tracked down has got a flat tyre, there are so many things that can happen!  But in production, there are never problems, just situations that you will overcome in a cool calm and collected manner, even if you are faking it!  And for me, as a producer, the shoot day is the most rewarding, you get to see all the work that has gone into it, and fingers crossed - if there are no ‘situations’ to overcome - you can really enjoy it.