There’s lots of talk about SOPA and PIPA, but not much being said about – “DMCA focuses on removing specific, unauthorized content from the Internet, SOPA and PIPA instead target the platform — that is, the site hosting the unauthorized content” (ABCnews.com)

You may ask how this could change what we do. There are many ways. One happens to be spammers who comment on our blogs. When they comment and leave an unauthorized link on our site, No matter how short of a time it is posted, we will be seen as the ones accepting the unauthorized content and possibly be shut down.

This is just one little example. Please read the entire article with understanding and sign the Google Petition.

Thank you!

Here’s the full article -

SOPA, PIPA: What you need to know

If we cannot stop this bill, This may be the future of all you favorite blogs.

Kristy & Mike! Mike happens to be the coolest guy in the world. I say that because after our engagement photo session I received a text message one evening. “Hey, lets go get a beer” I didn’t recognize the number so i asked “who’s this?” The reply was “The coolest guy in the world!” Just my kind of people! We love our couples and actually like spending time with them to get to know them and actually be friends! We happened to have a few drinks the night of their engagement shoot and have been trying to get back together since. I’ve been a bit busy though, sorry Mike! We’ll get out soon. I plan on calling or texting in the next week or two. So I got a call from a really sweet sounding bride named Kristy! We planned a time to meet so I could meet her and her insanely huge, muscle man fiance Mike. Side note – Kristy and Mike have the best teeth I have ever seen!

I usually meet at an office in Ybor city. We happened to meet at a Panera this time…. I think. Its been a while. They both walked in with nice smiles and I shook Mikes hand as he crushed mine. I got to know them a little bit before jumping in to the stupid sales-y part of stuff. I hate talking sales. I’d just rather hang out and have fun. Kristy mentioned she wanted the best wedding photography she could find and Loved the way 12-1Photography has such a relaxed look to all our wedding pictures! Thats a comment we get a lot. We constantly and painstakingly study people, interaction and comfortable posing in order to get the best photography poses out of our couples for their Wedding or engagement photo’s. No matter what, we can’t settle for mediocre and don’t think anyone should, especially for their wedding pictures. Mike and Kristy wanted unique, creative, fun and relaxed wedding photography and engagement photography.

Kristy & Mike decided 12-1Photography was the best wedding photographers for them and we got going scheduling their engagement session. Since they just moved here from up north a bit,… think they said Pennsylvania. I could be wrong. They had no clue where to do their engagement pictures. I though about it and suggested Ybor city. They like that kind of feel and it happens to be a great place for pictures if you know where to look. We did the engagement shoot in Ybor! We started around 4 or 5ish while the sun was still out. I think i might be one of the only photographers in the world who happens to love being out in full sun light for a shoot. I love the challenge of creating dynamic wedding or engagement pictures in the sun. We ran all over ybor had some fun, and stopped in to First Chance Last Chance Bar which happens to be a perfect little bar for a good hang out time. We did a few pictures in the bar, had some drinks and left as friends and very happy with the way the day unfolded! Here’ s Kristy & Mike’s engagement Pictures. Hope you enjoy and keep an eye out for the two part finale at the end. Its pretty great. Thanks to Mike and Kristy for and awesome photo session. We are pretty stoked to photograph your wedding!

Awesomeness!Part1Part 2

I recently photographed a new line of cymbals being produced by Sabian cymbals (Sabian B8Pro) with Drummer Tim Yeung, currently playing with Morbid Angel

Another recent photoshoot was this years Avalanche tour which featured Sabian Artist, Stone Sour, Skillet, Theory of a Dead Man, Seether, Art of Dying

Be on the look out for the music site of 12-1Photography – Reidstains.com will be a blog site, showcasing all the new music photo shoots we are doing.

Enjoy the pictures!

