We recently connected with Julia Fenner and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Julia, thanks for joining us today. Alright, let’s jump into one of the most exciting parts of starting a new venture – how did you get your first client who was not a friend or family?

I started taking photos for fun in college when I met my now-husband, Chris. He was getting into filmmaking and videography and had a DSLR, which was the nicest thing I’ve ever shot with at the time! He let me mess around with it a lot and I had so much fun whenever I did! College is the perfect time to drive out to a field with some friends and take their portraits at sunset or set up a quirky shoot with your roommate in your tiny duplex. I just practiced with that thing all the time! My first real paid clients were Chris’s friends who had just gotten engaged. The four of us drove out to the closest beach and I captured some photos of the happy couple. We had so much fun and got a few decent (for my new skill level) photos while we were at it! I SLOWLY started getting more paid clients between the fun/silly photo shoots I did for fun; mostly college senior shoots or engagement shoots since that was the stage of life I was in. I will forever be grateful to those trusting friends and clients who hired a brand new photographer with their special moments!

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 family and wedding photographer who shoots all around the Atlanta area. I shoot about six weddings a year, which I have found to be a manageable number for me. I love working with the bride on creating a timeline that ensures a smooth wedding day and I absolutely love capturing engagement shoots, which are always filled with adoration and little kisses and are, to me, the easiest thing to shoot because my couples are so excited to be in this stage of their lives and feeling so in love. I have worked with kids in some capacity all of my life, which is a big reason why I also love family shoots. I love being able to call forth a child’s personality that the parents often see but are unable to capture at home with their phone. It is always an honor when a family comes back to me year after year for their updated family photos and I get to see how the family has grown or changed. I have some families who I have captured their engagement shoot, wedding day, maternity, newborn, and yearly family photos, which I know is unique because a lot of photographers either do wedding OR family, but I love being able to do both. Something that goes along with this is that my editing style is timeless and consistent. You can look at photos I took six years ago, and while I have grown in my photography skills, the colors and composition will be consistent and they don’t just look like a dated Instagram photo. This consistency is extremely important to me as I want my clients to love their wedding photos in 30+ years and not feel like they are dated because of current trends.

Finally and most importantly to me, it is my joy and my goal to help women feel more comfortable and beautiful in front of the camera. It’s such a common thing for me to hear women say that they hate how they look in photos or they feel awkward in front of a camera. This is a wonderful challenge for me: to be able to bring out the inner beauty and speak truth to these women about who they are and watch them shine in front of me!

Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?

After 12 years as a professional photographer in the Atlanta area, almost all of my clients have come to me because I was recommended to them by a friend. This is such a huge compliment for me and I do not take it lightly! Maya Angelou wrote, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” That is the reputation that I have worked hard at earning and I think that is what brings clients back year after year and why they recommend me to their friends and family. You can capture amazing magazine-worthy images, but if you are making your subjects feel rushed or uncomfortable in the process, you will have that reputation and will likely not be hired again. I work really hard at communicating constantly with my clients throughout the entire shoot: encouraging compliments, light conversation, personal anecdotes, posing instructions. The constant conversation helps them to feel at ease and almost forget they are having their picture taken, so that the end result is that we all had a really great time together while creating memorable photographs!

Any resources you can share with us that might be helpful to other creatives?

Yes, OTHER PHOTOGRAPHERS!! We are all in this together and have so much to learn from each other. I shadowed a few photographers when I was just starting out, but I really wish I had continued to do that for much longer. Professionals should not carry secrets of their trade around with them to hoard. Our experience and knowledge should be shared freely and often! I have recently had a few different friends come over to shadow me while I edit or even to give them tips about how to use their new camera on manual setting, and it was honestly so rewarding for me! It made me even more thankful for the photographers who took time out of their own schedules to give me advice or allow me to watch them work. If you are an aspiring photographer or even just wanting to learn to use your camera better, please reach out to me, I’d love to help get you started!

Contact Info:

• Website: www.leggybird.com
• Instagram: instagram.com/leggybirdphotos
• Facebook: facebook.com/leggybirdphotos

Image Credits
Personal family photo by Andrew Rayn Photography