History repeating itself?

Photo credit Julia Kellett

In 2006, I hired a student of mine to help me with a wedding. It all started when he broke one of my personal lenses while taking pictures for the yearbook. Unable to pay me back, I offered to allow him to work it off. I had a client who wanted a videographer for their ceremony and asked if I could do it. They were paying the same amount that he owed me, so I worked out a deal- he videos the ceremony and his debt is paid. After that, stick around to take pictures of the rest of the day with me. One of the photos I wanted him to get was the ceremony from the top of the Clubhouse at Baywood Greens. He did great and Brandon has been my second-photographer ever since! He's also done quite a few weddings of his own.

Brandon has wanted to work in the restaurant business for a long time and when the opportunity to manage a new bar/club and restaurant in Salisbury came up, he jumped at the chance. Unfortunately, that means that he can no longer be my second-photographer. He's honoring his commitment to me and finishing up the season at any weddings I need him for, but he is moving on soon and will be missed. He's a great photographer (I taught him well LOL)!

Being a teacher, I have a renewable supply of people who have an interest in photography. Some of those students have helped me with the photobooth or other small jobs. One student in particular showed some serious promise. She worked the photobooth for me last year and did a little photography at one wedding, but we could never manage to schedule her to actually shoot a wedding with me. Until yesterday. Where she helped me photograph a wedding at Baywood Greens where she took this photo...from the top of the clubhouse. She did a fantastic job...maybe history will be repeating itself and she'll do more weddings with me. But she has her own business and is already off to a great start for someone so young.

Meanwhile, I do have a new second-photographer lined up for next season and I'm looking forward to working with her! Time to mix things up a bit at Sam Ellis Photography :)

*I'd share photos from that wedding Brandon photographed, but they're on my old website and I can't remember the password! They're archived in my safe...but that's too much trouble.

Trash The Prom Dress...for charity

Many people have heard of the trend of "trashing" a wedding dress. I'm not sure where it all started or by who, but it's been going for a few years now. The idea is that you wear this dress once and then store it away presumably to hand it down. But, you can still have some fun with it before you have it cleaned. I've done a few sessions like this with brides and they're so cool. From the bride's standpoint, they get great photographs of themselves wearing their wedding dress in an unconventional environment. As a photographer, it gives me a creative release to try something unusual.

As a high school teacher and school photographer, I take lots of pictures at the prom. It dawned on me one day that we can take this dress-trashing trend and transfer it to prom dresses! In 2009, I did my first Trash The Prom Dress photoshoot and I loved it (see below)!

Since this photoshoot, I've offered to do it a few times and it's always been fun for me as well as the girls. But it dawned on me one day...what do you do with the dress afterwards? I was assured by two drycleaners that the dresses could be cleaned and brought back to good as new, and I had the idea to donate the dresses to charity! There are numerous organizations in the area that take used dresses and make them available to underprivileged girls for little or no cost. And I began offering these sessions free of charge if the girls donate their dresses after they are cleaned.

It was time to do another shoot, so I posted it on social media, contacted a few students, spread the word, and had nine girls show up to trash then donate their dresses. This one turned out to be my favorite session yet, here's a few of my favorite images:

And here's a few outtakes just for fun (all photos are taken at the edge of the water and are completely safe):

 

If you'd like to see more of these types of images, please visit the Sea-niors gallery on my website-http://www.samellis.com/Archive/Seniors/Sea-niors/

If you are interested in signing up for my next Trash The Dress session for prom/homecoming/wedding/bridesmaids dresses, email me at sam@samellis.com.

Senior portrait photographer- Longwood Gardens

I love where I live, we've got beaches, farmland, old wooden barns, and a little bit of urban landscape, all of which make for great photographs. Thousands of people come here to vacation, many of them have their family portraits taken while visiting. The majority of my wedding clients come here just to get married on our beautiful beaches. However, to be honest, sometimes it feels like the scenery never changes, but it also pushes me to be more creative. When I look at other photographer's work, I can almost instantly tell where the images were taken.  So it's always nice to get away from the area and photograph someplace else. I've photographed weddings all throughout the region and done a few engagement portraits in Washington D.C. But I've never done a senior portrait outside of the area.

I've been wanting to photograph a senior portrait at Longwood Gardens for some time now. Living two hours away, it's not exactly practical though and not many seniors want to go that far for pictures. I managed to talk Reneé into making the trip and it was well worth the travel time. Originally, she wanted to do her photographs on a local college campus, but after seeing pictures from Longwood, she was all for it.

Photographing in a place like Longwood makes things more interesting for me. Exploring little areas within the expanse of the place and creating a photograph that incorporates someplace new is exciting and drives me creatively. There are so many more locations within the gardens to use, I'm looking forward to the next client who wants to go there.

There are also other locations that would be great for senior portraits including some of the state parks in northern Delaware and southeastern Pennsylvania; cities like Philadelphia, Annapolis, Washington D.C.; and college campuses around the region. Where would you like to go? Let's make it happen! I have a passport :)

Here's a few of my favorites from her session:

Feeling appreciated!

