What to photograph and film in your clinic

A shoot without a plan produces nice images and few useful ones. First decide where each image will go.

1. Start with where each image will be used

• Website: landscape shots of the entrance, reception and rooms, and team portraits.
• Google Business Profile: JPG or PNG photos from 10 KB to 5 MB, 720 x 720 px recommended, and videos of up to 30 seconds. Google asks for sharp, well-lit images without heavy filters.
• Instagram: Meta recommends vertical 9:16 for Reels and Stories and accepts feed photos between 4:5 and 1.91:1.
• Ads: shoot key scenes both vertical and landscape, with space for cropping and text.

2. What to photograph

• Entrance and reception: in daylight, sign readable, clear front desk.
• Rooms and details: empty, ready rooms in real light, plus close-ups of textures, materials and the prep area.
• The lead practitioner and the team: portraits, the group and a staged treatment. Clients want to meet the practitioner before booking.
• Process: gloved hands, the couch being cleaned, a sealed pack being opened.
• Products: what you use and sell, on a neutral background.

3. Short videos that work

The practitioner explaining aftercare, such as the first 24 hours after a treatment. Behind the scenes as a room is prepared before the first client. A question you get every week by message, answered in under a minute. Use clean sound and write the first sentence before you press record.

4. What to keep out of frame

Clients without written consent. A client’s face in the background or in a mirror. Screens showing the diary, records or a chat. Before-and-after images out of context or against the rules: see our guide to advertising rules in aesthetics.

A person’s image is personal data and, in a clinic, it can reveal health information. The GDPR, which applies in Ireland, treats health data as a special category, and the European Commission says valid consent must be freely given, informed, specific, explicit and possible to withdraw. In the US, HIPAA treats full-face photographs as identifiers. For a team member or volunteer client, use a written form stating where the image will be used and what happens if they change their mind.

5. Plan the day without stopping appointments

Write a shot list by room: who appears, where each image goes. Shoot before opening or in your quietest session, rooms first. Give the lead practitioner one block of one or two hours, with the video lines agreed.

6. Reuse the material for months

File everything by room, person and format, with date and consent. One explainer video becomes a Reel, a cut for Stories, a still for your Google profile and an image for the website. Spread the shots over the coming months and update the photos when the clinic changes.

In Dublin, our photo and video team can plan and shoot this at your clinic.

Before the shoot, check

Does every shot have a destination and a format? Is there written consent from everyone in frame? Who checks backgrounds, mirrors and screens? Has the diary been adjusted?

Sources: Google Business Profile Help; Meta for Developers, Instagram media; European Commission, sensitive data; European Commission, valid consent; HHS, HIPAA de-identification. Checked in November 2026.

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