HOW WE COMPARE

Calisto Pro vs HoneyBook & Studio Ninja

HoneyBook and Studio Ninja run the paperwork around a shoot. Calisto runs the studio: inquiry to contract to shoot day to gallery delivery to print sales to review, on one client record across 71 products. Core carries no additional cost. Commerce is a 1% revenue share. Every other suite is priced per app in the Marketplace.

Vidéographie et photographes

Feature by feature

Calisto Pro beside Studio Ninja

15 Only in Calisto Pro
7 In both

Calisto Pro beside Studio Ninja, feature by feature
22 features	Calisto Pro	Studio Ninja
Inquiry Forms & Lead Capture	Oui	Oui
Project Pipeline by Shoot Type	Oui	Oui
Contracts with E-Signature	Oui	Oui
Invoices, Deposits & Payment Plans	Oui	Oui
Bring Your Own Payment Processor	Oui	Non
Client Gallery Delivery (No Pixieset Required)	Oui	Non
Client-Side Favourites & Album Proofing	Oui	Non
Print & Album Storefront with Checkout	Oui	Non
Second-Shooter Scheduling & Pay	Oui	Non
Wedding-Day Timeline Builder	Oui	Oui
Shot Lists & Location Scouting Notes	Oui	Oui
Questionnaires Tied to the Client Record	Oui	Oui
Portfolio Website on Your Own Domain	Oui	Non
Review Requests & Reputation Monitoring	Oui	Non
Vendor Coordination Hub	Oui	Non
File Archive with Version History	Oui	Non
Multi-Currency Invoicing	Oui	Non
Email & SMS Marketing to Past Clients	Oui	Non
Workshop & Mini-Session Ticketing	Oui	Non
Online Course Hosting	Oui	Non
VoIP Calling from the Client Record	Oui	Non
Accounting Sync (QuickBooks, Xero)	Oui	Non

What replaces it

What runs videography & photographers on Calisto

The apps that take over from Studio Ninja, each in the words videography & photographers businesses use.

Client-management tools vs. a complete studio platform

	The Old Way	The Calisto Way
Inquiry forms	Basic intake	Forms, routed to a pipeline
Contracts & e-signature	Included	Sign, with audit trail
Invoices & deposits	Their processor only	75 gateways, you choose
Shoot scheduling	Calendar sync only	Agenda, with travel buffers
Gallery delivery	Pixieset / Pic-Time extra	Depot + Navigator, native
Print & album sales	Third-party lab tools	Catalog + Pulse checkout
Second shooters	Not modelled	Workforce, assigned per date
Portfolio site	Template microsite	Sites, your domain
Review collection	Not available	Reputation, included
Payment processor	Locked to theirs	Your merchant account

What moves

Bringing your data from Studio Ninja

Your data is read in your own browser and sent to your Calisto account. Calisto never sees your login for the old system.

From an export file

Export your data from Studio Ninja and drop the file in. It is read in your browser and mapped onto Calisto.

Any spreadsheet you export from Studio Ninja can be mapped onto Calisto, column by column.

The Studio Ninja migration guide Move my data

PRICING TRANSPARENCY

1% of revenue on Commerce. Core is included.

HoneyBook charges a monthly subscription and takes its cut of every payment you process through it. Studio Ninja charges per photographer. Calisto charges nothing to set up and never charges per shoot or per photographer. Core carries no additional cost. Commerce is a 1% revenue share. Every other suite is priced per app in the Marketplace.

Calisto Pro

1%of revenue

Revenue share on Commerce

HoneyBook

Subscription + processing

Monthly per-user subscription · Payments processed by HoneyBook at their rate · No gallery delivery

Studio Ninja

Per-photographer plans

Per-photographer monthly plan · Stripe or PayPal only · No gallery, no print sales

WHAT THEY CANNOT DO

The gaps a client-management tool leaves

HoneyBook and Studio Ninja handle the contract and the invoice. A photography business also has to deliver galleries, sell prints, schedule second shooters, and collect the reviews that bring the next booking. None of that lives in either tool.

Gallery Delivery: No Pixieset Subscription
Neither HoneyBook nor Studio Ninja delivers images. Photographers pay separately for Pixieset, Pic-Time or ShootProof, then reconcile two client lists by hand and hope the gallery link in the contract still works. Calisto delivers galleries from Depot through the client portal that already holds the contract, the questionnaire and the invoice. Client-side favourites, album proofing, comments, per-gallery download permissions and expiry all sit on the same client record. No second client list, no second subscription.
Print Sales: A Storefront, Not a Link
Print revenue is where a portrait studio makes its margin, and neither tool sells anything. Calisto turns the same gallery into a storefront: prints, albums and digital packages priced per gallery in Catalog, checked out through Pulse, and paid through your own merchant account. The order lands against the client record rather than an export, so the reorder campaign next Christmas already knows who they are.
The Studio Around the Shoot: Team, Site and Reviews
A studio with second shooters, a portfolio site and a review pipeline is running three more systems. Calisto handles second-shooter availability, assignment and pay in Workforce, publishes the portfolio in Sites on your own domain rather than a subdomain, and requests reviews automatically after delivery in Reputation. Every one of them reads the same shoot record, from inquiry to review.

Collect deposits. Your way.

HoneyBook processes your payments and keeps the processing margin. Studio Ninja routes you to Stripe or PayPal and nothing else. Calisto connects to 75 payment gateways across 11 global regions. Your merchant account, your rates, and deposits that land in your bank rather than a platform balance.

See every payment gateway

Honest answers

Switching questions

Can I move my existing clients and bookings across?

Yes. Export your clients and projects from HoneyBook or Studio Ninja as a CSV and upload it in the Switch portal. The importer maps the columns to Calisto fields and shows you the mapping before anything is written. Contracts and galleries stay where they are until you are ready to move them.

Do my clients need an account to see their gallery?

No. The client portal opens from the link you send. They see the contract status, the questionnaire, the gallery, the invoice history and their print orders in one place, from a phone browser, with no download and no app store.

Can I keep my own payment processor?

Yes, and this is the largest single difference. HoneyBook processes your payments and keeps the margin. Calisto connects to 75 gateways across 11 global regions. You keep your existing merchant relationship and your rates, and the fees pass through at cost.

Does Calisto handle second shooters?

Yes. Second shooters are scheduled against the shoot record with availability, assignment and pay tracked per date. Their access is scoped to the shoots they are on, so a contractor does not see the rest of your book.

What does it cost to start?

Setup costs nothing and there is no credit card required. Core carries no additional cost. Commerce is a 1% revenue share. Every other suite is priced per app in the Marketplace.

Everything Calisto does here

The pages behind this comparison: the sector, the apps and the guides.