At the last wedding, the father of the bride was welcoming everyone to the reception and thanking everyone for making the day special. He thanked the couple, the other parents, all the guests who came from near and far, the florist, the venue, the DJ...and the photographer. He called us all the "best in the business!" :)
Shortly thereafter, I was sneaking into the buffet line and he came up behind me. He proceeded to tell the woman he was with that with that when his daughter got engaged, one of the first things he did was to look at photographers. He talked to his daughter and told her that he found the best photographer in the area and he wanted to try to book him. However, she had her own ideas and had already had her heart set on someone else. Knowing that it's his daughter's special day and it was ultimately her decision, so he asked who she wanted to hire. He was overjoyed when she told him she wanted to hire Sam Ellis Photography (he actually did a little dance when telling the story) because that's who he wanted to hire too!
I do love being a photographer, and it's nice to hear that my clients appreciate what I do! Here's a photo of this awesome father after dancing with his daughter:

Wedding Tip Wednesday- Hiring a Professional Photographer (again)

I'm not one to beat a dead horse, but I can't say it enough...if you care about the photography for your wedding, hire a professional. I realize that not everyone cares as much about pictures as I do, but if it matters to you, don't chance it.

I was participating in a bridal show last Sunday and a woman approached my booth and was flipping through the albums. I asked if she was looking for a photographer (everyone went to every booth to get their card signed off to enter a drawing) and she hesitated and said, "kind of." She told me that she's getting married at the end of June and her fiance's family friend was hired to do the photography and that he's just getting started. The issue is that he's not returning her emails or phone calls! That's a HUGE red flag for ANY business.

Obviously, people lead busy lives and if this is a budding business he may not be able to devote all his energy to it. However, I know how brides can worry about their wedding day and how much effort and planning they put into it. That's part of why I take wedding photography (and all my photography) so seriously. I'm a full-time teacher, but I also consider photography a full-time business. I make the time to answer phone calls and emails and handle the business at night and on weekends. I also have my wife to handle much of the business side of things, order fulfillment, editing, and album design. I certainly wouldn't be able to do it all without her!!!

I gave this worried bride some advice and words of wisdom and informed her that my associate photographer, Brandon, is available that day since I will be out of town. I hope that it all works out for her, but she's in a difficult spot since her future mother in law is the one who hired this photographer. Imagine the strain it could put on their relationship if she's not happy with the photographs. It seemed like photography was pretty important to her and she was worried about what she was going to end up with...if anything!

And that's your Wedding Tip Wednesday!

Here's a photograph taken by my associate photographer, Brandon:

Wedding Tip Wednesday- Sand Ceremonies

A common wedding tradition is the lighting of the unity candle. The bride and groom take individual candles and light a candle representing their union and that candle is save for posterity. Out on the beach though, candles don't stay lit because of the wind and someone came up with the great idea to use colored sand (usually the wedding colors) to incorporate the environment and show that the two couples are united. They make a great decorative element in the home as well.

There's a trick to this sand art though. You have to take turns pouring the sand into the vessel to get the pretty stratification. If both people pour the sand at the same time, you end up with one color on one side and the other color on the other side with a little blending in the middle. It also takes a while to fill the jar, so it wouldn't hurt to start the process ahead of time and just top the sand off during the ceremony. You could also finish it off after the ceremony. I also recommend filling the bottom of the jar with sand from the beach where your ceremony is as an added memento.

Here's a very nice example of a sand ceremony jar. This particular one had a color of sand for their kids too.

Wedding Wednesday- Featured Wedding Album: Bard-Eaton Rehoboth Beach Wedding at Salero

Call me old school, but to me, nothing finishes off the joy of a wedding like a wedding album! We design our albums to tell the story of the wedding day from bridal prep to the final exit or last dance. An album is something couples can bring out on anniversaries, look at with their children as they grow up, and reflect upon the love and excitement of the wedding day. This is just something that you can't do with just a disc of images.

Here's a recent wedding album we designed for Kristen and Josh who were married on the beach in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware and had their reception at Salero.

All images copyright Sam Ellis Photography

Have fun, but don't overdo it!

Wedding Tip Wednesday!
Weddings are a celebrations, possibly the biggest party you'll go to as an adult. Of course you want to have fun, kick loose, and live it up, but be careful not to overdo it. Know your limits when it comes to alcohol. Make sure you're eating throughout the day if you're having cocktails while getting ready and drink plenty of water.
I hate to say it, but I've seen brides being helped out of the reception because they were too intoxicated to walk on their own! I won't guess how the wedding night went :)
This goes for guests too- nobody likes a sloppy drunk at their wedding!

*note, everyone was well-behaved at this wedding...well, mostly anyway :)

Fraudtographers??? What is that?

A recent blog post of mine was about how to choose your photographer. Taking that one step further, it's important to know that amongst the millions of photographers in the world, there are frauds! I've seen photographers who post some cool bridal portraits that they took at a modeling session or a workssop, but their actual wedding work is less than impressive. I've also seen photographers who have stolen images from the internet and passed them off as their own. I've even seen well-established photographers at bridal shows with albums full of images they didn't take because they're using album company sample albums...but they don't tell people that. Recently, there was a Craigslist ad going around the photography forums where someone was asking to buy people's work because they were just starting out and didn't have any images of their own to showcase!

So how do you know your photographer is legit? The folks over at Offbeat Bride have some tips on how to flush out the frauds. Check it out at http://offbeatbride.com/2014/03/fraudtography#.UxaUgvldXzM

One of the tips is to look at the photographer's website and look at full weddings...well, here's mine! www.samellis.com

Wedding Tip Wednesday- The First Kiss

This is something I tell EVERY couple before they walk down the aisle...give  a good first kiss! You don't have to get crazy, but hold it for a few seconds, make it last, make it meaningful. Not only does it show your passion, but it allows us to get a few good photos :)
Here are just a few first kisses we've taken that I like, more can be found on my website- http://www.samellis.com/: