We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Priye David a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Priye, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today One of the toughest things about progressing in a creative career or as an entrepreneur is that there are almost always unexpected problems that come up – problems that you often can’t read about in advance, can’t prepare for, etc. Have you had such and experience and if so, can you tell us the story of one of those unexpected problems you’ve encountered?

Let me talk about two problems I faced running my business.

In the spring of 2021, I went to a different city (Kelowna) for a friend’s wedding. I wasn’t the photographer for the event, but I went with my gear. Cameras, lights, lenses… the whole nine yards.

The wedding activities spaned through the weekend: friday to sunday. On Sunday, I had a photoshoot in my city, so I had to leave early from Kelowna back to Kamloops. I got home and started packing my stuff from my car to go set up for the photoshoot I had that morning.

And then I realized my camera bag was not with me. I checked everywhere in the car, including places where bags wouldn’t fit. I couldn’t find my gear. The estimated cost of everything in my camera bag was a little over $12,000.

I called the hotel and airbnb where I stayed on Friday and Saturday, they didn’t see my camera bag in their rooms. Rightly so because I took the bag into my car.
I guess someone found a way into my car and stole my equipment.

At this point, I was feeling all kinds of sad emotions, confused, distressed, and all that. I walked into my building and I found my clients in the elevator. They said to me, “Dont worry, Priye, we are just getting our make up done. We would be at the studio on time.”

Side note: My clients for that day stayed in the same building as me. They were basically my neighbors.

So I called a friend, Jonathan, and asked to borrow his camera for the shoot. This was also a struggle because I had to learn how to use his camera on the job. We used different brands, so you can imagine the struggle I went through learning and using a different brand for the first time to do a paid job.

After a few weeks, I got a loan to buy a new camera, and I continued my entrepreneurial journey.

The second one isn’t something unexpected per se, but one of the problems I faced was getting (the right) clients and pricing. As I improved with my craft, a lot of people wanted to work with me, and that’s a good thing. But running a business requires that the business should at least sustain itself. To do that, there has to be a decent inflow of revenue.

A lot of the people who were attracted to my work weren’t able to pay for my services, or they complained that it was a lot to pay for. For context I was charging between $50 – $100 at the time.

I had issues getting clients that were able to pay even when they loved my work. I surpassed this through aggressive marketing and networking. I had to put myself within the right circles, I had to tell the right people and show them my work. I am quite introverted, but I had to do the whole networking thing and talking to people so that I overcame the problem of not getting the right clients and being paid well to sustain the business

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

About myself. My name is Priye David, I am a Creative director and photographer at Circle Studio. I am a headshot and portrait photographer

I have ventured into various genres of photography – weddings, street photography, product photography, events and I even tried to photograph insects and flowers.

I settled as a portrait photographer because of my affinity for people. Making that connection and above all, the reactions I got when I unveiled their portraits to them. I loved the excitement my clients showed when they saw their images.

I also stuck with headshots because I have learned that for corporate entities and even entrepreneurs, your first impression especially socially is through the image people see of you. On platforms like LinkedIn where people are job searching or hiring, everyone is judged based on that first impression- your profile picture. The more professional you look as an employee or hiring personnel the higher the chances of getting acquainted. Then they go on ahead to read the profile and check the qualifications and all that.

My goal is to help people put out the best version of themselves to create a captivating first impression for their potential employers or employees.

How did I get into the industry?
Funny story; my co-founder who used to be my housemate was going through a depressive episode.

So one day he calls me to say, let’s get a camera. He said whenever he is depressed he likes to buy stuff.
Pause – do you know how wealthy you have to be to buy stuff – expensive stuff – when you’re depressed?

I told him I didn’t have the funds for that, but I like the idea of owning a camera. So we got the camera, with HIS MONEY. We spent a little over $3,500 on the camera.

But he never really used it. He didn’t get into the camera stuff if you know what I mean. But I did, I was using the camera every day, I attended the “University of YouTube” to learn everything I could about the camera and taking pictures. I loved it.

