We recently connected with Willie Reese and have shared our conversation below.

Willie , thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Crazy stuff happening is almost as certain as death and taxes – it’s technically “unexpected” but something unexpected happening is to be expected and so can you share a crazy story with our readers

So the business of Photography can take you many places because there are so many different genres to choose from. I usually do event photography, such as weddings , quinceañeras , birthday parties, corporate events, and fashion show Photography. All of them have their challenges and I can tell you stories from so many different aspects but there’s one thing that remains the same out of all and that is it’s just business, It’s always not personal. i’ve been brought up and raised to believe that when you take care of people and you’re nice to people that they will generally take care of you and be loyal to you as well. In the real world and in the business world that is not true at all. The problem that I’ve seen with Photography, especially with the fashion industry is that there are so many different avenues and opportunities that people just aren’t loyal they come and go as they please and even though I have a good product and I’m a skilled photographer the grass may look greener on the other side to perspective, clients and models. So the downside to photography can be that you don’t always have returning Clients for individuals to continue to work with a regular basis so emotionally I had to toughen up and realize that I have to continue to move forward and try to get business and not rely on individuals to just simply be happy and come back again as return customers for serious investments.

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?

Well, as I grew up in New York City, I always had an eye to create things. So I used to draw a lot everything from Marvel comic books two cars and monster trucks. Certain cartoons were always fun to draw as well. I did have my limits though because of my vision as I am legally blind in one eye. So I had my challenges and drawing and presenting three dimensional objects, but I had fun trying and I had a real good time doing that. Then one day at a wedding event maybe when I was 12 or 13 my father put a camera in my hand and ask me to take pictures of the family and the event. Suddenly everything came to life and I found a new way to be creative and express art a different way. What made it more interesting is that the more pictures I took friends family and everybody else was telling me how great I did considering my vision. so I never looked back and I’ve been photographing ever since. Oh sure the doctors told me that I had limitations and that I was very lucky to even be able to see at all and that my vision could go at any time. I didn’t let that stop me. I just wanted to capture life and enjoy life for as long as I could and I’m still taking Pictures to this day.

Have you ever had to pivot?

Business of photography can be a saturated market to say the least. There are a lot of photographers out there on different levels. So I pivoted my business into Waste. I was always looking for clients and looking for ways to get clients myself and there’s nothing wrong with that, but I decided to let some of the heavy lifting be done by Other companies. There are companies that you can pay a small fee to they can advertise your business to Clients and help you to book Clients as well so I started using these agencies and that has helped quite a bit to grow out my business. I also pivoted a different way and took on another challenge to not just continue with Photography, but I also started my DJ business. Playing music is a great way to express yourself and have a lot of fun in the process so I was able to turn my business into another, and also began the path to finding more clients with each of my services playing off of each other.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

Well, as was previously mentioned, I have a vision disability and basically see out of one eye. So there are limit limits and challenges that I deal with every day while I’m doing photography. It could be something as simple as paying attention to details that I may or may not see But learning how to compensate for that. I’ve had to train myself to do certain things into developer behavior to check for more details and to be able to do certain things so it might take me a little bit longer to develop and take the picture because I need to make sure that I go through basic routines to make sure the shot is clean. Other people can see things from a distance but me I may need to walk up and be closer to the models or the environment so I can see if there is trash in the background or if somebody’s hair is not positioned to a certain way, so it may take a little bit longer for me to develop the actual picture. As I mentioned earlier too, there’s a problem in the market with people being loyal and faithful and so I had to learn to be resilient and realize that it’s just a business. It’s nothing personal that you have to move forward and continue to move forward and not let your feelings get in the way.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://Willreesephotography.com
• Instagram: @willreesephotography
• Facebook: Will Reese
• Youtube: Will Reese Photography

Image Credits

1. Daniela Jarimilio
2. Anniyah Rivera
3.Angeles
4. Verneka
5. Jada Bowman
6. Alberto and Alba