Shooting for friends/family story

taking photos for people you know way too well is hard.

I have a high school senior that lives with me and is a pretty needy kid. He's been putting off his Sr. photos for months now. I'll be like, "Let's go out next week on Tuesday and do them." He's like, "Alright". And then something comes up and he bails.

I finally just said, "We're going out today so get ready."

Now we just got done arguing over him feeling "rushed". He's comparing it to another Sr. session I did where I went out with one of his classmates. He has no idea how long I spent with the other senior. No idea how many images I took. I spent an hour tonight getting images before the sun went down.

It has more to do with his need of having to be in control and I told him to just get them done as he has like one more week to get his invitations out in time. His mom (even though he lives with me) needs to get the cd, order prints, write the invitations and get them out.

He tried to have me put it off for two more weeks and is now whining about a comparative shoot he wasn't even around for with another Sr. I think at that shoot I shot for 1.5 hours. This one with him an hour and got what he needed even though he didn't even want to be there to begin with.

You always have to evaluate the line between being a "professional" and being a friend. When it came to the session it was like any other session. The time was 6:30 to Sundown (1-1.5 hours). I got the images I needed. There was no pay involved. And he's been putting it off forever. So I had to be the "parent" who made him get it done as well as the photographer.

This is somewhat a rant and also a peep into the whole family/shooting thing. After the session and him whining about the session I told him that he could look at the images I have. If his mom doesn't like them he can figure out how he can make time for another photographer that is going to charge him. He'll be treated the same, have the same amount of pictures, same pace, same time of shooting. He'll just pay a few hundred dollars more that is unnecessary.

Those of you who are thinking of shooting for friends/family for free be careful. My case involves some fairy tale thinking on how we would spend one-on-one time together and bond (why he's needy, needs a male figure, etc) and since it didn't get fulfilled the complaints come.

If it were just any other client they would be fine with how it went. Since it's a person with close ties and emotional baggage it became a fiasco.

(though I did get some good shots for my portfolio )

Years ago when my father owned his own business, a car dealership, he often told me the worst customers were family members or your very closest friends. I have seen that proven out not just in his business but over the years I have known people that owned their own businesses and many of them have expressed the same thing. It is sad but it is a fact of life. Hopefully he will look at his photographs and then see some of his friends and he will realize that you did him a favor and you were being a friend to him.

It's all worked out now. He apologized yesterday and wants to go out and do more. Once he saw the pictures he really liked them as well as his friends commenting on them. It's funny how people don't feel like you are getting the images they want and then once you PP them and send tag them their tune changes.

His mom was stressing him out and pushing him to go with the photographer they know that's been doing it for years and years. She did his older brothers. They are traditional and mine aren't as traditional. People just go with what they are comfortable with. After talking to him the stress of his mom pushing him to go to someone and paying for it just because they did that in the past got to him.

The deal with the mom, though, is that she thinks that you have to have blue bird sunny skies to get any good shots done. I've continually told them over and over (even the clients) that the best time to do it is before sundown and I schedule my shoots for that time if it's reasonable for the client. I hardly ever want to shoot in bright daylight for portraits. I usually say, "As long as it's not raining the best time is when it looks like a horrible day for pictures. Overcast, cloudy, dark days are the best." Yet, non-photographers don't see it that way for some reason.

It's funny how people return to photographers even though they don't like them much. One of my best friends had his wedding shot by the same person who did his sister-in-laws. The sister-in-law HATED the photos and was wrecked because they stunk but the family talked to the photographer (booked and paid already) to do a better job. She did a better job but they still went with the comfortable already known photographer instead of looking for another one.

Anyway, good ending to this story at least.

Here's a couple just to give you an idea:

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Those are really good.