PHOTOSHOOT MOODBOARD TEMPLATE
A layout that survives
contact with the shoot day.
Most moodboard templates are a grid. A grid tells the crew nothing about which image is a lighting decision and which is a styling one. This template is six labelled groups in shooting order, each with room for the one sentence that says what you want taken from the reference. Plans start at $7.99 a month billed annually, with a free plan before the end of 2026.
From $7.99/month annual
Free plan coming 2026
Duplicate it per shoot
Used by creative professionals at:
Artlist
Pixar
Nike
Red Bull
The North Face
Porsche
Start from a ready-made template
Pick a board to see what you can build, then let AI fill it in. Every template is a real, editable starting point on the same infinite canvas.
Film Moodboard
Collect film references, color palettes, lighting, locations, and tone in one place, then invite your crew.
What is in a photoshoot moodboard template?
Six groups, in the order the shoot day uses them: lighting, styling and wardrobe, composition and framing, colour and grade, location or set, and hair and makeup. Each group has space for references and space for one written instruction. That instruction is the part templates usually omit and the part the crew actually reads.
The reason to template it at all is that the grouping is the hard bit, and it is the same every time. Deciding which images are lighting references and which are composition references takes ten minutes of thought that you will otherwise redo on every shoot. A template that arrives pre-grouped means the work is filling it, not designing it.
It is deliberately not a fixed grid. Storyflow's canvas is infinite, so the template gives you the six labelled zones and then lets the shoot decide the shape. A beauty job might need a huge hair and makeup group and no location group at all; a landscape editorial is the reverse. Zones you do not need get deleted, and zones that matter get more room, which a fixed-cell template cannot do.
Duplicate it per shoot and the boards stay comparable, which is worth more than it sounds when a client asks for "the look from the spring one". Storyflow is paid-only during early access at $7.99 per month billed annually, with a free plan launching before the end of 2026, and 200+ tactics included on Plus, Pro and Max.
HOW TO USE IT
Fill it in the order the day runs.
The template is arranged so that finishing it produces a shot list almost for free.
01
Duplicate the board
Start from the template rather than a blank canvas, so the six groups and their labels are already there and you are only choosing images.
02
Drop references into the right zone
Drag saved images straight in. Deciding which zone an image belongs to is the moment you work out what you actually liked about it.
03
Write one instruction per zone
A sentence that names the part of the reference you want. This is what the crew reads on the day, and what the client approves.
04
Share and shoot from it
Send a view-only link to the client for sign-off and to the crew for the shoot, then ask the AI to draft the shot list from the board.
Why six groups rather than one grid.
On the day, nobody browses a moodboard. They look up the single thing they are about to do.
Each department finds its own zone
The stylist never reads the lighting notes
Labelled groups mean the photographer, the stylist and the hair and makeup artist each open one part of the board and get an answer, instead of interpreting the whole thing.
See how to make a photoshoot moodboard →
Room for the sentence that matters
Space for the instruction, not just the picture
Every zone has a text area beside the images, because a reference on its own carries a dozen decisions and the note is what says which one you meant.
See the photoshoot brief →
Arranged in shooting order
Finish the board, get a running order
Because the zones are laid out the way the day runs, a completed template already implies the schedule, and the AI can turn it into an explicit shot list.
See the AI shot list generator →
Same template, comparable boards
Every shoot filed the same way
Duplicating one template per job means last spring's board can be opened and read instantly, which is what makes "the look from the last one" a usable request.
Browse the template library →Plans from $7.99/month annual. Free plan coming late 2026.
Duplicate the template for every shoot, with no project limit. Storyflow is paid-only during early access, and anyone a paid member invites to a board joins free today.
Duplicate the template per shoot, unlimited boards
200+ tactics on Plus, Pro and Max
Drag in images, PDFs, links and video
View-only client links need no account
THE ZONES
What each group is for.
Delete the ones a given shoot does not need. A beauty job and a landscape editorial use different halves of this.
Zones one and two
Lighting, and colour kept separate from it
Lighting: References with the source named: hard or soft, direction, height, fill or none. This zone is the one the photographer opens first.
Colour and grade: Palette in front of the camera and treatment after it, kept apart, because merging them causes arguments on the day about what is fixable later.
One anti-reference: A single labelled image of what you do not want, which narrows the direction faster than three more images of what you do.
Zones three and four
Styling, wardrobe, hair and makeup
Silhouette first: Shape usually matters more than the exact garment, and saying so prevents a sourcing hunt nobody needed.
Sourced versus aspirational: Mark which references are actually available so the fitting is not the moment everyone discovers the plan was fiction.
Swatches beside the looks: Fabric and colour chips live on the canvas next to the images they belong to rather than in a separate thread.
Zones five and six
Composition, framing and location
One reference per frame size: Wide, mid, close and detail, so coverage is agreed before anyone is on location losing the light.
Scout photos beside the frames: Location images next to the compositions they suit, which is where a shot list comes from without writing one first.
Ordered like the day: Arrange the zones in shooting order rather than in the order you found the images, and the template becomes a schedule.
Why not a fixed grid
The template bends to the shoot
Zones resize: A beauty job needs a large hair and makeup zone and no location zone. A fixed-cell template forces every shoot into the same proportions.
Size carries meaning: Make the three images that define the job large and leave the rest small, which a uniform grid flattens away.
The whole job on one surface: Brief, references, swatches, scout photos and shot list on the same board, and the AI reads all of it when you ask a question.
Explore templates for your project
Every template opens as a real, editable board on the infinite canvas. Pick the closest fit and make it your own.
Film Moodboard
Collect film references, color palettes, lighting, locations, and tone in one place, then invite your crew.
What creators are saying
Join early creators getting structured workspaces and AI that remembers their projects
“Storyflow has sped up my workflow by at least 3x, which means more flow state and more projects I can actually ship. It truly changed the way me and my team create.”
Reilin Joey
Director & YouTuber
“One prompt gets me a structured board. But the tactics are my favorite. I run my YouTube scripts through them and my intros and retention got better. It's amazing.”
Justkay
YouTuber & Freelance Filmmaker
“I used to juggle five apps to plan a project. Now I describe what I am making and get boards, lists, and a schedule. All in one place.”
George
@fernwehchronicles
The template, answered.
What photographers ask before starting from it.
Six labelled zones, arranged in the order the shoot day runs: lighting, styling and wardrobe, composition and framing, colour and grade, location or set, and hair and makeup. Each zone needs room for references and room for one written instruction saying what to take from them. Storyflow's template gives you the zones pre-labelled on an infinite canvas, so a shoot that does not need a location zone can delete it and a beauty job can make hair and makeup the largest group on the board.
Start from the layout instead of a blank canvas.
Six labelled zones in shooting order, ready to duplicate for every job. Plans from $7.99 a month billed annually.