Of Business Cards and Gratitude and the Glory of Moo

 Long, but felt important. Read or don't, it's okay.

I posted a bunch of collages of some new business cards I recently ordered to a few of my social media channels tonight--hoping I didn't annoy my followers and friends, but it was something I really wanted to do. Since it's exceedingly odd for me to look at my own stuff and go, "Huh, this is actually good!", this process of choosing my new set of marketing material was fun and stressful and...bizarre, kinda. I am my own worst critic (and I'm glad for that if it makes me try to continually improve at what I'm doing), so to have a ton of photos to choose from and have a hard time culling the herd--not because I hate them all and I'm trying to find a handful of acceptable photos, but instead to be having a hard time because I'm finding so many that I think are worthy of being seen--it's a weird thing. But I think it's a good one, too.

Also, shout out to stupid baby Rachle circa about 2003-ish when I was just starting to toy with pursuing photography professionally, a thing I'd always loved and felt passionate about but that I was clueless about from a business standpoint. At that time I had other photographers (people I very much respected and still do!) advising me that I needed to specialize and "just shoot weddings" or "only do portraits" etc, rather than having more than one subject. "You'll never get good enough for people to want to consistently hire you if you don't focus on building your skills in just one type of photography". I remember thinking, pffff. I'll be bored out of my mind if I just do one thing--so I didn't. This isn't to say I shoot EVERYTHING--I still only do a few things versus trying to be a jack of all trades, but how lucky am I that I'm still able to work right now? 2020 has been a huge dumpster fire in many ways, and that's especially the case for a lot of people in my industry and the creative industries in general. The fact that I'm still able to (safely!) do my job when I know so many of my counterparts are struggling is incredible. I hope this doesn't come across as me bragging because it's not--this is me trying to express that I'm very grateful for this fact. As a naive but headstrong 20-something year old I followed my gut in what to focus on (ha ha photography pun), and that has paid off in so many ways. And now I have so many of you who give me both your faith and your business, so much so that I sit here with my brains frying as I try to figure out which of my photos to use for marketing and feeling bad about not being able to feature every single session or event in the order and hoping no one feels left out. Seriously, I'm a lucky little weirdo, hiding behind my camera, fortunate enough to have a bunch of awesomely trusting people who make what I do possible.

So humbly, I thank you if you've ever jumped in front of my camera or helped me behind the lenses. Maybe you came to me for something huge like your wedding or the birth of your babies, or perhaps it was for headshots to further your own career,. You may have chosen me to document your family's story in portraits, or you might have trusted me with something intimate like boudoir photography. You might have followed me into very cold water to make some underwater magic, or perhaps you first discovered me when we were both skulking around in the dark and fog of a local theme park looking to make someone's Halloween season rad. Perhaps it was even some combination of more than one of these things...but regardless, I appreciate you.

Collages below...this was a beast of an order, but I'm so stoked for it to arrive! Thanks to Moo.com for being so very wonderful and for giving me both the blessing and the burden of Printfinity and the option to choose like a zillion card designs. Super excitable "can't narrow down, going to choose a bunch!" photographer me appreciates the variety, and fussy "just pick one and stop lamenting your choice--keep it simple, stupid!" practical me frowned and rolled her eyes the whole time, ha! And oh, hey, I've got a sweet referral code if you've never ordered from Moo and want to look into it...just message me and I'll pass the savings along to you because these cards have always served me very well and they might be awesome for you, too.

(P.S. I'm so glad I don't have to sit at my computer all day tomorrow now that I'm finally done with this order. I'm going to play in my garden for the day, wheeee!)

Website Updates, Memory Lane Trips

I've been working on updating my website over the last week after a refresh on my gallery pages that my super awesome and incredibly talented web designer Erick did for me to improve how the site loaded on mobile. (If you're in need of a web designer extraordinaire, give me a shout and I'll happily supply you with his contact info; he's the best!) Anyways, as I worked on getting my galleries full and pretty again, I came across more than a few images from years ago that I still like. This made me feel pretty good, because I'm notoriously hard on myself and very critical of my own work. Seeing a few oldies but goodies was a nice little surprise as I was working and sorting out what needed to go into my new and improved gallery pages.

I know I can say with confidence that anyone who works in any sort of creative field would agree when I say that going through older work is sometimes cringe-worthy; very often when we look back at where we were skill-wise a handful of years ago, those of us in the artistic disciplines want to cry, rip our eyes out, drink a gallon of vodka, or all of the above. So to find a handful of images from back when I was really just getting this machine that is RSP fired up that I still like made me feel pretty darn good. Also, giant shout-out to my clients who were so willing to help me as I got up and running back then; a lot of them are still with me now, still trusting me to capture the important stuff in their lives, and that's no small thing.

Here's to progress, to revisiting some old favorites, and to the realization that even though I'll never stop being my own sharpest critic, sometimes it's nice to look back. It lets me see how far I've come and also helps me to appreciate that even when I was just getting things figured out, I got lucky with a few shots here and there. Onward and upward, friends, but enjoy a few of my recently unearthed faves from the archives. Here's hoping you are well as we all dive into spring!