We recently connected with Birdie Thompson and have shared our conversation below.

Birdie, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. If you could go back in time do you wish you had started your business sooner or later?

If I could go back in time, I do wish I would have started working in photography sooner. Just before I began, I was working in television production as a production assistant. Once the was canceled… but then picked back up… and was being moved to Atlanta, I decided to take photography more seriously.

For me, starting sooner would have looked like me going the route of photo assisting. I like to think that I would have found a great photographer to assist for and learn from until I felt I was ready to go out on my own. At the time, I didn’t have any friends who were a photographers and I had no one to ask any questions, so I was just kind of figuring things out with Google. What would changed about my experience starting sooner is maybe I might be further along than I am now… or maybe not. Who knows! As cliche as it sounds, everything happens for a reason and maybe, for me, everything has happened the way it was suppose to.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Hello, my name is Birdie Thompson and I am portrait, editorial, and headshot photographer based in Los Angeles. Since I was a kid, I was always taking pictures mainly hanging out with my friends or at parties but being a professional never crossed my mind. It wasn’t until college that my love for photography really grew. Like lots of students, I still wasn’t sure what I was going to do with my life. I moved to L.A. from New Jersey and worked in television production for a years. During hiatus from production I found a website called MeetUp and took a One Light Photography seminar and that really ignited my pursuit back in photography. I bought some gear, called friends and family and began doing test shoots as much as I could.

As for actually getting into the industry, I do that but the way of red carpet/event photography, which was not at all planned. A photographer I had met put me in contact with an agency, one event led to another and before I knew it, I was working red carpets events almost daily. But through doing this, another photographer and I became friends and he introduced to a publicist friend of his. She and I met and clicked right way. She asked if I wanted to photograph one of her clients and the portrait/editorial shoots took off from there and it helped build my portfolio.

I think one possibility that may set me apart and definitely makes me happy is when client says how comfortable they felt with me. If you can get a someone to feel relaxed in front the the camera, the possibilities of emotions to capture could be almost endless. For me, being able to gain some sort of trust with my subject, ensures that we will create some great images and have fun while doing it.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

For me, the most rewarding aspect of being a creative especially in photography is the ability to convey emotions and capture moments in time through my images. I like to talk with my clients in between shots and my favorite moments to capture are the ones when you getting them laughing and catch them at the right second in the middle of genuine moment. Another rewarding aspect is meeting many different types people, getting to know them and their story a bit with the time you have with them.

Have you ever had to pivot?

There isn’t a particular story but the pandemic has caused me to pivot a bit. Even though I’ve been doing portraits alongside red carpets, red carpets took up most of my time and for a long time I wanted to stop but didn’t. Once the world shut down, just like everyone else, it made me to reevaluate everything and what I wanted to do. When events started picking up again, I didn’t go back full time and I was forced to get out of my comfort and concentrate more on portraits, editorials, and headshots. So far, I’ve had amazing opportunities come my way, among has been doing some shoots for The Hollywood Reporter and Variety… hopefully with more to come haha!!!

Contact Info:

• Website: www.birdseye-foto.com
• Instagram: instagram.com/birds_eye_photo
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/birdie-thompson-4497a3/

Image Credits
Photo of Birdie Thompson by Tommaso Boddi All other photos by Birdie Thompson