Life has been a bit of a rollercoaster lately. I wanted to write a post to stick a pin in all the stuff that has happened over the past year or so and mark my 'starting position' as a freelance commercial photographer!
My first photo job with my Dad :)
I have worked in Education the majority of my working life, I started off in North Devon working as a theatre technician for 6th form Dance, Drama and Music courses. Starting out part time and slowly taking on more responsibility until I was teaching stagecraft (back stage theatre stuff like set design, lighting and sound). I was also working in the evenings as a musician in a pretty cool band called Carbon 14 which then morphed into the more laid back Small Town Mentality, check us out on iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/artist/small-town-mentality/id96622799
2006 - I met my now wife and moved to Weston-super-Mare (I know it's not Devon but there was this hot girl living there) I managed to hook her by saying I was a surfer... Kenny Wells if you ever read this please keep the rip tide story secret haha.
Me and my wife #punching
I started working in a local secondary school as a media technician, creating film and pictures, learning as I went (Youtube is a wonderful thing). Fast forward to 2016 and education has changed so much - my job has changed, I have more responsibility, I create the school prospectus and marketing materials, I teach primary school kids and teachers how to use iPads and make cool animations. But the school becomes part of an Academy Trust and my role is outsourced by the incoming leadership... I'm made redundant, for me it was not a nice experience and it really made me evaluate my identity - pretty dangerous to view my worth on this planet as dependant on my job but I think a lot of us do.
I didn't decide to go freelance straight away, I became a Plumber! Well for 6 months anyway, I will always value that experience and it taught me a lot about working for yourself and putting in the hard graft.
Here I am polishing pipes
I hope nobody reads this and thinks wow this guy is so good at self evaluation and making good decisions... nope not me, I honestly don't know how I feel about something until about a week after its happened, I was still processing my redundancy whilst unblocking student toilets and hanging radiators. My Plumber boss had an operation and had to sit it out for 6 weeks, I still needed to earn money so I picked up a few photo jobs and really loved it, not just love but LOVED IT! Here is the thing, I have bills and this has always one of the boring but very real reasons I have never gone full time, My wife is starting back in work and doing well, My kids are both full time at school now, the time was right and I just needed the push (remember I don't really know what I want until after?) Friends and family believing in me, number one my wife who believes in me and this from a photographer's blog I came across...
““I hit a snow covered ledge approx 150ft below my start position with a lovely large rock boulder on it. I hit this and sustained some quite serious injuries, mainly thanks to the boulder, broken ribs, upper leg, arm, pelvis separation and collapsed lung.... I would say that people often say that when you stare death in the face your whole life flashes before your eyes. I would disagree and say that I have talked with others since who have faced the same situation and I experienced reflection on all the things that I wished I had done but not, the things I wished I had said, the moments that I wished I had seized. In short the things that I would have done differently if I knew I would not have the time ‘later’ in life.””
Bummer, I guess I should then...
I don't want the regret of 'what if' when I'm an old man - what if I had followed my dream and become a photographer?
So I am getting to answer the question: Can I make a living out of taking pictures?
The honest answer is I don't know yet. Watch this space.