Casey Templeton Photography

The masses seem to connect with America’s Pastime fairly well so lets talk about “being a photographer” in terms of baseball.  Anyone can own a baseball bat, even the very best baseball bat, but we know without a doubt that we can not hit a 95 mph fastball out of Yankee Stadium.  So why do so many people think if they own a fancy digital camera that they are automatically a  “professional photographer?”  It appears that putting a camera up to your eye can also make you blind to reality.

“Oh yeah, I’m a photographer too.” -2 of every 3 people you know

I am often asked if I get nervous about everyone now becoming “professional photographers.” The truth is, no.  The more bad photographers out there, the more we have a chance of sticking out in the crowd. Going back to putting it into terms we can relate with: if a beautiful woman is standing in a room alone, she is still a beautiful woman.  Fill that room with 100 other not very attractive women and that woman’s beauty stands out even more.

The accessibility of photography is possibly the most biggest contributor to the growth of the art. Yet, to allow photography to be a hobby is altogether different than claiming a professional status. I always want to make myself available to help starting photographers, developing their own personal vision from behind the lens. Personal photography is a gift, an attainable artistic tool that we should all use to document our lives in a beautiful remembrance.

Being a professional photographer and actually making a living at doing it, is so much more than owning the right equipment. This also applies to countless other professions.  Let us beat the dead horse here:

- Just because I own Photoshop, doesn’t mean I’m a designer.
- Just because I own a pen, doesn’t make me a writer.
- Just because I can turn on my Mac computer, doesn’t make me a web developer.

Feel free to leave your own or share your photos of pretty flowers and sunsets.

Images from shoot with TNA Professional Wrestler and country music singer, Mickie James, on the farm where she keeps her horses.

The most valuable service I can offer my clients is my personal vision.  I have a certain way of seeing the world so I focus on that, not on giving the client what I think the hot style is in the industry. I would always be a step behind if I was only chasing the transient industry fads.  Find your vision, trust your eye.

When I am approached by a possible client, I like to show images I feel would fit within their brand to see if our ideas for the brand are somewhat consistent.  If we work together, rather than providing them with only the one or two images they asked for, I like to provide a photo library of images where each image can work with the others to show an overall consistency, a fluid vision.  Beyond filling their immediate image needs, this hopefully gets their minds racing with greater ideas of how they can incorporate the images in various other campaigns.

Long term working relationships are formed when your vision is adopted by the client and it becomes their vision too.

One of my clients that I have this relationship with is here in Virginia, Bon Secours Health System and their agency, Free Agents Marketing.  We began working together in 2009 and although the work is nothing too exotic or uber-exciting, they believe in my vision for their photography and have given me the freedom to place it directly into their branding.  Brand-Vision Utopia!  Long term working relationships are formed when your vision is adopted by the client and it becomes their vision too.  This makes it harder to use multiple photographers because consistency is lost, and keeps you in business.

“The first time we met Casey, he talked about creating a library of images for us, which was something we, too, were hoping to achieve.  You can see how this image library he’s created helps us maintain consistency across the Bon Secours brand,” Suzanne Doran, Art Director at Free Agents Marketing. You can see some of the images from the Bon Secours photo library below.

Bringing your personal vision to a clients brand.