It all started about 2 years ago. I was working in corporate America and had just married the man of my dreams. This man happened to be a journalist and got an amazing opportunity to be an editor at a paper about 3 hours away from where we were living. Not being able to pass it up we packed our bags and I kissed my high paying, grownup job goodbye.
Moving to a small town hit me like a ton of bricks. There were no business jobs, only trade jobs, manual labor jobs. Jobs that paid minimum wage to people who were happy to have it. I took on an at home quality assurance job and just kept my eyes on the classifieds daily. It was then that my husbands newspaper increased their local sports coverage and started to find their staff photographer being double booked. Knowing the sports editors wife was out of work and very creative they asked me if I would like to try shooting some examples and if they liked what they saw they might throw some work my way. I had a Kodak P&S 5mp camera. I shot pictures of an antique jail, photos at a rodeo, photos of a soccer game. Turned them into the editor who thought I had an eye. We negotiated an amount per photo and there is was my first paying steady gig.
My first photo...taken with a P&S and given to the editor...
Now I had always felt inferior on the sidelines of sporting events with my little point and shoot. But it was night time football that brought me to the realization I needed to save my pennies and dimes for some real gear. I bought my current DSLR a Nikon D70 used online for about $600.00. I borrowed an ANTIQUE flash from the staff photographer and read anything I could get my hands on.
As I realized some success with sports photos the paper began to send me to bigger events, state tournaments and on the road with teams. While covering a playoff football game I recieved correspondance from another publication asking how much I charged for my photos. From that point on I finally realized that working freelance meant I could cover a single event for multiple papers and see my paycheck doubled, or even tripled.
I started looking for other avenues of making money off my photography. I tried stock photography which just seemed like so much work for such little return. That is when I came into contact with MW Photography's Martyn Warwick. Martyn was the owner of an event photography company that mostly photographed soccer tournaments. He was in a real pickle and needed an action photographer for a tournament in the next city. Even though I did not have the proper equipment (a telephoto lens) he took a chance on me and asked me to shoot for him over the weekend. It was entirely outside and 10 hour days. Time flew by I had a blast and was once again sure that photography was it for me. This grew into a very prosporous relationship and I now shoot for him on a regular basis throughout the summer. The company pays for my lodging, and fuel on top of a very pretty penny for my services.
Once people I knew started seeing my body of work I started to get requests to shoot things. Parties, portraits etc...I stumbled on my latest challenge when I agreed to take some engagement shots for a dear friend. I was hooked. I felt such pride in my images and the couple loved them. Wasn't long before I was shooting for another couple...and not long before THAT couple asked me to be a secondary photographer at their upcoming wedding.
This brings us up to current here. Still freelancing for the paper. Very steady work although just to be sure I have a GAURANTEED paycheck bi-weekly I do keep my at home job on the side. I take weekend jaunts to other cities for MW Photography and once again I find myself in unfamiliar territory this time branching out in wedding photography.
One thing that I am very proud of as a photographer is my drive, my hunger. I refuse to be pigeonholed, to settle, to transform this love into just something to pay the bills with. I have high hopes for this 'hobby'...
2 comments:
Awesome story. I've always loved your photos. Great job. So all this happened in 2 years. How long did it take before you became more of a photographer for the paper?
Actually it was pretty much right off the bat. I would say I recieved steady work from them about 2 months into freelancing. I was lucky in a sense that their staff photog is pretty flaky and in addition to being needed when they were double booked I often got things thrown at me like 5-10 mins before an event because she couldn't be there...The trick was being super reliable and available.
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