Photographer’s Diary – Week 2 – Where Does the Time Go?

Posted by Matt Lange on Aug 12, 2009 in Photographer's Diary | 2 comments

A lot of things have been going through my head the past few weeks, since leaving my fulltime job. Money has been a huge part. Getting clients another. But this past weekend, something else entered my head…

Last Saturday I drove up to Ruston, LA, home of Louisiana Tech University. I have taken this trip, probably 100 times in my life, since the beginning of my college life, all the way through last football season and all the other stuff in between (like living there). I love it in Ruston. I really do. It’s very laid back and relaxing. There is a different vibe there. It’s a much simpler life, and I do miss it. My wife and I often talk about moving back, and maybe we will when this photography thing takes off and it doesn’t too much matter where I live. But that’s a different story.

This trip was different. This trip was to move my brother Gus into his dorm room. Yes, my brother who is 10 years younger than me, is going to college. So I ask, where has the time gone? Upon entering the dorm, the smell hit me. The smell of 3 months of empty building and sanitizer. The dim lit hallways were all to familiar. And I as I walked up the stairs, the memories came flooding back to me. It’s been 10 years since I left Baton Rouge and all of my friends behind to go to this foreign land and start a new. And in the blink of an eye, it is now his time.

I’ve always loved the camera. I’m drawn to it. It’s magnetic. It was at Tech that I decided, photographers don’t make any money. I’ll be a graphic designer. And I did it. BFA in hand, I went to work….as a video editor? The funny thing is, a week before graduation, the Dean of Art told me that I was on the verge of greatness….strange. A year later I stumbled across the great Kelly Moore’s site, whom I worked with at the Louisiana Tech yearbook, and I thought, ‘I can do that’. I bought myself a Canon 20D and the rest was history. I’ve been giving this photography thing a ‘go’ ever since.

Three weeks ago, I walked out of a secure job. I had no clients and no clue really how to do the business side of this. I blinked. It’s three weeks later and I’m trying to fit everything in. It’s strange how fast time can go by. Two weeks ago I thought I made a mistake. Now I feel like I’m on the brink and it’s very very exciting. I get some praise for the work I do. I never in my life would have thought I could bring people to tears by photographing their loved ones. After all, to me it’s just a camera. It’s what I know how to do. I forget that it’s a talent. And I don’t mean that to sound conceited. It’s true. I don’t get it. It’s second nature. So what is going to happen 10 years from now? After all, 10 years ago I was just a punk kid coming out of a public school in Baton Rouge with a few bucks, some dissatisfied parents and knew everything about everything…..riiiiiiight. So now I’m 28, married, a dog, a cat and a dream. Will I be considered ‘old’ in ten years? Will life expectancy be 130 by then and I’ll still be young? 30 is the new 20, but I’ll be 38. Will 40 be the new 20?

To my younger brother….don’t blink. Take it all in. When your eyes open again, it will all be memories. Enjoy it. I did. Here’s to the future.

A Photographer’s Diary – Week 1

Posted by Matt Lange on Aug 3, 2009 in Photographer's Diary | 0 comments

For the first installment of the new, weekly entry, I guess I should do some sort of introduction of myself and situation to bring you all up to speed.

My name is Matt Lange, which you know.  I’m a commercial photographer in Baton Rouge, LA.  A little over two weeks ago, I walked away from Corporate America to pursue this dream I have of being a successful commercial photographer.  How has it been so far?  Nerve wrecking honestly.  When I put in my two week notice, I just knew I had it all lined up. I had money in the bank.  I had a couple photo shoots lined up that were just going to suck new amazing clients to me like I was the black hole eating the universe.  Well, that didn’t really happen. Don’t get me wrong, I had some awesome shoots so far, with a few more coming up soon.  But the reality is, when you take that jump, you better hope that chute opens before you hit the ground.

Since leaving Corporate America, I stepped back into the world of part time work.  Since I haven’t landed my deal with Nike yet, I have to have something to do to supplement some income and give me some breathing room to do some more shoots.  This is such a strange, yet familiar world.  I work as a QA Test for EA Sports.  It’s actually really cool.  I’m not allowed to really talk about it so I’ll just leave it at that.  Oh, and I’ll say, I meet some really ‘different’ people.  Moving on…

So what’s the goal of all this you ask?  Oh, you didn’t ask?  Well I’ll share.  Someone in the back asked.  I heard it.  I want to be a big time sports photographer.  I want to shoot all things sports.  Ads, Television Spots, Games, whatever.  If it involves sports,  I want it.  I love shooting everything, but I want to do that for money.  I have to eat right?  The whole purpose is to do what I really love.  I’ve had a pretty bad run at full time jobs.  I met some good people, don’t get me wrong, but I wasn’t happy.  The only job I really liked other than pictures was working in College Football.  But being married doesn’t really allow for that.  So this is the next best thing.

