We recently connected with Autumn Jordan and have shared our conversation below.
Autumn, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Let’s start with a story that highlights an important way in which your brand diverges from the industry standard.
When I dove headfirst into wedding photography back in 2022, it was with a promise to stay committed to my true north: documenting the world around me in an authentic and tender way, to celebrate the small moments with the same grandeur as the big ones, and always prioritize shooting on film.
Some would say it’s a stroke of luck that I carved out a niche for myself in a saturated market at the same moment that interest in film photography accelerated for both photographers + couples. I truly believe it was more of a testament of my commitment to and perseverance within my craft for a decade+. When I graduated from Bennington College in 2014 with my film photography degree, I witnessed darkrooms + labs closing left and right, I experienced the end of the local drugstore processing C-41 film and handing over glossy prints in an envelope within 24 hours, I purchased the remaining 50+ rolls of film from a shuttering local lab for $100, hoarded rolls of discontinued Fujifilm Reala in my fridge, I was turned down from darkroom jobs in the city I had just moved to because they were operating on a skeleton crew.
Despite diving into a 9-5 for the next 8 years and the increasing difficulty of finding film and getting in processed, I still always made time to keep up with and continue to hone my skills. Whether that was biking through Boston with my 4×5 flung over my shoulder to photograph friends, toting my Hasselblad on vacations and always needing to ask for a hand-check on my film while going through TSA, or paying more my own film + processing for projects related to my day job.
By the time I dove into wedding photography full-time, I was burnt out from a few years spent in “creative roles” that required me to fulfill someone else’s vision and the isolation of the pandemic. For my first year of weddings, whether I was booked for my film work or not, I always toted along at least 1 film camera (but often times more like 5 or 6), I taught myself Super8, and I witnessed my couples not only increasingly asking for film coverage for their wedding day, but preferring the film photographs over the digital photographs they received.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
I am a film-focused photographer based in the beautiful Hudson Valley and available for travel across the world with 15 years experience behind the camera. My work is rooted in documenting love on 35mm, medium, and large format photography, and sometimes on super8. I was named one of Rangefinder’s 30 Rising Stars for 2024.
An artist first-and-foremost, my photos spotlight the intangible magic of being alive and the tender warmth of connection. My approach is documentary-style, with low-intervention (though I’m always there to hype my clients up, zhuzh hair or outfit details when needed) or to offer gentle direction rooted in genuine connection and experience over forced or awkward poses. My biggest priority on a wedding day is for my couples to genuinely experience their day and remain present with each other, their loved ones, and all the details they’ve put to effort into creating for their wedding day, and trust that the photographs they receive after it all reflect the big feelings and honest nature of their wedding day — the way the wind felt on bare skin, the way the sun hit the horizon, what it felt like to see their person for the first time on the wedding day, to embrace their mother or best friend, the way their cheeks were so sore from smiling and laughing all day long. I want to hand my couples their wedding day back to them, feelings, weather, tenderness and all.
I’ve been told by my couples that in addition to serving as their photographer that I am a “wedding or feelings doula”, supporting my couples well beyond making magic + heirloom photographs, and also in the decision-making around their wedding day — always encouraging them to make the decisions that feel good + true to them, and to prioritize time spent together, both on and off camera. I want my couples to walk away from their wedding day having experienced it all and ready to relive it through photographs — not waiting to experience it through photographs for the first time.
Can you talk to us about how your side-hustle turned into something more.
I photographed my first wedding while I was still in undergrad. It was for a professor getting married on campus in the company of friends, family and faculty. Having only been to a few fairly standard family weddings at that point, I was in awe of how the grooms for this wedding made the experience reflective of both the life they’d built together and the community they’d woven themselves into. They wore suits with flowers sewn onto them and had their guests bring ceramic teapots and teacups for an afternoon tea that involved toasts and contra dancing to a folk band in one of the academic buildings. It was at that moment that I realized weddings served a greater purpose than becoming partners in a hot and legal way — but rather the joining and celebrating of communities and the beautiful and rare experience of finding another person to share this life with, during both the magic and the mundane days.
I continued to photograph one-off weddings, from scouting Craiglist for additional gigs to help pay rent in my early 20’s, to photographing the weddings of some close friends who I had collaborated with previously in other photographic capacities (brand + food/beverage work). I spent my days of photographing for anyone who asked, despite being exhausted from my day job. I moonlit as an editor for another Hudson Valley wedding photographer. I second shot for other photographers. I just wanted to have a camera in my hands always.
When I abruptly lost my 9-5 in October 2021, I was extremely burnt out. I took a few days to wallow, before quickly realizing that this was perhaps the best thing that could have happened. With a few months severance as a short runway, I announced on Instagram that I was now a full-time wedding photographer. Within the next week I had booked my first 2 weddings under Autumn Jordan Photography. By New Years, I had lined up 8 weddings for 2022. I ended up photographing 21 weddings for my own business in 2022, and second / associate shooting an additional 6 weddings that season. Fast forward, and it’s mid-2024 and I just documented my 50th wedding, with a fully booked 2024 + 2025. I’ve brought on my first official collaborator (or an “associate” in business lingo, but I truly believe my collaborators are artists and deserve to have their work appreciated on the same level as my own), and recently was named one of Rangefinder Magazine’s 30 Rising Stars. While sometimes it feels like this dream life has unfurled in 2.5 short years, it’s been over a decade in the making!
For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?
Being responsible for documenting wedding days is something I do not take lightly. I understand that these photographs will someday become heirlooms: a record of two people becoming partners for life, the beginning of a family, some of the last photographs my couples may have with aging family members, and someday the only artifacts that exist after we are all gone. It’s a true honor each and every time to witness my couples be surrounded in love by all the ones they love. I want the photographs I hand over to my couples at the end of it all to truly reflect how they felt, how the day felt, and to be able to exist as a time capsule of the best day ever for generations to come.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.autumn-jordan.com
- Instagram: @atmnjrdn
