Today we’d like to introduce you to Emily Ballard.
Emily, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
I began my business back in 2009 just outside of Chicago, Illinois. When my now-husband received a job offer in San Antonio, I knew that our life would be changing. Now, sitting here over six years later, I am so grateful we made the move to Texas & are happy to be here for life.
I am blown away by all of my clients who have taken the time to support my business throughout the past 10 years. Words cannot express how grateful I am that the Lord has allowed me to capture & tell people’s stories through photography.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I think that moving after 4 years of having established my business was for sure one of the hardest challenges thus far. Just as I was begining to have a good list of repeat clients, I had to start over again. Thankfully, having a great portfolio to refer back to for my new clients in San Antonio helped to get my business here off the ground. What I have learned now in the past 6 years of being in business has far exceeded what I learned in my first four, and I think that moving was actually one of the best things that happened.
There was and still is so much hard work, time, and dedication that goes into making my business what it is today. Photography is such a creative, heart-driven career, and it can take so much in you, in order to succeed. All that being said though, I try my best to stay away from the current culture of, “you must hustle with everything you have” and “push people down to get to the top”. Community over competition is something I have to continually remind myself of. Just because someone else is succeeding in this space, that doesn’t diminish my art or my accomplishments.
Please tell us more about your work, what you are currently focused on and most proud of.
I am a Lifestyle Family Photographer. I specialize in families and newborn sessions and find that in those is where my creative mind gets to flourish the best.
I crazy love what I do and I feel like that shines from the very first email you send me. I am so excited for every single session that I have the honor of capturing. I work very hard on prepping all of my families for their sessions so that they feel the most comfortable with me on their session date. On their session date, I make sure to let my families know that I have a lot of grace for them on that day and give room for that during their time with me. Sometimes, traffic stinks getting to our location, sometimes kiddo falls asleep on the drive over and needs a few minutes and a snack in order to wake up. Often times, a newborn baby will need to eat multiple times during a newborn session. Sometimes, a child is overwhelmed with all that is going on and needs a few minutes without a camera in his or her face before they are ready to continue. All of these things I completely understand and allow time for. I work really hard on making sure that the authenticity of my families shines through in the most beautiful ways during their session. I pay special attention to the little details that make my families unique and special and work on capturing those.
It would be great to hear about any apps, books, podcasts or other resources that you’ve used and would recommend to others.
I love the classes that CreativeLive and Clickin Moms puts out and have bought/attended many of those.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.emilyannephotography.org/
- Phone: 630-390-8144
- Email: hello@emilyannephotography.org
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/emilyanne.photos/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/emilyannephotos/
Image Credit:
Emily Anne Photography, LLC
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