Today we’d like to introduce you to Sylwia Ok.
Hi Sylwia, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
Thank you for inviting me to be part of your series and to share my story! For as long as I remember, I’ve been always interested in design and art, but my professional career didn’t begin in photography. I was born and grew up in Lodz, Poland, and moved to Key West, Florida after getting a degree in Computer Science and Econometrics from the University of Lodz.
Key West is where I met my husband of almost 19 years now, and that’s where my adventure with photography started when I got my first DSLR. With my husband’s military career, our life was never boring – in 16 years we called Key West, FL, Bradenton, FL, Kodiak, Alaska, and Pasadena, Maryland home. We took advantage of each transfer to explore the beauty of the country, zig-zagging through most of the states and National Parks. As you can imagine, I took thousands of pictures during our road trips.
The idea of becoming a photographer came to light in 2009, when I was working a corporate job with Verizon in Tampa. Around that time we started planning our family and I simply knew that I would rather have my own schedule after having a child. So, I enrolled in an online photography program at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh to get my second degree in photography, fulfill my dreams, and learn all the fundamentals.
Around the same time, my hubby received orders to Kodiak, Alaska, and we moved there in the summer of 2011. Kodiak Island is a dream place for a photographer to live and that’s where my business officially started. At the end of 2011, I opened my first studio, and within a year, I was able to successfully establish both portrait and fine art landscape work with the local community.
In 2014, we moved to Maryland where I continued photographing clients in my home-based studio. 2 years later we finally welcomed to the world our daughter, Sophie, and on her 3rd birthday, after serving the country for 27 years, we said goodbye to Coast Guard and Maryland and we moved back to Bradenton, FL to our forever home.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Oh, definitely not a smooth ride when you’re a military family! I had to move my portrait business to another state twice, and basically start over from scratch in a new place.
Unlike in other states, we lived, running a portrait studio from our house in Bradenton was not an option, so I leased my first commercial studio, a 1000 sq ft space in Lakewood Ranch Corporate Park. Little did I know that Covid will happen just a few months later, putting my business to a full halt for a few months.
It was scary at first, to say the least. Geared with the marketing and business knowledge from various business and photography workshops that I took in the last 5 years, I was able to create a roadmap for success and my portrait business has been steadily growing. My recent award nomination for the Manatee’s Chamber 2022 Small Business of the Year Award is definitely a confirmation that I’ve done something right in the last 2.5 years.
As a mom and an entrepreneur, it’s also challenging to find a perfect combination of work/life balance. Our Sophie has just started her journey with school last year and our afternoons and weekends are usually filled with post-school activities, meaning I had to say np to many networking events.
It feels great to be in charge of my own schedule for sure and prioritize what matters to me the most.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I’m a commercial and fine art master portrait photographer and my main mission is to help my clients with stunning portraits and photography for their homes and business.
I’ve been a Certified Professional Photographer from PPA since 2015, received a Master Photographer distinction from Professional Photographers in America in 2019, and an Associate Photographer distinction from The Portrait Masters in 2021.
For the last 11 years (3 years in Alaska, 5 years in Maryland, and 3 years in Bradenton/Sarasota), hundreds of families and businesses have trusted my skills and received stunning images for their businesses and home.
My portrait clients love the customer experience and the portraits I create for them. Each session and portrait is carefully designed with the client and an end product in mind – from design and planning consultation where I will go through the closet to pick outfits for the entire family, through a stress-free session with guided posing, guided ordering appointments, and the highest quality of the finished products. Handcrafted custom-designed albums and wall portraits printed on canvas, metal, or acrylic are just some of the most popular options clients can choose from.
My commercial clients love to set themself apart from the competition and that is certainly possible with magazine-quality images I can create for them for their advertising, website, or social media. Professional headshots and branding portraits became quickly a niche that I’m known for not only in my networking and business groups.
As a portrait artist, I’m constantly invested in education and further honing my skills. The biggest highlight of each January is attending the biggest photography conference and expo organized by Professional Photographers of America, ImagingUSA. That’s the time I level up my business for the year by learning about new trends, finding new products, and getting inspired to further improve the work I do.
January 2019 and Imaging USA was definitely a highlight of my career for me. During that conference, I received a Master’s Degree from Professional Photographers of America, one of the newborn portraits that I entered into the International Print Competition received a perfect 100 score and I was among the finalists in the children’s category for Grand Imaging Award, which ended in a 2nd place.
In 2021, I started a personal project called Mission Motherhood, something I’m very passionate about. So many women, including me, goes through the road full of obstacles to become a mom. For me, it was 7 years of going through unexplained fertility issues and 4 lost pregnancies before I became a mommy to Sophie and the day Sophie was born, was by far the most magical day of my life.
Since then, my appreciation and love for my own mom also grew beyond measure and I wish I had photographs of me as a child with my mom. That’s the reason, every year, I’m being photographed with Sophie and create an album of portraits of me and her so she can have those portraits one day when I’m not here.
I also want my clients to celebrate the wisdom, strength, and beauty of motherhood and that’s why I started offering those portraits to my clients: portraits with their child/children, portraits with a mom (no age limit here), and of course maternity portraits for those that are about to embark on the motherhood journey.
Because one day their children will look for photos of them… WHAT WILL THEY FIND?
So, before we go, how can our readers or others connect or collaborate with you? How can they support you?
The best way to reach me and talk about your photography needs is by calling me directly or by filling out the contact form on my website.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.sylwiaok.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sylwia.ok/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SylwiaOkPhotography
- Other: https://www.pinterest.com/sylwia_ok
Image Credits
Grand Imaging Award 2019 by Alex The PhotoGuy