A few pictures from another shoot I did with Guruz Media and Five finger Death Punch

I (Reid) got a call from Chris a while back, who loved our style of wedding photography and told me his fiance Krista did as well and really wanted us to photograph their wedding so, so bad! They were so excited to have found a photographer that really showed their style and could capture their personalities in the way 12-1Photography does. They couldn’t wait to meet us and reserve us for their wedding! Well,… That sounded awesome to me and I wanted to take pictures of their wedding just as bad as they wanted me too. Chris & Krista locked us in with their contract and deposit and it was set! The wedding and reception were to take place in Ybor City in Tampa. The ceremony was at St Peter Claver Catholic and the reception was held at the Lions eye institute. Our time was scheduled very wisely. Chris & Krista wanted to get their monies worth and have “time” for really great bridal portraits. We hopped in the car after the ceremony, family pictures and bridal party pictures and drove around Ybor looking for cool locations for their wedding pictures! Ybor City offers many locations for very cool wedding pictures for the bridal party and bridal portraits! I love the bridal portrait time because we get to have fun, relax and build more of a cool relationship with couples, just like we do in our engagement sessions. 12-1Photography strives to have a great relationship with every couple who chooses us for their wedding photography. Chris & Krista are a great example of building a wonderful relationship with your photographer and what it does for you, your confidence on the wedding day and producing a beautiful final product of wedding pictures you will be proud of. Here’s a few of our favorites from Chris & Krista’s wedding and……! A little surprise at the end! We are sooo excited!

Vendors -

St Peter Claver Catholic

Lions eye Institute

A Piece of Cake

Florist – tba

Catering – tba

Surprise!!

As I said, the engagement photo session took place in Johns Pass. John’s pass is a great location for engagement pictures if you are looking for that signature Florida look in your pictures. Take a look at some of our favorite engagement pictures and get ready for an awesome supprise in this post!

I figure I’d start this post with a common look Leslee and I receive from concerned brides and grooms when discussing wedding photography pricing. It’s not only Tampa and St. Pete brides. It’s brides all over the country.

Kevins post

“Let me start by explaining my motivation for writing about this topic.  As a wedding photographer myself, it would be easy for people to expect me to have some underlying agenda when talking about what photographers get paid.  I hope that it becomes obvious from my words below that I am not trying to vent about a lack of appreciation or understanding or anything like that.  In fact, I think that our clients and many others very much appreciate the value of the work we do.  My true motivation is that I think this is a valid question and I’d love for more people to understand the answer.  Personally, I really wish someone had helped me understand the value of good wedding photography before my own wedding.  I truly understand where people are coming from when they’re shocked at what photography can cost, because I’ve been there myself.

I remember having a conversation with my wife, Kelsey, shortly after we had launched our wedding photography business about how we never wanted to become those “elitist” photographers.  You know, the ones who were good and knew it and whose base package cost more than any “frugal” couple would want to spend.  We like frugal people.  We didn’t want to rule their weddings out.  So we made a plan to always keep at least one very affordable wedding photography package… say, less than $1000.  Well, today our base package for wedding photography is more than twice that amount.  So what gives?  Why is it that good photography always seems to require a big budget?

If your perception of photographers is that they’re raking in the dough, taking home thousands of dollars for every day or two of work, making something like $400 an hour, you’re not alone.  It’s a common perception.  After all, we’re used to the idea of being paid hourly.  We know that only so many hours can be spent at a single wedding.  And we all have cameras and know how to push the button and take a picture.  So when you see the photographer’s price list, showing numbers like $3000, $4000, $6000… it’s only natural to look at her in disbelief and assume she’s either some kind of scam artist or just full of herself… right?

There are many reasons why good photography costs what it does.  I’m going to talk about three of those reasons, beginning with perhaps the most eye-opening of all:

It’s not just one day of work.  When you’re observing your photographer, you’re observing him at his “shooting” job.  This person also has a job as an editor and as a business manager.  These other two jobs take up a great deal more of your photographer’s time than the actual capturing of photographs and he needs to be paid for all three jobs, not just one.  If he’s not personally doing all three, he’s paying someone to do the other jobs.  Every photographer’s workflow is different, but on average, it’s probably safe to say that for every day your photographer spends at his shooting job, he is also liable for about 6 days at his other two jobs.  Suddenly, the “one day of work” turns out to be more like 7.

