On the afternoon of Friday, March 25th, 2016 the cherry blossoms officially reached peak blossom. And on that same afternoon, myself and 15 vendors and 12 other photographers were at the start of an incredible styled shoot; one that I had been dreaming and planning of for weeks. I don’t know how I managed to schedule this shoot on the actual day of peak blossoms….and I especially don’t know how we managed to dodge the rain that was drizzling (pouring, at times) all morning long – but somehow, we did (The answer? God. Seriously. He must love me! Because I was praying hard!)
After my last styled shoot, I had seen first hand just how much work and effort goes into making everything come together – every vendor’s piece is so important and vital to the overall experience and resulting images. I wanted a way to say thank you for believing in me to my vendors and the other photographers participating – and I wanted to do it in a way that was more personal than just some fun swag (although there was that, too!). I wanted to interact with them on a one-on-one basis, even if for only 5 minutes each. So, I offered headshots to everyone coming! I’ve never done that before – done so many portraits in a row, in such a quick succession, but it was SO fun. After I took Brandi’s photos, she thanked me and I told her, “Of course! I love this!” and she said, “I can tell.” I loved hearing that from her, and I hope everyone else I photographed that day felt a piece of my love for THEM by sharing what I love to do with them.
I’m going to open my heart a little here, and tell you something a little humiliating for me. Yesterday, I not only received my first “No” for submitting this styled shoot to a blog, but I also found out that my last styled shoot, which was previously featured on a blog I was pretty proud to be featured on, had been taken off of their website after “recently re-launching their website with a more sophisticated aesthetic.” What a low blow!! Talk about a confidence wipe-out. I was pretty down on myself about it, and wondering to myself what the point of doing these shoots even is, and why I even bothered with them. I suddenly felt very defined by someone else’s expectations of beauty and a worldly standard of Keeping Up With The Joneses. I’ve been fighting the comparison monster for awhile now, some of it stemming from social media and some of it stemming from things like this – not enough likes, not enough followers, not enough shares or comments, and apparently not enough editors who think my work is “good enough.”
Getting into this “world” of photography has done SO many wonderful things for me and for my business. I’ve become smarter, more efficient, far more courageous, and I’ve honed my skill even more. But there is a lot of “popularity contests” that exist in the photography world of Instagram, Facebook, and blogs. It seems if I don’t have a feature on a particular site or I don’t have a particular type of website, if my images don’t look a certain way….then it’s somehow less then.
But then I reread an email I had received from one of the participating photographers. She had declined having portraits taken that day (I totally get it…I didn’t want anyone taking pictures of ME that day, either!), but later, after I had sent out the gallery with everyone’s images in them, she wrote me and said, “You brought out each person’s personality and made them shine!” This is exactly what I needed to hear after getting down about my two rejections. It doesn’t really matter if an editor or a blog doesn’t choose to feature my session (or changes their mind after the fact)….what matters is the way we all felt that spring day. And all of us felt proud, excited, and united. At least, I know I did. At the end of the day, I was beaming with joy. And as I edited those images, I swooned all over again. THIS was my type of beauty! And I’m not just talking about the images of the details on the sweetheart table or the ring shots on the macarons – I’m also talking about the images I took of the women who were there supporting me. I fell in love with those images, too. And I realized – or rather, I re-remembered that THAT was why I had gotten started in photography in the first place. Because making people see how beautiful they are to ME made me feel happy. For me, photography has always been about the connection between myself and individuals. So what if I’m not “accepted” by the popular crowd? Since when has that mattered to me, anyway? I crave something deeper. I crave something different, something real and honest and raw. And if that doesn’t look good splashed across my Instagram or a national wedding blog, then so be it!
I hope the people I took portraits of felt loved, beautiful, and worthwhile. I hope they know how grateful I am for their help and their hearts. I DO want their work to be seen by the masses, because I think it deserves to be, and I’m rooting for them even more than I am myself! But even if this shoot isn’t picked up, I hope they know I feel blessed to call all of these women new friends and confidants in this industry and in this life!
To see even more Behind the Scenes photos, be sure to check out the #mrosestyledshoot hashtag on Instagram!
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