This is the question everyone gets stuck on the first time they book a studio. Book too little and you finish under pressure; book too much and you pay for empty hours.
The way to answer it isn't to guess how long the shoot takes, but to work backwards: how much time goes on everything that isn't shooting, and what's left.
1. The time that isn't shooting
Every booking has three parts that aren't shooting: getting in and unloading, setting up lights and the set, and clearing out at the end. For an experienced photographer with familiar gear that's usually twenty to thirty minutes at the start and ten at the end. For someone arriving at a new space, or bringing a complex set, it can be double.
Which means a one-hour booking gives you roughly twenty to thirty minutes of actual shooting. That's enough for one focused portrait and not enough for anything beyond it. If it's your first booking in a particular space, add half an hour just for getting to know it.
2. A starting point by type of shoot
These are starting estimates, not rules - they vary a lot with the photographer, the number of looks and the level of production. Personal branding for one person with two or three looks: two to three hours. Product photography for a small catalogue: three to four. Social content with several sets: four to six.
Two things stretch a shoot more than anything else: outfit changes and the number of people. Each additional look is ten to fifteen minutes that isn't shooting, and each extra person on set adds coordination time. If hair and makeup happen in the space, count their time separately - it doesn't overlap with shooting.
3. Book precisely, and extend
The temptation is to book a buffer "just in case". Usually that's a mistake: you pay for an hour you didn't use, and at the same time you block an hour someone else could have booked.
Better to book what you actually need and check in advance whether you can extend. At ALTAYKA you can extend if the hour after you is still free, and the booking is then repriced for the new total number of hours. If it's already taken, the rental ends as planned.
4. What happens if you finish early, or late
It's worth knowing in advance which way a studio works. Finishing early almost never earns a refund - you pay for the time booked, even if the shoot ended before it. That's another reason to book precisely.
In the other direction, running over is charged. At ALTAYKA it is charged as an additional hour, and the last five minutes of the booking are already set aside for clearing out - so plan the end of the shoot before them, not inside them.
5. How the price list changes the maths
When pricing is tiered, the gap between four hours and five is smaller than the gap between one and two. That shifts the decision: adding a fifth hour costs less than it seems, and the pressure of finishing on time costs more.
At ALTAYKA a single hour is ₪250 and five hours are ₪1,100 - ₪220 an hour. You can book from one hour to ten, in whole hours. It's worth simply looking at the two tiers either side of your estimate and seeing what the real difference is.
The short version
Don't ask how long the shoot takes. Ask how long everything else takes, and add it.