Executive Portrait: Tiago Paiva for Forbes Portugal Cover
From Palo Alto Alley to Forbes Portugal Cover
When Forbes Portugal came to me for a cover portrait of Tiago Paiva - the Portuguese founder and CEO of Talkdesk - I wanted the image to feel grounded in the reality of how he'd built the company: not in a boardroom, but on the ground, in the world. Forbes Portugal described him as the founder of the "bold unicorn Talkdesk" - a cloud-based contact center platform that grew from a startup into a $10 billion company operating in 75 countries. That story deserved a portrait with weight to it.
We shot in an alley next to Talkdesk's global headquarters at 120 Hawthorne Avenue in Palo Alto. The location gave us texture, depth, and a sense of place that a studio simply couldn't have matched. Silicon Valley has no shortage of glass towers and polished lobbies - I wanted something more honest than that.
Tiago Paiva, Founder of Talkdesk Unicorn - Forbes Portugal Cover.
On location in Silicon Valley - executive portrait photography by San Francisco photographer Marc Olivier Le Blanc for the cover of Forbes Portugal.
Preparation Is the Shoot
What most people don't see in a cover image is the preparation behind it. Tiago is a founder running one of Europe's most valuable software companies - his schedule is not flexible. He carved out a window for the shoot, and it was my job to make sure every minute counted. I arrived hours early, walked the alley, read the light at different angles, and set up strobes before he stepped outside. By the time he arrived, the entire setup was locked. All he had to do was show up.
The art direction called for a grounded, confident portrait - not a stiff executive pose. I pulled a leather office chair out into the alley, positioning it against the raw brick and concrete of the HQ surroundings. It's a small prop, but it does significant work: it places the subject in a business context without leaning on the visual clichés of a corner office. An alley, a chair, a man who built something that changed an industry. That's the frame.
A Subject Who Knows How to Be Photographed
What made the session flow was Tiago himself. He's genuinely warm, immediately at ease in front of the camera, and responsive to direction without needing much of it. Some executives take time to settle in - Tiago didn't. He has natural presence, the kind that reads clearly at magazine cover scale. Within the first frames, we had what we needed. That ease in front of the lens is something you can't manufacture in post, and it's what separates a cover portrait that works from one that merely looks professional.
The issue was part of a landmark moment for Forbes Portugal - the first time in the publication's history that it launched two simultaneous covers, celebrating the reader's freedom of choice. The other cover featured Patrícia Mamona, the Portuguese Olympic silver medalist. Together they represented two kinds of ambition: athletic and entrepreneurial. My portrait of Tiago anchored the business side of that statement.
Executive Portrait Photography in San Francisco
A cover portrait is one of the most demanding formats in editorial photography. The image has to communicate authority and approachability in a single frame - it needs to hold attention at newsstand scale and still work as a thumbnail online. The combination of location scouting, prepared lighting, strong art direction, and a subject who is genuinely comfortable being photographed made this one of those sessions where everything aligned and the results delivered exactly what the client needed.
Based in San Francisco's Mission District, I work regularly with editorial clients, publications, and corporate communications teams across the Bay Area and beyond. Executive portrait commissions have taken me to corporate campuses, urban locations, and private studios throughout California and internationally - for publications including Forbes, National Geographic, TIME, GQ, and Harvard Business Review. If you're looking for an executive portrait photographer in San Francisco for a press feature, annual report, or publication cover, I'd be glad to hear about your project.
If you're looking for an executive portrait photographer in San Francisco with experience shooting for major business publications, I'd love to hear about your project. View my editorial work or get in touch to discuss your project.
Marc Olivier Le Blanc is a San Francisco commercial portrait photographer working with venture capitals, tech, publications, corporations and magazines. His work has appeared in Forbes, Tech Crunch, Wall Street Journals, and dozens of Technology websites..
