I don't think it's worth getting professional pictures unless you are wanting to pay a decent amount (£500-£1000 plus) and most of the best ones are in London or Manchester. The ones of middling/cheap quality & price are not any better than taking them yourself and often worse, because posing someone is a bit of an art, and if you are doing it yourself you can just see what is flattering for you.
I'd totally agree with this, but the last and final time I tried professional photos - ten years ago - was also the most expensive and by far the worst pictures of me I think I've ever seen. I'd almost finished building my new website and was heartbroken (and then fucking furious).
The last straw was that the makeup artist had covered my face in bright orange base so even if the pictures had been any good I would have had to bin them (I was told when I pointed out the makeup was too dark that it was 'for the lights'). The photographer was patronising and annoying too, and made it clear that he was only interested in doing his stock poses with the same props and backgrounds (anybody remember the white telephone/chaise longue?

) that he used for every single person even though I'd made it clear I wanted something different that represented me - that was £500 straight down the pan.
There's some middle ground too - my pictures are selfies but I put time and effort into cropping them and adjusting the saturation, lighting and so on so they look nice, and like Patricia I take hundreds just to get a few that are any good
