—— A Quick Set Up Guide ——

How I Use Claude

How I use Claude — The Leap
The Leap · Photography Education 01 / 09

How I use Claude

A quick set-up, so we're working the same way.

Takes about ten minutes.
Everything I teach happens inside Claude — the tool at claude.ai — so that's the one place we all need to be working.
You don't need to pay anything to begin.

The free plan

Start for free

When you sign up at claude.ai, you're on the free plan.

It covers everything the live courses ask of you.

Usage resets on a rolling five-hour window — in practice, around 30 to 100 messages a day, depending on how busy things are.

I'll always be clear whenever something needs a paid plan.

Free£0 to begin
Claude's everyday model
Projects to organise your work
Web search & file uploads
Artifacts — little tools Claude builds you
Getting set up

Tell Claude how to work with you

Open Claude, click your initials, and go to Settings.

Add instructions Claude follows in every chat — how you like to be spoken to, and what you're working on.

Set your voice, so Claude writes more like you.

We go much deeper on voice inside the courses. This is just the switch that turns it on.

Settings
Instructions for Claude
How to work with you
Your voice
Write more like you
Notifications
On or off — your call
Privacy · the important one

Two toggles that matter

Go to Settings, then Privacy.

Leave Location on — it just lets Claude give you sensible local answers.

Do this one first

Turn off "Help improve Claude". Off means your chats — your clients, your business — aren't used to train the AI.

Settings › Privacy
Location
Sensible local answers
Help improve ClaudeOff
Model-training setting
Getting set up

Switch capabilities on

Have a look at the capabilities list and switch them all on — web search, file creation, the lot.

I keep everything ticked.

It's what makes Claude genuinely useful, rather than just a chat box.

Capabilities
Web search
File creation
Code & data analysis
Artifacts
Which Claude

Pick your model

At the top of any chat there's a small dropdown to choose your model.

Sonnet is your everyday workhorse — the free default, and all you need to begin.

Opus is the heavy-lifter for complex thinking. Haiku is the quick one.

Honestly? Start with Sonnet. Don't overthink it.

Choose model
Sonnet
Everyday workhorse
Free
Opus
Most complex thinking
Paid
Haiku
Fast & simple
Free
Two ways to work

Chat or Project?

All the live courses need
A Chat
A single conversation. Open it, talk, you're done. Perfect for one-off jobs.
A Project
A workspace that remembers. Give it instructions and files once, and every chat inside works from that shared context.

You don't need Projects yet. When we build your content system — the first live cohort course, which you can apply to join from September — that's where they come into their own, and I'll walk you through it there.

For later

When you go paid

You can do a great deal on the free plan, and I'd start there. Two things I use every day do need a paid plan — worth knowing about for later.

Claude in Chrome
A browser extension that lets Claude work alongside you on any website. I let mine run across all sites — and add anywhere sensitive, like online banking, to its blocked list.
Cowork
Where you hand Claude a bigger, multi-step job and let it get on with it. This is the engine room of the content-system course.

You're set

That's the set-up. Ten minutes now saves you hours later.

Anything that doesn't behave the way I've described — tell me. That's exactly what I'm here for.

Get help
hello@kirstyhamiltonphotography.com