Today we’d like to introduce you to Stacy Paul.
Hi Stacy, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
Eleven years ago, photography found me. It was an accident really. As a new mom, I was posting WAY too many photos of my babies on Facebook (as moms do), and my friends started asking what I charged. I thought they were nuts, but eventually, peer pressure won and I decided to give photography a whirl.
When I was just starting out, I admittedly didn’t know anything about anything, with one exception: I KNEW that I was NOT going to photograph weddings. The thought of botching someone’s wedding gave me a day drinking two bottles of wine type anxiety. Weddings were for people who knew camera stuff, and wedding stuff, and all the stuff. Which was definitely not me.
Enter Kortney, who ended up being my very first bride. I had taken some photos of her with her boyfriend John as a kind of experiment. Ya know, to see if I could take decent engagement (ish) photos. I must have done a fair job because once they were engaged for real, Kortney decided that I was shooting her wedding, whether I liked it or not.
I really dug in my heels and thought I was standing firm in my refusal, but for every one of my no’s she said yes, for every “but what if I screw it up!?” she said “You won’t”, and for every “No really, I AM GOING TO SCREW THIS UP!” she said, “I believe in you, you will be fine.” In the end, she won that battle and you know what? She was right.
So while there will always be a place in my heart for shooting families and couples; thanks to Kortney, weddings are TOTALLY my thing.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle-free, but so far would you say the journey has been a fairly smooth road?
Oh goodness, of course, there have been challenges. That’s just part of life (and running a business), right? For me, probably the biggest challenge has been keeping some sort of momentum going.
Once I fall behind on emails, or blogging, or editing, or posting to IG, etc., it can seem impossible to catch up. You just have to keep moving forward, no matter how small your steps may seem.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I primarily photograph weddings, but I also love families and couples. Basically, I like taking pretty pictures of people. My strength lies in the narrative, so while I feel like the phrase ‘storyteller’ is overused within my industry, that’s kind of what I do.
I take photos of how things feel. Mix those feelings with a little bit of art and whimsy, and that’s me.
Can you talk to us a bit about the role of luck?
Well, I’m lucky that my newest kitty friend, Sven, chose my porch for shelter during hurricane Elsa, and lucky that my teenage daughter and I share the same taste in music and TV, but that’s likely the extent of it.
That’s not to say that I don’t believe in luck, just that it hasn’t really affected me in a profound way.
Pricing:
- Wedding Photography starts at $2800
- Elopements start at $1000
- Family and Portrait sessions start at $400
Contact Info:
- Email: [email protected]
- Website: www.stacypaulphotography.com
- Instagram: @stacypaulphotography
- Facebook: Stacy Paul Photography
