There are Way Too Many Photographers Today

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"Everyone is a photographer today." "The iPhone is killing the industry." 

I use to say stuff like this all the time. Photography today is a constant game of Instagram uploads, gear acquisition, and proving ourselves above every other Joe Smoe with a camera and a brain. But the crazy thing is this is no new phenomenon. People having been saying that this and that is the end of photography. When disposable film cameras were introduced that was the end of professional photography. The iPhone is the end of photography, that new "consumer" grade DSLR is the end of professional photography. It'd not the end, it's just the beginning of change.

This blog is going to be mostly opinion based and my thoughts about the photography industry as a whole. If you have any comments or questions about this please comment below. I think that the time we live in with various ways to take amazing photographs is vastly different because of one thing. The Internet. Thanks to the internet and sites like Instagram, blogs, and YouTube we can get our work in front of potentially the world. The only reason you think photography is dying and there are too many photographers is because you are seeing everyones work. 

Shot on Sony A7II with Sony 55mm f/1.8 and lite with a Phottix Indra500 Strobe

The iPhone definitely has put a truely amazing camera in the pocket of many people who would never consider themselves a photographer and may never feel the need to hire a professional, but so did all the people who initially bought the first consumer Kodak 35mm film camera. Everyone said the same thing when the first "Kodak" camera was invented. Instead of complaining that there are too many photographers today we can focus on making work that stands out and that sets us apart from those who are not making a living off of art. If we really are honest, other industries are much worse with oversaturation. I just graduated from Bellarmine University with a degree in Business Administration, and so did several hundred more. That number is growing every year with new grads. Several hundred new Business Admin grads every May, every year, just from one small liberal arts school in Louisville, Ky. My wife has been graduated with a Masters in Occupational therapy and has a certification and license to practice and still can't find a job in our hometown, she has been looking for almost 7 months. Every job is oversaturated, it's really an eye-opening realization and somewhat reassuring. We have to set ourselves apart and do unique work that matters to us. 

Shot on Sony A7II with Sony 55mm f/1.8 and natural light

So how do you be unique? How do you find personal style? Time.

It takes time to get a personal style. I feel like I am getting closer to a personal style and niche to my work but I am still far from it. You are reading this because you are discouraged by the current place of the photography market, just remember you are yourself and only you can make the work you do. 

Rebranded for Your Viewing Pleasure

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I've always kinda just been indifferent with my website design and branding. If you've been on my website a few months ago you would've seen a typical white site with some random galleries and a generic logo that was just my name. A few people who I met with to critic my work and more specifically my website design suggested I needed a logo to set myself apart. I needed something that was simple and rememberable that would easily be recognized on set or in blogs or videos. I'm not a fan of watermarks so you most likely won't see it on there. My friend Zach Jenkins (owner of Fifth Made and Spartan Case), did some work for trade with me to do a brand overhaul. 

I told him I wanted to subtly stand out with a different site than my peers and competition. Most photographers have a white site, and for good reason, it looks great and is east to read. I wanted to look different. Zach suggested a striking black design with a clean and modern font that would become standard across all my business assets and deliverables. 

It's a simple design but perfect to my brand and me. The design Zach made has become a standard across my business cards, invoices, website, and soon to be stickers to brand all my gear. 

Clay Cook - Creative Space

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Clay Cook is a portrait and editorial photographer from Louisville, Ky. Clay has a very polished and beautiful look to his portraits. He works out of his beautiful naturally lite studio.

Clay started his journey in photography back in 2010 after his band split. With a constant drive to create, Clay built a successful photographer career in a rather short period of time. He has had opportunities to photograph for Livestrong, NFL, Papa John's Pizza, Red Bull, Forbes, Adweek, USA Today, ESPN, Waterboys Initiative. His most recent campaign was Wings of Kilimanjaro for the Waterboys. 

Clay has built a successful career in the advertising and editorial world of photography over the past few years through his strong social media presence - @ClayCookPhoto

January Update

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This one is definitely a little late, but each month this year I'm going to try and give a brief update as to some of the projects I've done each month. January was a crazy one. I was coming out of a slow month of work (the holiday's always slow things down). The month started out with an instagram connection to local filmaker, Mike Vance (Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/mikevance). 

Next, was a shoot I did of one of my wife's friends. Her name is Neema, and she is a refugee from the Congo. You can read her story here: Neema. I did this and Mike's shoot right after I got my first canvas backdrop. I loved the tones and feel of it.

This next shoot was one for TOPs Magazine. This is a portrait of Renee Murphy. She is a news anchor here in Louisville for WHAS news. She was as nice in person as she is on TV!

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Next up was a concept shoot I did with my friends new Subaru STI. We wanted to capture some images that look like they could have been used in an advertisement. I love the look and feel of this image. This one shot took about 1 hour to shoot and 2+ hours to edit. I light painted with a Phottix Indra strobe and stacked the photos in Photoshop. I think the PSD (Photoshop file type) was over 3GBs. 

This was another shoot I did for TOPs. It is of "Super Mom" Chesson Hazelwood. Read the story here: http://www.topslouisville.com/Read/8939/Supermom%3A+Chesson+Hazelwood

This next shoot is for my friend's new company, Spartan. He is making awesome lid organizers and lid organizer mounting plates for Pelican 1510 and 1535 cases. I couldn't just have one photo because this product is awesome and I give it my highest recommendation. Seriously check it out! 

This was one of my favorite shoots. I wanted to challenge myself with lighting and I normally shoot with artificial light. This was all natural window light. I had a scrim up on camera right to diffuse the light even more. This was shot for the Voice Tribune's food issue. The restaurant featured here was the 502 Bar and Bistro.

Close to the end of the month now, I connected with local artist Mallory Mesiner. She makes lots of awesome drawings and paintings and does custom portraits! We did a few photos and a short promo video!

Last, but not least, we did a part 2 of my friends Subaru STI. This time the focus was one the car's details. I had to include a couple photos here cause this thing was a beast. 

Honeymoon

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Six months ago today on August 13th, I married my best friend and we took one of the best trips together. We went to Catalina Island in southern California and San Diego. First off Catalina Island is one of the most beautiful and sweetest little places I've been to. We also spent some time in Disney and I shot a little video on my iPhone documenting the trip (so please excuse the image quality). Check out the photos below, they were all shot with either a Pentax 67 and a Nikon FE. The film was developed and scanned at State Film Lab

We stayed at the wonderfully adorable Catalina Courtyard in the city on the island, Avalon. We were on the island from Sunday afternoon until Thursday morning. Thursday afternoon we fought rush hour traffic for four hours and made it to San Diego where we stayed in the "Little Itlay" district at an adorable little boutique hotel called Hotel Vyvant. The weather was wonderful, people were friendly, the food was amazing! We had some of the best Italian food I've ever had! We also took a break from social media for the entire time which was great! 

Below is a video I made, I really had no intention of making a video, otherwise it would've been better. However here is just a little bit of the highlights from our trip! I hope you enjoy! Please disregard the image quality.