Mini sessions
Home → Mini sessions. A day of fifteen-minute Christmas sittings, an afternoon of headshots, a morning of Easter minis.
You describe the day once, the sittings are made for you, and clients book them from your booking page.
Before you start
Mini sessions use one of your sessions for their name, price and deposit. Make one first under Booking → Sessions — for example "Christmas mini, 20 minutes" — so the minis have their own price. See bookings.
Laying out a day
Under Lay out a day, fill in:
| Field | What to put |
|---|---|
| Which session | The session this is, and so what it costs |
| Date | The day |
| Where | Optional, such as "The studio" |
| From and Until | When the day starts and when you stop |
| Each lasts | 15, 20, 30, 45 or 60 minutes |
| Gap between | 0 to 60 minutes, to reset between families |
| Places each | 1 to 20 — more than one if a sitting takes several families at once |
| Who is shooting | Only shown if you have a team; leave it at Anyone otherwise |
Press Lay out the day. Sittings are made from the start time onwards, and one that would run past the finish time is not made.
Adding to a day, and clearing one
Laying out the same day again is safe. Sittings already there are left exactly as they are and only new times are added, so extending an afternoon by an hour does what you meant rather than doubling the morning. The screen tells you how many were added and how many were already there.
Each day is listed with how many places are Booked and how many people are Waiting.
Remove unbooked takes away the sittings nobody has booked and **keeps the booked ones. If you need to cancel somebody's place, cancel their booking under Home → Bookings**, so they are told.
What clients see
Clients book on your booking page: they choose the session, then the date. On a date that has mini sittings for that session, only those sittings are offered, each showing how many places are left when there is more than one. Times fill up as people book, so nobody is offered a time that has gone.
On other dates, that session follows your normal weekly hours. If you only want it booked on mini days, set your weekly hours under Booking → Hours to apply to your other sessions rather than All sessions.
Each booking behaves like any other: a confirmation email, a calendar attachment, payment at booking, anything you have set up in automations, and a client record under Clients → Clients.
A client cannot move a mini session place themselves; they are asked to get in touch.
The waiting list
When a sitting is full, people can put their name down for it.
- Somebody who asks to wait for a sitting that still has room is told to book it instead.
- Asking twice is harmless. They are told they are already on the list.
- When a place frees up — usually because a booking is cancelled — the first few people waiting for that time are emailed at once, and the first to book gets it.
Waiting for a place, at the foot of the Mini sessions screen, shows who is waiting for which time, with their email and phone, and marks the ones already told.
On a Christmas day that sells out in an afternoon, that list is usually next year's bookings.