I am big fan of Thumbtack since it's been an effective means for me to connect with clients that I wouldn't normally find. So far I have a good experience working with them and I look forward to continuing to work with them in the future. When they gave me the opportunity to be featured in the Thumbtack Spotlight, I jumped on it as fast as I could. The Spotlight about me can be found near the bottom of the page which you can get to by clicking the badge above or clicking here.
Last week, I had the pleasure of photographing the Kelly family in their home. It was a little more challenging than I expected it to be since their two-year-old daughter was a bit of a tough customer to get to smile. Luckily, prior to the shoot they already had a few ideas of spots in the house where they wanted me to photograph them. Since they had done such a wonderful job of planning ahead, I mainly got to focus on getting the lighting right for making some great photos.
February was an interesting month. I ended up having two paid shoots that I got off of Thumbtack. Also, I had a free shoot that I gave away as part of a prize drawing during when I had work on display at Sidecar Studios. I'm working on editing images from a couple of those shoots and hope to have them finished up by the end of this week. I'm so happy to have some work to do during these colder months. Also, I volunteered my photography skills for the Waukegan Park District a couple nights this month and did photos for their Mother-Son Sweetheart Dance and Father-Daughter Date Night.
This coming month, I'm not sure what exactly to expect with my photography. I'm definitely looking forward to the beginning of spring and as a result more outdoor photography. While life may become a little busier with photography, life may be a little busier this month with my other jobs. In about a week and a half, I have orientation for Six Flags and will have to say goodbye to my beard that I've been growing the past few months. Then a week later, I'll be attending Six Flags' Leadership Summit and learning about what this coming year has in store for the park. This is also the time of year where many schools will be having spring break and as a result KeyLime Cove be getting busy and I'll be working more there.
A couple of weekends ago, I had the opportunity to have a photo shoot with Michael. He is one of my clients that I met through Thumbtack. I was very excited to have the opportunity to use downtown Waukegan as the backdrop of a photo shoot. Leading up to the shoot, we discussed a little about what he was seeking for a location for the shoot. When he told me he wanted an urban setting and that he didn't have any place in particular in mind, I thought downtown Waukegan would work well. The two reasons it came to mind were that it feels like a very solid urban setting and I'm very familiar with it. He told me he was unfamiliar with the area but would trust my judgement.
Friday and Saturday night, I helped the Waukegan Park District by being the photographer for their Mother-Son Sweetheart Dance and Father-Daughter Date Night. Doing photography was definitely a learning experience for me in regards to taking portraits and printing on location. The first night was a little rough since I was attempting to take the portraits and print them nearly simultaneously. By the next night, I had learned my lesson and instead chose to shoot most the portraits at once and then print the pictures once I was mostly freed up from shooting. This system worked so much better and made things much less stressful for me. I feel like this event went well for the most part and I would likely be willing to do it again next year if asked.
As the years go by, it usually becomes more difficult to get everybody together to have family portraits done. That's why when these two families asked me about doing family portraits, I was more than willing to do it. It was certainly an interesting and challenging shoot for a couple reasons. First, it certainly stretched the limits of space in my small studio space with having thirteen people total between the two families. Second, I took a lot of photos of a ton of different groupings.
Well here we are already one month into 2016. This as expected has been a slow time of the year when it comes to the photography business. I'm not too nervous about this fact and realize that at some point in the future, there will be a part of me that will miss this slow period. Since I've had quite a bit of time on my hands, I've been using my time to gain knowledge on photography and business side of it. Last week, I got to watch numerous webinars from some of the most respected names in the photography during the Turn It Up Conference. The last few days, I spent preparing for a shoot that I had yesterday. So you guys can look forward to me posting shots from that shoot later in the week. Additionally, I had a week in there where I didn't get much work done since my cat played with and chewed up my computer wire one night while I was sleeping.
My final photo session of 2015 happened the day after Christmas. Going into this shoot, I was nervous for a couple of reasons. The first factor was that this was my first time doing a shoot in a client's home. Also, due to the nature of the holidays, I did not have as much time as I had become used to in order to prepare for this shoot. Obviously I overcame my nerves and did this photo shoot. In the end, everything turned out well and I look forward to working with Cynthia and her family again in the future.
Hope everyone enjoyed the holidays and are enjoying the new year. I know I'm a little late in posting for this new year. The last couple weeks have been quite hectic as a result of the holidays so can you really blame me?
I'm really looking forward to what this new year has in store for me. One of my goals is to catch up on a few shoots that I've been meaning to do before the summer season begins. My bigger goal is to find a wedding photographer that I can become a second shooter/assistant for the coming wedding season. I see this as the perfect opportunity to gain experience in wedding photography. If anyone knows wedding photographers in the Chicago or Milwaukee areas looking for an second shooter or assistant, please put me in contact with them.
The month of July went nothing like I expected it to go unfortunately. I spent the first week and a half of the month without a cellphone. On one hand I kind of enjoyed being "off the grid" and being free of the distraction of having a cellphone. However, being a little harder to reach than normal is not good for a growing business. As a result of being without my phone, I ended up missing out on a photo session.
Additionally, in my last post I mentioned that I was hoping my workload was going to ease up a little and give me time to work on my photography. To my disappointment, my work schedule did not slow down and instead was still rather busy. My job as a landscaper took up its normal 40 hours a week and work as bellman still took up a few evenings of the week. This week the job as a bellman finally had me scheduled for one day of work. Granted, most of the spare time that I have had has been used to continue with the renovation project at my parents' house. By the end of the week, the renovations should be complete and hopefully I finally will have more time to devote to my photography.