Photograph by Jon Davey


The Findr wesbite is connecting photographers to events professionals


Photograph by Zoe Hammill


aimed at showcasing the talents of a community of professional photographers, who have a flair for brightening up even the dreariest of corporate meeting rooms. Hewitt, who has sourced financial


backing from Innovate UK and from private Edinburgh investors Apollo - as well as throwing a not inconsid- erable amount of his Johnston Press redundancy money into the project - explains: “We’ve got 450 photogra- phers on board so far, but we want to get to the point where we’ve got enough photographers for the cus- tomers, and enough customers for the photographers. We’re creating a market.” Te website - which takes a small


service fee for every booking made - has some clever functionality, too, and allows the photographers and clients’ calendars to be synced together, avoiding unnecessary third party communication. Users can browse according to their needs, so can look up photographers by loca-


tion and skill sets such as events. Te aim will be to build that out further, based on a searchable tree, tagging structure, which will enable users to drill down further into specialisms. “We’re hoping to give photogra-


phers a way to connect to customers in a way which is relevant to their skill sets. We’ve had a really positive reaction so far.” Hewitt, who is based at Edinburgh’s tech hub CodeBase, concedes there has also been some “tension” among photographers who view the service as competition. “It is a disruptive business model, there’s no doubt about that,” he says. “But the site can help establish which client base work is suitable for them, also. It’s a two-way street. And the recommendation aspects of the site are really important - they allow people to share knowledge of talent outside of their networks; so it can create new opportunities for photographers and simplify an event planner’s work.” www.findr.me


Photograph by Andrew Wilson EVENTSBASE | AUTUMN 2016 | 31


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