During the last “9th with Nathan”, I begged you guys for help with topic ideas. You all were awesome and I have plenty of starting points to work with now. Thank you!
Today’s article was inspired by Natasha from ISO-Photography in Sydney, Australia. She asked, “What about some history lessons about yourself Nathan, how did you get into photography, what made you want to do it for a living, your inspirations along the way, those who helped and supported you when you were getting started? Was it smooth sailing or did you hit some rocky roads in the early days…?”
As much as I’d like to say my fascination with photography started when I was a little boy, it didn’t. I can’t in good faith claim that my spy camera from 1993 counted as a genuine interest in the art of photography. It was a black, tiny thing that probably never even had a roll of film in it!
The first thing I remember actually piquing my interest in photography was a digital camera I received from my dad on Christmas in 2001. It was a Nikon Coolpix 775 and it was amazing. (It even took compact flash cards which were compatible with RCA Lyra mp3 player!) I was a geek back then and the concept of digital photography was just awesome. 6 months later, my grandfather gave me his Canon A-1 SLR on father’s day. I had no idea at the time, but those two gifts would change my life.
They say college time is a time for experimentation. And it was… for f-stops, ISOs, and shutter speeds. I absolutely loved exploring my college campus and shooting whatever I could. Usually that meant the sunset and the “forests” around UCF, but it was great practice simply because I was out there. It wasn’t technically challenging, but it was immensely rewarding because I created it on my own terms.
There was something incredibly liberating about going out and just creating for my own fun. And having friends that supported it was icing on the cake. (Thank you Maria, Danielle, Jeannie, TJ, Jason, Nick, Jensey, etc.) Especially Maria for taking me to Target to develop my film more times than I can remember! She must have been very grateful when I got my own car and a DSLR. (Canon D60 in November 2003 for $1000 off ebay!)
Fast forward a few years to the end of my college experience and I was about to graduate with a degree in Digital Media. I had never taken a photography course, but it was definitely still an interest for me. If you asked me in May 2005 what I was going to do over the next year or two, I would have told you I was going to become a sports photographer. Not for the NFL or anything ambitious like that, but for local kid’s leagues. I had programmed my own online proofing system and figured I’d just get in touch with a few local chapters and sell the images to excited parents.
Thankfully that didn’t come to pass and the school-required Senior Showcase saved my butt. I had my proofing gallery and a bit of photography on display for anyone bored enough to come see. As luck would have it, a local wedding photographer and not-the-famous crooner, Brian Adams came by. He was looking for help with some programming, but was drawn to my booth because of a simple photo that Jensey encouraged me to display:
Long story short, he hired me to come into his office for a bit of programming, which eventually turned into assisting with office duties, which eventually turned into my first job assisting a real photographer!
Throughout college, I was adamant that I didn’t want to photograph people. Shooting little kids running around kicking a ball was as close as I wanted to get to portraits. The thought of interacting with an individual subject sent chills down my spine. After working with Brian for a while, I started to realize it wasn’t really that bad. Once you have a grip on your equipment and at least vaguely know what you’re doing, interacting with people is possible. (And maybe even fun!)
In addition to thanking Brian for seeing potential in me, I also have to thank him for shielding me while entering the wedding photography industry. I wasn’t thrust into the stress of a wedding day. I got into it slowly, just shooting details or moving bags and light stands. It was the best possible way to get a feel for the industry and not worry about the pressure of being the main photographer.
I worked under the guidance of Brian from summer 2005 to winter of 2006. (I also worked at Best Buy until mid-2006 because my Digital Media degree wasn’t good for squat. Thanks, UCF!) In January 2006, I had my very first wedding on my own! It was my roommate and I was excited but incredibly nervous. I borrowed a 70-200 2.8 from Brian as well as a few extra memory cards. I’m not going to recount the whole day here, but long story short, I got out alive. Thank goodness Jensey was there as a guest because I absolutely needed her emotional support. Ending the day with your battery dead and 10 shots available on your memory cards is stressful!
A few months later, we had another wedding booked thanks to the mother of our first wedding’s bride. Still a little stressed, but with a newly purchased Canon 20D in hand, I was feeling more confident. Jensey came along to the second wedding as an assistant, using the 60D and whatever knowledge I could stuff in her pretty little head. She had no photography experience, so it was a fun experiment bringing my wonderful girlfriend as potential help.
