Wow, where did the last few months go?

Ok, sorry about that... Honest!
I have been meaning to update the blog here for a while now... So here goes!

That seems to be my theme lately, this is becoming the year that I finally get things rolling. There are whole lists of things that have bugged me, some of them for years. I've already taken care of some of them in the last couple of weeks.

Maybe you can relate? I've always suffered from "Home Run" mentality. I hate to do something half way. So in my mind, if I can't afford to do it right, or if I don't think I can spare the time to finish it correctly, I just won't start. In reality, "Base Hit" thinking would serve me better. For example, today I decided I should at least sit down and Blog something... Maybe I'll only write a few lines of rambling musings, but its a start. Tomorrow or when ever, I'll be thinking about it and something interesting might come out of it!

Since this blog is about my Photo and Video business, let me mention that briefly :)

I used to live in a medium small town called Wenatchee. That is in just about the exact center of Washington State. Go ahead and open your Google Maps page, right? Anyway, the first 5 or 6 or what ever years I was doing Wedding Video and Photo jobs, I lived in Wenatchee. Every year I drove over to Seattle 3 or 4 times for weddings, which is about 3 hours one way. In the other direction is Spokane, also about 3 hours away. In the whole time, I never did one wedding in Spokane. Now that I have moved to Seattle, I got to go to Spokane for a wedding. And of course in the process I met a lot of great people, made contacts, and will probably end up doing a few jobs a year in Spokane. I'm not complaining, but it sure would have been easier to go to Spokane when I still lived in Wenatchee!

Since the begining I have said I'd do jobs State Wide, and I have hit some pretty far out places. So its just my luck now that I've moved toward one side of the state, instead of the middle, that I'll start getting jobs from that side too.

But that's all good, right?

I also came up with a better definition of my perfect client. The first few years I pretty much wanted anyone to book me, just starting off is like that.Then I started to learn that I liked some jobs more than others. In the last year I started to listen more closely to my clients when we'd talk on the phone, or through email, to see what they were like, how they thought about things.

Then at this last job, in Spokane, the photographer said something that I'd never really put into words before. Basically, we started talking about rates and so on, and I said I had more fun doing wedding video in the $800 to $1000 range. Even though I have enough experience and good enough equipment to probably do well in the $2000 to $3000 range, I think that people who can afford that kind of pricing have different sense of humor or something.

Or said another way, I like to have fun when I'm at a wedding. I've always associated more with "blue collar" workers, for lack of a better word. I don't really spend a lot of time talking to people in suits, in fact I often will shoot a wedding in nice jeans and a nice shirt. I know photographers who will put on a suit for a wedding, and I actually bought a tux one year to wear for weddings. I just wasn't comfortable wearing it. I looked great, though!

Anyway, over the next month or so I'm probably going to go back and rewrite some of the copy on my website, at www.Seattle-HotShotz.com and see if I can work more of my own flavor into it. I often tell the Bride, or the Bride's mother, that what we do is a lot of a personality based business. If my sense of humor doesn't mesh well with yours, we are in for a long day. I've known some technically awesome photographers and videographers who just didn't get along well with people. People would hire them because they loved their samples, which is why you hire a photographer, sure. But its hard to smile at someone who isn't funny, ya know?

Ok, enough of that for now.
Drop me a line if you read this, I'd love to hear from people. I sometimes spend way too much time in my office during the week! There is a link somewhere on the right side of this page to send me emails!
Carlin