Since this is a ‘diary’ I guess I’m supposed to fill everyone in on what I’ve been up to.  Well, when I left that job, I had 3 things lined up:  Louisiana Tech Football Promo photos, Praline photos (which are on my site) and music video editing for Motion Family.   Well, the first thing I did was photograph the pralines.  Man, food photography is tough.  I’m not really at liberty to discuss too much about this right now, but I think they came out well.  When we do round 2, it’s going to be epic.  That very same weekend, my wife and I made the 4 hours trek to Ruston, LA to photograph the Louisiana Tech football job.  I really should say, that shoot turned out great!  I love those pictures.  But if you have noticed, they aren’t on my site.  Well, here is where the stressful part of being a photographer comes into play.  NCAA states that I cannot use a current player’s likeness to promote my business.  ’But Matt, I thought you did them for Tech and not yourself’.  Yes, true.  But it’s still a rule and I have to follow it.  Sucks, but hey.  They’ll be up soon enough and I will be a very happy camper.

I’ve also been spending a lot of time in the last two weeks trying to figure out how to get clients.  Oh man, every photographers question when they first start out, “how do I get clients?”.  Well it’s been about 3 years since I got back into this, and I still don’t know.  But I’ll tell you what I have been doing.  Emailing, like crazy, to everyone.  I basically have set my sites on the ultimate goal, sports, and have tried to figure every way out to get my foot in the door.  A big problem I keep having though, is that I keep trying to go straight to the top, and forget about the local scene.  I have a season sideline pass with Southcreek Global, to cover LSU from the sideline, so the back of my brain keeps telling me it’s good enough.  Well, it’s not.  I’ll figure it out one day.   But I’m trying to get in where I fit in, around here I guess.  Just trying to get some commercial clients to get that portfolio built up.  I have been lining up shoots on my own dime to get it rolling.  I have found that in doing so, I get a very ‘free’ feeling.  I like to think that this is how it is when you do commercial work.  I sit there and plan/research exactly how the shoot will go, and then it does.  It’s an amazing thing really.  When I get the Nike gig, it’ll be just like that.  We all know it probably won’t be, but hey, I can dream.

I don’t know if this was a great opening ‘diary’, but I think it caught everyone up.  Next week’s will be a lot better.  Seeing as how I just thought of doing this yesterday, I really just freestyled this one.  I covered the basics though:  quit job, part time job, NCAA ruling surprise, pralines, music videos and money parachute has yet to be deployed.

I’ll post again, let’s say, Tuesday.  Every Tuesday I’ll do this.  It’ll replace the Tuesday creativity posts, seeing as how I can’t get to a computer during the day anyway.  Thanks for reading if you made it this far.  I’ll condense them from now on.

A Photographer’s Diary – Intro

Posted by Matt Lange on Aug 3, 2009 in Photographer's Diary | 2 comments

I spent the past weekend in Destin, FL trying to relax my brain and figure out this bold new journey I was going on with my photography business.  I racked my brain for what seemed like 10 straight hours, trying to think of something interesting to blog about.  I wanted so badly to come up with something that would make me the next Chase Jarvis or Strobist, but it just didn’t click.  What am I doing wrong?  Then it hit me.  I’m trying to hard to be something I’m not.  I love to tell it like it is, yet for some reason with this blog and my business, I try to be something I’m not.  It works…a little.  But I think people see through that.  Why try to do what Chase does with his blog?  Sure, I love doing the behind the scenes videos and will continue to do that.  I’ll definitely keep posting my work, because I love to share.  But I don’t scour the internet looking for the newest gear or the newest social trends.  I want to do this my way.  I want to shoot sports but I want it to be my style, even if mine looks like someone else’s.  So far I don’t think it does, but I haven’t found the person already doing it yet.   So I have decided to add something new to this blog.  By the time you get to read this, I’ll either already be typing it or it will already be posted.  I want to share with you what it’s really like to be a photographer.  It’s not all ‘beautiful’ ‘amazing’ weddings.  It’s not all gorgeous landscape shots or big budget clients.  It’s work!  And it’s TOUGH work.  It’s awesome and it’s stressful all at the same time. It’s very very competitive.  I’ve met some good friends doing this and some people I want to slap in the mouth (since I’m speaking freely).  I’ve also seen some AMAZING things.  Sometimes it sucks and I want to quit.  Sometimes I think I’m the best photographer around and sometimes I think I’m the worst and want to hang it up.  Anyway, with all that said, I’m going to take you all on my journey, and why not?  I think people would really be interested in how it really is.  So, once a week I want to share my experiences.  I want to do more than just show the most recent images from a senior portrait session and talk about how ‘awesome’ it was.  I want you all to know my struggles, successes, frustrations and just general opinion on…..photography stuff.  Think of it as ‘No Reservations’ meets Matt Lange.  I’m the Baton Rouge, photography, Anthony Bourdain.  He’s a far better writer and host, but I’ll try.  So strap it in.  It’s going to be fuuuuuuntastic.

Matt