I've taken to bringing my laptop computer with me right to the photo shoot.
If there's time, at the end of the photo shoot, I put the CF card from the camera into the computer... to review the images just shot. Will use Paint Shop Pro on the computer to open up the photographs, that look promising, and zoom in on faces/expressions etc. Use this primarily to satisfy myself and the client that we've got at least a few good shots that we can work with. It also comes in handy when you've got a fidgety kid whose getting tired of having their picture taken... you can ask them, do they want to see what you've got so far? and let them have a look at a few of their pictures. Kids love looking at themselves! Then they're usually more than happy to go back and take some more.
In one case, have actually had the client choose the reference photo right at the shoot. But I don't set up that expectation (it'd be too much pressure and they might choose something that's not ideal)... will usually suggest we just have a look and make sure there's a few they like --we don't look at them all, get a sense of what they like (in terms of expression, etc.,), tell them alright then I'll go home and cull through all of them and send them back a handful for them to choose from. I'll send them back 5 or fewer just by email within a day usually. Maybe it's just where I live, but I've yet to have a client who doesn't have email and appreciate the convenience.
The tools I'm using for this are:
- a digital camera that uses a CF card to store the images.
- Paint Shop Pro, (though assume photo shop would also work?)
- a CompactFlash PC Card Adapter* --this is a flat little case that the CF card slides into so that it will fit into a slot/port built into the laptop computer.
- oh, and a laptop computer
* My camera uses a CF (CompactFlash) card, so I've got a CompactFlash adapter, I would guess that there are other adapters for different kinds of camera memory cards?