First, since you voted for July 31st as the next Marathon Boudoir, it shall be! I will open registration up and announce details for it in a few weeks, if you’d like to be put on my mailing list for the boudoir sessions if youre not all ready, just email me at shelby@shelbyleigh.com or just keep an eye on the blog for the announcements!
And I’m pleasently surpised at those of you interested in learning. I’ve always thought about teaching photography, so I’m going to set up a little class/workshop geared towards moms with SLR’s and beginner-moderate skill level photographers this summer.
Now I want to answer some of the questions I got!
1. “What do you recommend are the steps for taking photography to a professional level? i.e. full time job! ”- Amanda
There are so many ways to do this, you can apprentice with established photographers, you can start second shooting, you can go to school or you can just dive in! If I could start over I would either start apprenticing or second shooting with other photographers, this is a good way to see how people work, build your portfolio and maybe even get paid! When you feel comfortable with your experience and when you think your skills are good enough to start charging, then you should get everything together, start charging and marketing yourself. Hone your skill and charge what your worth. Pricing is probably one of the hardest things once you go full time, really figure out what your time is worth. If you did the math on your time and products on any single sale I think most of us photographers would be really surprised on just how much our pay actually equals out to be. Unless that is, youre charging what you should … and in some cases I should practice what I preach. I know how easy it is to put something like working numbers on the bottom of your to do list. Photographer, Stacy Reeves, obviously knows a lot more about this then me and offers a really great free pricing guide on her site HERE.
2. “ What type of camera do you have and what tips would you give for choosing a lens? Is there one type of lens you use the most? - Susan
I shoot Nikon!
I use a D700, D200 and D90 and I have a variety of lenses. I made a big mistake when I first started getting into photography and bought lenses based on their focal length and paid no attention to their aperture range, thus I was stuck with some “slow” lenses, and was wondering why I wasnt getting those sharp, bright images with that nice depth of field. My favorite lens is my 50mm 1.4, I love this lens because it can be used in almost any situation and shooting wide open at 1.4 creates gorgeous creamy bokeh. I also love this lens because its inexpensive for what you get! And you can buy the 1.8 version for even cheaper… next to nothing if you get can snatch it used. One of my favorite tricks to use with my 50mm is making it into my makeshift macro! I posted about this trick a couple years ago on my blog, and if you want to know how to make your 50 (or I think most lenses will do this too) click here!
3. How did you get into the photography business?” - Susan
When I was 13 I followed in both of my sisters foot steps and tried out for my high schools Pom Squad. Following tryouts I found out that sadly, I didnt make the team! I had always played around with our point and shoot cameras at home and my mom saw my interest in photography, so she surprised me with my first film SLR in hopes of cheering me up! It worked, I still have so many random photos I took of our cat back then! A year after I had Riley, I had a thought of “how neat would it be to be a wedding photographer?!”, so after the encouragement of my family I jumped into it and started shooting weddings for cheap, and my business grew from there! I’ve been shooting professionally for 5 years now! And dont worry, my sophmore year of high school, I tried out again and I made the Pom Squad! If my scanner was working properly I would totally post pictures from those days!
3. “I got one! do you have any bridezilla stories?????” - Greg
Nope. But if I did, do you think I would be posting it here for all to see.
5. “How did you get started in boudoir photography?? I think its so awesome!!! Are there any boudoir tricks?” - Lisa Young
I’ve been shooting boudoir since I started photography 5 years ago. It was something my mom told me about and I ran with. At first, I thought she was silly (and I thought the name was so cheesy), but it is so much fun! I dont have any tricks but I do like to make sure the whole experience is relaxed and fun. I pretty much have to make sure I’m this girls best friend by the time shes in front of my camera or awkward will be written all of her face in the pictures! Thankfully I find that all my clients are not hard to warm up to.
Thanks for the questions yall! They were fun to answer!