It’s kind of neat looking back and realizing how that wedding changed our lives together; when we realized Jensey had an eye for photography too, there was no turning back! It took a while to transfer what I spent years learning, but it was obvious that we could work together on this. I put together a best-effort website and we ended up with 9 weddings shot by the end of 2006. In 2007, that exploded to 30.
Thanks for sticking around and reading all of that! I hope it was interesting if not informative. :) Next month, I’m hoping to either talk about that very first wedding, location scouting, or how and where to share photos online. Have a question or suggestion for a future post? Let me know in the comments below!
In case you missed my past articles, here are my favorites:
Thanks for sharing that with us, it was really interesting to hear how you became a photographer and I am really pleased that you did. Really looking forward to meeting you next year and seeing you work your magic at my wedding. You both do such an amazing job.
Thank you, Alex! We’re equally excited to meet and work with you guys. :)
so awesome! I like that it kind of fell on your lap, I’m a firm believer the best things are not sought out but brought to you by mistake!
Agreed. It’s been a blessed road!
That was truly very interesting!!! It really is interesting to find out more about someone and we all don’t know what is around the next corner! But we just keep turning them and learning something new!! Love to you and to our darlin’, Jensey!!!
Thanks you so much, Judy! :)
Thanks so much for sharing Nathan! I am so glad that Chris & I were fortunate enough to be one of your 30 weddings in 2007. For a million reasons, you & Jensey are truly the BEST!!! We love you guys!
Aww, thank you, Brooke! And thank you extra for seeing something in us so early on. :) Hope to see you guys again sometime soon!
I’m sad that the article ended! More!! ;)
I’ll be sure to work on our First Wedding post sometime. And hey, you’ll have to work on article like this sometime too. =P How’s everything going?
I loved reading this! I felt oddly more connected to you in life experience since Mike and I are both UCF Knights and he graduated from the Digital Media program in Dec 2009. I read parts of the article to him and he think’s you’re even cooler now, “Really? Digital Media? I’m impressed that he actually DID something!” Oh and we both worked at your Big Red rival across the street, Circuit City in Waterford. Haha!
Anyway, as “they” say, “Coincidence is God’s way of remaining anonymous.” I love stories where someone’s entire life changes based on what could have been a minor, mundane experience. :-) thanks for sharing (in a totally serious, not snarky sort of way)
So glad to hear all of this! :) Digital Media was fun, but it was pretty useless when the degree was practically inaugural and the apex of teaching was a HTML tag.
Oh, Circuit City. You never even showed up in our rear-view mirror. ;) On rare occasion, I actually miss that job. I was a horrible salesman, but still enjoyed it. I mean, really, I know this family doesn’t need to pay $30 for a USB cable or $50 for a “software setup!” Whaaaa?! But hey, $200 to have someone come into your home and plugin a wireless router? Sure! Now I remember why I didn’t love that job. =X
I was so excited when I saw in my newsfeed that there was a 9th with Nathan article for me to read. This was so interesting, and the photos you posted along with the post were SO cool! Keep up the fabulous work Roots! :)
Glad you liked them, Lydia! It was really neat browsing through the old portfolio and seeing what stood out and what still looked like passable art. :) (My favorite, though, is simply the mirror thought with Jensey!)
I still want a copy of that candle photo if you ever find it. I was so sad when it was damaged during one of the moves. It is still hanging anyway though, water damage and all :)
What fun to read! I’m really proud of you, Nathan. Always have been–
As you may have seen, I’m just now catching up on my blog stalking. :) Great article Nate! Glad to see the 9th with Nathan is back! I wonder if I ever ran into at Best Buy, I think I went every week. Haha. I shot around UCF a ton myself since I lived on campus. I’m definitely interested in your location scouting article. I’ve been saving a few spots!
I can’t believe I never commented on this article! It was a great read! About the time you were having friends running you to target to develop film; I was working my way through college at a target one hour lab! :)
Good memories, for sure! :)
Apparently, I missed this blog post. Jeannie brought it up the other night, so I thought I’d go digging to see if I could find it. I’m so glad I finally got to read it! For the record, I was always happy to drive you to Target… it usually meant that I got a first glimpse at your photos. :) Some of those early ones are still favorites. I’m so proud of how far you’ve come over the last several years. It’s been super fun to watch your amazing talent (and Jensey’s).
Very glad you saw this! :) :)