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Welcome to our Find Photographers search page! You may experience a little learning curve, but we think you’ll love the new features and functionality. Some of those features require a password to enable, so please email us and we’ll send you one.
With so many excellent photographers to choose from, it’s really important to filter for the criteria that’s most relevant to you. You can search using any combination of these filters. To clear all the filters, click on the word PHOTOGRAPHERS.
One of the things that makes Wonderful Machine unique is that we display our photographers in their actual location (I know, right?) Since our photographers are geocoded, you can simply type in the exact location of your shoot and you’ll get results in proximity to that search input. So if you need a photographer in, say, Madison, Georgia – rather than search on Atlanta, you can simply search on Madison.
You may notice that within the first 50 miles, the photographer results are randomized. That’s on purpose. Since we consider that any photographer within a 50-mile radius is “local,” we think that it’s best for our photographers and our clients to give all of those photographers an equal shot at coming up first in any location search.
We’ve recently changed some specialties and added others. We used to have Reportage, but then we decided to split that out into Breaking News (for news of the day), Social Documentary (for long-term documentary projects), and Conflict/Crisis (for hard-core coverage of the war, famine, natural disasters, and other dangerous situations). We’ve also added Body (for swimsuits, lingerie, dance, and nudes), as well as Events, Headshots, and Science/Technology.
Since photographers often find themselves on the road, this unique feature allows them to update their travel plans so that whatever date you search on, our search results will automatically display photographers in the location they expect to be on that day. Of course, we can’t guarantee that all of our photographers are always updating their travel plans and it won’t indicate whether they’ll be available for your shoot, but it does display location more accurately than any other photographer directory on the internet. If you’re not sure of your shoot date, or if it doesn’t matter, just ignore that field. If you’re ever wondering where a photographer is based, just click on the About link in their profile and you’ll see it at the top.
If you already have a photographer in mind and you just need their contact information, you can find them by name (wherever they happen to be).
The funny little icon just to the right of the word PHOTOGRAPHERS is supposed to look like a video camera. Click that and you’ll just see photographers who are adept at shooting video. You can use that filter in combination with any of our other filters.
When you’re logged in, you can click on any headshot and you’ll see a gray circle appear around that picture. Click it again and it disappears. We call this our “Favoriting” feature because that’s how most people use it – but you can use it to keep track of photographers for any purpose.
When you want to filter for just your favorites, click the circle icon to the right of the word PHOTOGRAPHERS. Click the circle again and it removes the filter. You can then add other filters on top of that if you want to.
Our Shortlist feature is similar to the Favoriting feature, but instead of a longer, more-permanent list of photographers for your own use, our Shortlist is usually shorter and more-temporary, and it’s intended to share. Instead of clicking on the head shot, click on the name and it will turn orange – indicating that you’ve selected it. Let’s say, for example, that your boss asks you to come up with a few photographers to consider for an upcoming project. You can look at lots of photographers, click on the names of the ones you think are a good fit, select Shortlist in the Specialty menu, click FIND, then click the SHARE button which will create a link to your list that you can then share with anyone (they won’t need a login to see it). Your recipient can then bookmark that link in their browser and refer to it at any point in the future.
You may notice that when you click on the Director or Favoriting icons, the search results update automatically. But when you input a location, specialty (including Shortlist), date, or name, you have to click the FIND button to update the results. We think this provides the best user experience.
Clicking on the name of a city will bring up a map where you can see the photographer’s location in proximity to your search input.
The last line shows, phone, email, website, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Wikipedia. If a photographer has more than 10,000 Instagram followers, we indicate that with a purple (periwinkle, actually) Instagram button that shows you their follower count on rollover. (Not that that’s always important, but it’s sometimes important.)
Who says personality isn’t important? A brief bio can provide insight into a photographer’s personality, which can help you decide whether they’re a good match for your project. Our bio pop-up window also displays the photographer’s languages and their home base (which is sometimes different from the temporary location that might show up in their profile).
We have a feature called Unpublished, where our photographers can share self-assigned projects that are available for licensing (those projects also provide valuable insight into each photographer’s personal interests and style). You can get to a photographer’s Unpublished project (if they have posted one) from their profile or you can browse through all of our photographers’ projects by going to Unpublished in the Find menu. Each project comes with a description, and that text is searchable in case you’re looking for something specific. Feel free to contact photographers directly or you can contact our team for additional support.
On some of our photographers’ profiles, you’ll see a BTS link where you can see their behind-the-scenes video. Those videos can provide great insight into their personality and working style.
While the list view provides you with a tremendous amount of useful information as well as unique and useful searching, bookmarking, and sharing capability, it’s fair to say that there are times when you’re simply going to want to just look at a ton of pictures. That’s when you can switch to the gallery view.
Just to the left of the FIND PHOTOGRAPHERS title, you’ll see two icons indicating whether you’re looking at the list view or the gallery view. Clicking on the four little squares will switch you to the gallery view. Click on the three little lines and it will switch you back to the list view.
Hover over any photo in the gallery view and you’ll see the name of the photographer and their location. Click on any photo and a modal window will pop up and you’ll be able to scroll through a mini portfolio of images representing all of their specialties. You’ll also see that photographer’s profile with all their information.
Wow, that’s a lot of information! While we strive to provide you with a simple and intuitive yet powerful online photographer search, please also remember that our 45 staff members are always happy to walk you through a demo, provide recommendations, answer questions, or hear your feedback about any aspect of our website or our company.
For questions or a quick demo, give us a shout!