My father was around once while I was editing a wedding.  I was in the middle of merging 3 nearly identical photos of a large family in order to produce a single image that showed everyone looking at the camera, with their eyes open, and that did not feature a kid trying to be funny by holding his hand in front of his crotch.  He stared in wonder and asked if I have to spend that much time on every group portrait.  I laughed.  ”Yeah, pretty often.  I had to do the same thing with our own family portrait from this Spring too.”  ”No kidding,” my dad answered.  ”Do your clients realize you do this?”  ”Well, probably not.  Most probably just see the end product with all smiling faces and wonder how they were all able to look composed at the same moment.”

There’s a second misconception about photographers that compounds the first one, and that’s the notion that photographers keep all (or nearly all) of what they charge.  In fact, according to Professional Photographers of America, the most successful photography studios allocate 25-35% of their gross income to cost of sales (their actual costs for prints, albums, assistants, packaging, etc.) 30-40% to operating expenses (advertising, equipment, studio space, utilities, supplies, etc.) and about 35% to take-home pay.  That’s the best-performing studios in the country.  Most photographers only take home 20-25%.  But for now, we’ll assume the best.

So let’s say you hire a photographer for a standard 8-hour wedding package with a total investment of $3000.  That translates to about 56 hours of work for the photographer and, at best, $1050 of take-home pay, or $18.75 per hour.  Better than burger-flipping pay, but not exactly 400 an hour.  And remember, we’re still talking about the most successful photographers.  During our first and second years of full-time photography, we made $2 per hour and our business took a loss.

Our experience as a new studio wasn’t uncommon.  Many new photographers will often operate with low rates for a couple years, or however long it takes for them to realize that their business has been dead from the beginning.  There comes a point in all of our careers when we have to decide to feed our families.  At that point, the wedding day package for $1000 will disappear from the price list, guaranteed.

The third big reason that good photography costs what it does is that it’s worth it.  A lot of people don’t realize this – or maybe don’t want to realize it – until it’s too late.  I was one of them.  Kelsey and I got married right before we got serious about photography.  We wanted to save money, so we hired a photographer that we didn’t know much about for one of her smaller packages for the ceremony and asked a friend to photograph the reception for free.  We got some traditional group portraits and photos of the ceremony from our photographer and some snapshots of the reception from our friend.  That’s what we chose to pay for… and for what we paid for, they both did a good job and we are grateful.  But today, I have only one regret from our wedding day: not investing more in our wedding photography.  We didn’t have a big budget.  We did what we could to make it work.  But now the day is over.  We had sweet locations.  The day was gorgeous.  We got ready beforehand in a beautiful, rustic setting.  We put a ton of work into choreographing our first dance, which we performed in our beautiful, but dark, reception hall.  Kelsey cried most of the evening because of the love she witnessed among her friends and family.  Much of that exists now only in our memory.  It could have all been captured so beautifully.

There are photographers out there who are so much bigger than the photos they take.  They’re friendly and organized, and because they’re spending the entire day with you, they help you feel calm and stress-free throughout your day.  They take care of all the details before the wedding, so when the big day arrives, you’re already confident that they’ll take care of you.  They have equipment that can handle every situation, backups for their equipment, and years of experience to know how to use it.  They know exactly what to anticipate so that they can make the day flow smoothly.  They make it fun, they don’t get in the way, and in the end, they deliver beautiful pieces of art to commemorate your wedding – something that will last much longer than the day itself.  They love their work and it shows not only in their images, but also in the experience they give you all the way through.  This is why good wedding photography costs what it does.  And why, to many many happy married couples, it’s more than worth it.”

Thanks again to Kevin and to all the beautiful brides who will be reading this. I hope it is helpful and informative. We look forward to talking with you soon!

Primavera Studios

Original blog post

Krystal & Nick decided to have their engagement photography session at the University of Tampa which happens to be a great place for any type of fun photography. We have yet to photograph a wedding at the University of Tampa. We’ve done many cool engagement photo sessions there! Krystal & Nick were excited and slightly exhausted from moving the day before but ready to rock out their engagement session with 12-1Photography! Nick likes Nacho Libre a bit and I hear there might be a plan to bring some nacho libre masks to the wedding to use in the Wedding Crasher! We’re pretty excited about that, if it happens! You better get on that Nick! We had a really great time walking around the University of Tampa finding great locations for cool engagement pictures. Here’s a few favorites. Let us know what you think!