When we moved to Maryland three and a half years ago, I had no idea how much I would fall in love with our Lake Linganore community. Or how many treasures it would hand me for my photography business. Lake Linganore I went from a predominantly wedding photographer to a near-full-time family and portrait photographer. […]

I am a worrier and a planner. I’m also a helper. You put all of these things together and you have someone who has thought of just about every “what if” situation and scenario and has a lot of emergency situations covered for you and your photo session. Even for a simple family photo session […]

When you have new dreams, you’ve got to dress them up a bit and give them a big moment to explode into the world. Honestly, that’s kind of how it felt to talk about the future of my business (and of me) with Emilie of Buoyant Marketing this year as we prepared to create a […]

If there’s one area of my family photography business that I’m most proud of finessing this year it’s my client workflow. And, how I take care of my clients for every session through my client experience. Some of this needs to be credited to Amanda Hedgepeth — not only for mentoring me at the beginning […]

I am a Type Two — known as The Helper. They’re known to be considerate, selfless, generous. They’re also known to be needy, self-destructive, fearful of being unloved or unwanted. There are so many moments when a friend will say, “Oh, that is SO Type Two of you!”

There’s a great myth that photography is essentially just a person with a good camera and the good camera does all the work. It’s just not true. The hours before and after a photo session are filled with communicating, assisting, editing, delivering and just general creating in a workspace. These are the items that make the many steps and many behind-the-scenes moments easier and better for me and my clients.

I love finding new locations and secret (or not-so-secret) spots to capture my family, your family or just the view itself.

Every year, it’s important to me that I do at least one educational opportunity to help me become an even better photographer and to better take care of my clients. This year, I almost didn’t do any official workshops or classes. And then, in the last quarter, I saw a super-limited opportunity for Skype Mentorships with my #1 photographer inspiration, Amanda Hedgepeth.

Believe me — if I never had to think about pricing or raising my prices, my behind-the-scenes world with Wendy Zook Photography would be SO much easier and happier. It’s not the most enjoyable part of running my business, but it is the essential part to me being able to continue to run my business and pay for expenses.

I’ve been so blessed with a beautiful, crazy, busy 2019 in my business and I have zero regrets or complaints about that. I do, however, want to make sure that I’m always keeping my time between all of the things I love — family, hobbies, work — balanced.