in focus: michael houlden

It’s a bit of a funny story how Michael Houlden came to be interviewed for my “in focus” series. Michael and I attended the same workshop with Freeman Patterson in St. Martins, New Brunswick back in 2009 and while the group has stayed in touch, I don’t think any of them know about my blog. Enter Mark Krajnak. No I’m not kidding–the official Jersey Style Photography blogger. Seems that Michael pops in there from time to time and one day Mark happened to be talking about being a guest on my blog. Long story short, Michael poked around on my site and found out I was the same person who attended the workshop with him. So today I’d like to introduce to my friend Michael who is making some big changes in his life. I’m inspired by his gutsy attitude and here to cheer him on.

In seven words or less, tell us why you selected this particular image to showcase?

It captures the love and joy this family shares.

When we first met, your photographs were mostly of nature and landscapes and now you are photographing people too. What do you see are the reasons for this change?

A year ago, a work colleague asked if I would take a couple of photos of both her children as they had not been able to get their school photos taken together. I had heaps of fun interacting with and shooting these two kids that I was hooked. A few months later I arranged to shoot another colleague’s daughter who had done some modelling and came away with some incredible images. Not a lot happened after that until about mid year when a couple more people at work asked if I would shoot their family as they had just had a baby and suddenly I was shooting people regularly and just loving it. I had always shied away from people shooting as being “too hard” and sticking to abstracts and landscapes because they don’t move!

What I discovered is that shooting people really is hard and I absolutely love the challenge of figuring it out.  Every shoot, I make mistakes, I come home and think “Right. I messed up here and this is what I need to do next time” and every shoot has bested the previous. An example of a mistake I made. I was under the pump for a huge group shot. I just couldn’t seem to get enough light on the group from my lights. I walked my flash power right up, I jacked my ISO, adjusted aperture but I couldn’t figure out what was going on! After the moment passed and the pressure was off I did the old face-palm and realised that somewhere along the way I had pushed my shutter speed up and had exceeded my max flash sync speed. doh! I doubt I’ll make that mistake again and I haven’t to date. Fortunately I ended up with adequately exposed faces, but it wasn’t the photo it could have been. Additionally, I really enjoy the interaction with my subjects. I like clowning around a bit, getting some laughs, making images that go beyond what so many people have come to expect from photos. Digital has really democratised photography. You can make fantastic, saleable images on a phone now, if you have an eye and you know what you are doing. Unfortunately, this has brought with it such a flood of ho-hum photographs that people have come to accept ho-hum as good enough. When I get my subjects back for the viewing session they are blown away and really excited about what we’ve created together and that experience is fantastic.

Recently you shot your first wedding. Can you tell us how you prepared for this important responsibility?

I researched and studied my butt off. I don’t think I’ve ever put so much effort into preparing for anything in my life. At every turn I was reading and hearing from photographers saying one should second shoot weddings for a while before taking on one for yourself and what a mistake it is for a photographer to think they can shoot a wedding on the first go. In retrospect, I can appreciate why they say this and I think they are right in some respects. Certainly, it would be a disaster for someone to think they can take a couple good people shots so how hard can a wedding be? Wow. It’s a massive job and an enormous responsibility. It was a 14hour day for us at stress level 10 but we had prepared ourselves for it and it went off very well. The flag of success came when the bride and groom’s parents said the pictures brought tears to their eyes.  Everyone knew this was our first go and they couldn’t believe the results.

So, how did we get there?  For me, it was really about developing my people shooting skills as it was my weakest link. That and learning about all the stages of a wedding that need to be captured and when to fit them into a hectic, crazy-busy schedule. I think a lot of people associate shooting a wedding with people photography. That’s challenging enough on its own considering the time frame of the day and the lack of any “do-overs” however you have to consider that your job is to tell the story of the day. What does that mean? Details, details, details. Now comes the realisation that shooting a wedding entails landscape, abstract, product and macro photography in the same time slot as all those portraits and event photos that must be taken. Details, landscapes, abstracts and macro photography was something I was already well versed in, so it was a matter of developing the event shooting and portrait skills. There are some great resources out there to help and I soaked up everything I could from David Ziser’s Captured by the Light book and Digital Success seminars, Jasmine Star’s live wedding on CreativeLive and as many blogs as I could find. I practised the techniques and ideas from these resources during the family portrait sessions we were booking through the winter.

I also realised that while I could shoot a wedding with the equipment I had, I really needed to add a bit of equipment to ensure success and that didn’t come without considerable expense. I needed to make sure I had redundancy in everything: cameras, lenses, lighting. To be sure there are still items on the wish list, but the essential bases are covered.

You are making the transition to being a full-time professional photographer. What advice would you give to other photographers contemplating making the jump?

Hmmm, I’m not sure I’m qualified to be giving anyone advice at this point, I mean, I’m the one asking other photographers for advice.  I guess though there are some basic things to understand. Know the value of your work.  No one wins by giving away your work. Know or figure out what you want to achieve. What are your goals?  Are the things you are doing now moving towards or away from your goals? Know what type of work you want to do. If you want to shoot architecture, then your marketing should show architecture not all the stuff you’re doing to pay the bills. You can’t be everything to everyone, so don’t kill yourself trying.

As you think about this next step that you are taking, do you have any fears or reservations?

Oh my gosh!  Have I?  Nearly everyday, I think “I must be insane even thinking this!”. As I already mentioned, digital has democratised photography. “Ho-hum” has become “good enough” for so many people how do we convince them to engage us at a level that can sustain us?

We’re making the planning even scarier for ourselves by planning to move back to Canada from Australia to set up. I think most people making the transition from some other career to photography will have been shooting on the side, establishing a client and referral base in their area and have come to the conclusion that they can expand that into a livelihood. What we’re considering is a totally cold start. I mean, not only are we worrying about all the normal business venture concerns and choices about where to locate, but we have to find somewhere to live too, and without a regular, full time salary, even getting a mortgage will be a challenge.

Your wife, Jenn is also a creative and works closely with you. What are some of the challenges and rewards of working together with your spouse?

It’s really wonderful working with Jen, we have complimentary skill sets, creatively and in life. She excels in areas where I fail and vice versa. Jen has a fantastic eye for design and colour as evidenced in her quilt designs and she employs these abilities in creating fantastic image layouts that really impress our clients. She’s also a terrific organiser and helps keep me from wandering off with the fairies and butterflies. On the other side, I’m stronger technically and am able to provide Jen with technical support. I’m thrilled that Jen wants to learn how to use an SLR and I’m really excited to see what she creates.

On a different track, it’s exciting knowing that we are going into this venture as partners with each other for support. The challenge will be in keeping it real and separating the challenges of establishing a business from our personal lives so that those challenges drive us forward instead of apart.

As a transplanted Canadian, could you share some of the unique photographic terms you’ve picked up living in Australia?

Haha, I know where this is coming from. When you and I were at St Martin’s together for Freeman’s workshop in ’09 the “St Martin’s Club”, as we came to call ourselves, got a great kick out of the slang I had picked up in Australia and brought back with me. Interestingly, I haven’t learned any unique Aussie terms related to photography, probably due to the fact that I’m living in a small outback mining town and many of the members of our photo club are immigrants.