Interior & Exterior Photography; Venturing into a New Frontier

Susan Stripling is a renown wedding photographer in NYC. In a matter of weeks, her calendar was wiped clean of weddings by COVID19. Read her post on how she’s planning to expand into interior and exterior photography.

PIVOT.

I keep hearing that word used over and over and over again these days, and I was never really sure what the heck it would mean with regard to me as a photographer. I’ve built my whole career photographing people, and I’m as diversified as you can possibly get : weddings, portraits, engagements, theatre, headshots, corporate work. I even educate wedding photographers via an online platform, which is another type of diversification.

But what in the world do you do when a global pandemic wipes out ALL of that diversification (or almost all of it). What if your business is built on people being in front of your camera, physically, in person?  What if that’s all you’ve done for almost two decades?  HOW do you pivot?

The first thing I did was force myself to sit down and write my resume. I wrote it like I was going to leave photography entirely and go looking for another job. It made me REALLY look at myself, what I’ve built, and what I can do. It helped me identify areas that I’m very skilled in that I’d otherwise glossed over as just “part of doing business.”

I went to my LinkedIn and paid attention to it for the first time in, oh, ever. And I opened up and said “I’m ready to see what else is out there. How can I combine my love of everything I do – photography, business, everything – and find another way to get by while everything is so uncertain?”

Enter my lovely friend Rosalind Bordo. Some of you might remember Rosalind from back in the DWF days. She started out as a photographer, but then she became the founder of Two Bright Lights, eventually moving on from that almost a decade ago. Rosalind and her husband Jonas run an EXTREMELY COOL company called Dwellsy that helps connect renters with properties in a very unique way.

They’re going to be adding a photography directory to Dwellsy, and that’s where I come in. I’m going to be working with them to help them develop it, because you KNOW how much I care about photographers a.) getting work, b.) making money, and c.) being well cared for in the workspace.

I’ve always been interested in interior photography but never had any idea where to start other than word of mouth or attempts at SEO. The Dwellsy portal will be an actual free way to connect with actual work (free to property managers AND photographers), and I’m super freaking excited to help them with this and bring this to photographers. In a time that we’re talking about socially distant safe work, what could be safer than being the only person in an empty apartment, just you and your camera?

I’m really excited. I get to pivot, stretch my brain, help build something, and help photographers succeed at it. I’m determined that this will be a good diversified source of income for the industry in a time that weddings are so uncertain.

PIVOT!