So we sold our Playstation 4 console, television, dining set, couch, and everything we could find around the house. We used the money to get better lenses and some lights. Trust me, we didn’t know what we were doing, but it felt like we were doing the right thing. After selling everything we converted our living room to a photography studio.

And then we decided we needed a name for our new venture – Circle Studio

I kept on taking the pictures and everything within the creative space, and he handled all the administrative work, from emailing clients to consultation calls and delivering client galleries.

In 2021, he got a job offer in Victoria and had to leave. I continued running Circle Studio by myself. In 2022 I called him to say I’d like to buy you out of Circle Studio since he was no longer actively participating in the business. I paid him off and continued running the business.

In summary, I got into the industry because my housemate at the time and Co-founder needed to buy a camera to feel better.

Service offered and What problem do you solve.
As mentioned earlier I have niched down to portraits and headshots. Portraits could be for a celebration of some sort, or just to have because everyone deserves to have beautiful pictures of themselves. Headshots are tailored towards the business/corporate side of life and presenting yourself as the person you want people to work with.

One thing I have done is to try to merge both genres of photography artistically and seamlessly. What I mean is, that the traditional headshots are – for lack of a better word – bland. Bland is not bad per se, but as a creative, you tend to want to spice things up a little.
And so working with, artists, actors, and models who need headshots, I have had to integrate a style into it, and I have transferred that to corporate headshots also. So you can have a headshot that works well on your LinkedIn profile and could also be used as a social image for your Instagram and Facebook.

What you think sets you apart from others?
People talk about how they are not photogenic or they are scared to be in front of the camera. My job is to make everyone feel comfortable so that they can be their authentic self. Whenever the camera is in people’s faces they want to bring out the best versions of themselves for the camera. But with experience, I know that the best version of people is the version you get when they are their authentic selves. When people try to put up a personality because of a camera, I can tell.

What makes me stand out is that i am able to create authentic, timeless photographs for people. I break down those psycological walls and get them to a place of comfort and relaxation so we can create timeless images.

What are you most proud of
I would say I am proud of the journey, the process, and the growth. I look at my work from years back and how I ran my business then, things have changed dramatically over time. I am proud of the work I put into my craft, I am proud of the work I put into developing myself, I am proud of the results I get for myself and for my clients.

What do you want people to know about you
What I want people to know about me is that you are safe with me, and I am professional with you. My brand aims to convey luxury and fun experience at the same time. I make sure that you are presented and represented authentically to your world through my lens.

Have any books or other resources had a big impact on you?

Books! I am such a fan of books. Books contain the experiences and knowledge of people from years of experiences compressed into literary materials

Here are some of the books I have read that helped out with my entrepreneurial thinking and philosophy

Win without pitching manifesto – Blair Enis
Oversubscribed – Daniel Priestly
Key Person of Influence – Daniel Priestly
Profit First – Mike Michalowiz
The Pumpkin Plan – Mike Michalowiz
$100m Offers – Alex Hormozi
$100m Leads – Alex Hormozi
Purple Cow – Seth Godin
This is Marketing – Seth Godin
You can negotiate anything – Herb Cohen
Exactly how to sell – Phil M Jones
Exactly what to say – Phil M Jones
WIn – Donna O’toole

I have also watched several videos from the authors mentioned.
One steady source of video materials for entrepreneurship is Chris Do from The Futur.

I cannot over emphasize the necessity of knowledge in the field of business and entrepreneurship if you are going to run your own enterprise.

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

For me, there are two things.

1. The ability and freedom to create.
As a creative giving your mind the freedom to do anything within your field is very exciting, it’s priceless. I have worked a corporate job before and I know that it is somewhat restrictive. You have a task, and there is a process to completing the task. With creativity, it’s almost as if your mind has no limits to how far you can go. You can achieve your goals through various means.

With creativity, people come to you because of what they know you can do. You are not limited to certain processes per se.

2. The satisfaction of clients.
Personally, I am a people pleaser, I know this doesn’t sound like a good thing per se, but in this context, I am very customer-centric. I aim for the satisfaction of my clients. It is rewarding to see that the people I work with are satisfied with the outcome of the process

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.circlestudio.ca
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/circlestudio.ca/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/priyedavid/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/PriyeDavid