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ASKING A TOTAL STRANGER
to take a photo of you when
you're visiting a foreign coun-
try has its risks—and, often, not
many rewards. Nicole Smith
remembers getting a Parisian
passerby to take snapshots of
her and a friend during a visit
to France and getting blurry,
out-of-focus and unflattering
results: "You don't want to
keep asking them to take it
again, but they don't really cap-
ture the spirit of the trip," she
explains. Those photos, while
lacklustre, inspired her: what
if there was a way for travellers
to hire professional photogra-
phers, based in their intended
destinations, to capture their
vacation memories?
Armed with true 2013-era
technology (she searched
Craigslist to find photographers
and interviewed them over
Skype), Smith set up a test shoot
for some friends who were trav-
elling to Europe. "I gave the
photographer some instruc-
tions, sent him the money and
crossed my fingers that he'd
show up," she recalls. He did—
and after recruiting a crew of
18 photographers, Smith offi-
cially launched Victoria-based
Flytographer in 2013.
"Back then, there was no
global marketplace for easily
booking vetted local photogra-
phers—it just didn't exist," says
the founder. Her revolutionary
solution catered to a wide vari-
ety of travellers: friends looking
NICOLE SMITH
F O U N D E R A N D C E O,
F LY T O G R A P H E R
INNOVATOR
for mementos, couples plan-
ning destination engagements,
families wanting frame-worthy
photos that included everyone
("moms are always capturing
the photos of everyone else
but are often missing from
the memories themselves,"
she points out). Flytographer
connects travellers with repu-
table photographers (who are
also location experts), coordi-
nates shoots across different
time zones and even takes into
account optimal sunrise/sunset
hours for photos that wow.
In 2024, the company intro-
duced a one-step booking sys-
tem that allows customers to
instantly confirm their shoot.
Smith's team of 15 full-time
employees works with over
650 photographers in 350 cities
worldwide, and Flytographer
has captured over 4 million
photos and served hundreds
of thousands of travellers. "I
get to see stories of love and
joy and hope and wonder—
when the world gets heavy,
it reminds me we're all a lot
more alike than different; we
all want to capture memories,"
says Smith. And she'll never
have to ask a stranger to take
a photo of her again, no mat-
ter where she goes: "I feel like
I have friends in every city
around the world."–A.H.
"I get to see stories of love and
joy and hope and wonder—
when the world gets heavy, it
reminds me we're
all a lot more
alike than
different."
