We were lucky to catch up with Nick Heger recently and have shared our conversation below.

Nick, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. What’s something you believe that most people in your industry (or in general) disagree with?

In photography and video there is a big discussion people tend to disagree with that you don’t do work for free. Now in some cases, you are just starting out and trying to get experience then you typically do a lot of free work to build a portfolio, but once you have started to get paid work and have built a clientele a lot of people will tell you to always get paid for your work. While I see their point because you have to make a living, I have done a fair amount of free work that people would say I need to be paid for but in doing those jobs I’ve created great connections with people and because I did that for them I came into many jobs that are even bigger than my typical work.
A lot of what I do is also with local musicians and personally I think a lot of these musicians are incredibly talented and don’t get the support they deserve so it makes me happy to do work with them and give them content they can put out and try to get recognition. In the end it ends up coming back around and leads to bigger opportunities for myself when they want to have me out for bigger paying gigs and promotional work that they insist on taking care of me for supporting them when they needed it. That’s not to say it should be your mindset to use a situation thinking you will get something out of it but that’s been the way it has worked for me by helping people out when I see talent that should be seen by others.

Nick, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I started out doing photography in high school just playing around with friends and cars. Then after a few years and getting into fitness/nutrition that transitioned and started doing it more with products and people working out. After a handful more years I had people telling me I should do that as a job and start charging for work so I took that and ran with it. Now I do anything and everything I can, product, portraits, family photos, weddings, promotional work, commercials, and what really took off unexpectedly was the music industry. After my first live show I did photos the band responded and was blown away with my photos and started spreading the word to everyone to get with me for music related work. So now I would say 50% maybe more of everything I do is involved with local music for two years now. From music videos, live shows, promos, documenting in studio recording. I love getting to be in the mix of events, shows, whatever is happening and documenting everything, hopefully I can continue to develop and do more documentary film making jobs. I would love to get to tell peoples stories and create that image and feeling.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

I have had to pivot more times than I can remember in life in general. I’ve always been a passionate person in whatever I’m perusing and jump in with both feet. But my whole life I always wanted to build cars so that’s what I got into and went to school for. Worked in the industry for awhile till I found a career in fitness and jumped in to get an education in that, then moved out of state and tried to stay in the industry till moving back to Missouri and going back to automotive and at that time started to take photography seriously. I’ve had a lot of career paths, have moved around, and had to find things to just make life work. I have always had photography and loved it and now it happened to workout I am lucky enough people took to my style and like what I do so I can pay my bills.

What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?

I think a big part of being successful in mainly the music world with photography has just been that I’m extremely supportive of the people I work with. I don’t seem to meet many people in the industry that are a stranger. I think most people I work with can tell I genuinely care about their art, representing it in my work the best I can and how they imagine it. Getting into this industry isn’t about just getting work and making money. It’s carrying about what other people are doing and capturing it accordingly.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/_nheger_?igsh=dHNtbHd4MHh0N3I5&utm_source=qr
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/1DBFwtuqdv/?mibextid=wwXIfr