Todays Guest: Mark Youngblood of Youngblood Studios in Hagerstown, Maryland
Host: John Bentley
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Mark Youngblood Expert PageANNOUNCER: This program is sponsored by morephotos.com the online photo sales solution to professional photographers worldwide. Welcome to the VTalk Radio's Photographer Spotlight with your host, John Bentley.
JOHN: Today on VTalk Radio's Photography Spotlight we have Hagerstown, Maryland, photographer, Mark Youngblood, in the studio from Youngblood Studios. Welcome to the program, Mark.
MARK: Good morning. How are you?
JOHN: Just fine. Thank you for joining us today. Tell us a little bit about your photography business there in Maryland.
MARK: I'm a wedding portrait photography studio. Our main business is weddings. We dabble a little bit in commercial photography also, but definitely just weddings and portraits are the main part of our business.
JOHN: Now I'm sure weddings bring their own set of circumstances, a little bit different from the studio. When you approach a wedding, are you the only photographer? Do you take an assistant with you? How do you do that?
MARK: Actually I work, I want to say, a group of photographers. It's myself as the main photographer. I have an assistant that's been with me for about twelve years and then I have other photographers that have come along that I have them pick out certain parts of the wedding...whether it be the groom, or have them follow the bridesmaids and I would just want them concentrating on photographing certain parts of the wedding. So I have it covered with just not only my set of eyes, four or five sets of eyes.
JOHN: Wow, that's a really effective and full coverage then on any of your weddings. That's great.
MARK: Yeah, it just makes my job easier making sure I have everything documented that day, because any more it's not just about the traditional portraits at the alter. It's more of a story telling, documenting how things happen that day.
JOHN: Sure. Sure. Now you also do a lot of studio work. Looks like you deal with high school seniors. Tell us a little bit about that.
MARK: Love photographing high school seniors, it's just been a little tough in our area, because there are contract photographers as other photographers, I'm sure, run into this, but it get's better every year because we're just the more cutting edge, high school seniors something out of the ordinary. I actually have a warehouse that I rent for the summer time that I photograph high school seniors in that gives them more that MTV, that edgy look in their high school senior photographs.
JOHN: Hey, that's important. That's a good little niche to have then for the seniors. Now you do families. I know a lot of people are uncomfortable having their photograph taken. What do you do when you get a family in there that you might have Uncle Joe doesn't like his photo taken. What do you do to solve that kind of dilemma?
MARK: Well, with all my family portraits, I do pre consultation so I get to meet at least a couple of the people that are going to be in the portrait that I'm creating come the day that we're going to do their photograph. That way they know what to expect, they know how I do things. The biggest thing in portraiture is clothing, and I have a clothing consultation of what I think would look best in their portrait as far as their clothing selection. So come again portrait day, we pretty much have scripted of how things are going to happen that day so it's really no surprises for anybody.
JOHN: That's a good approach to have to have everybody informed on what's going to work best in a situation like that. Now, certainly with children, you've got a little different ball to play with there. How do you keep a child's attention when you're trying to photograph them?
MARK: Well actually with my portraits also I work with Andy, my assistant. He's a little bit of a kid, himself, and entertains the kids really well being comical and trying to get good expression out of them and then I just concentrate on getting the photograph taken. Work with the adults, pay more attention to them, and just let Andy do his thing and make photographs that way.
JOHN: Yeah, a little tag team going on there, don't you?
MARK: Yeah.
JOHN: It sounds like a good, effective way of doing it, that's for sure. That way you can focus on what you have at hand and that's taking a good photo and he can take care of entertaining the masses if you will. That's great. Now also with children, you do a lot of pregnancy photography and newborn photography, isn't that true?
MARK: Yes. With having my studio and business for 15 years, for a long time, I never photographed children, but after photographing so many weddings, I've had so many of my past brides coming back to me that have started families and have liked my work and I've done a lot of pregnancies and then I actually document the whole first year in a book I call The Baby's First Year where I start with pregnancy, have them bring back the newborn within that first two weeks, and then we do a three month portrait, a six month portrait, a nine month, and then we actually go to their birthday party and photograph them opening up gifts. Set them in their high chair with their birthday cake and take pictures of them with birthday cake all over them, and then I create an album from that.
JOHN: Wonderful. You get the whole span of their first year then. That's great. Now you also do commercial photography too?
MARK: Yes. I'm one of the main photographers of Alego Magazine here in Hagerstown called Hagerstown Magazine and it's a bi-monthly magazine that I get different assignments and I just get to meet a lot of different business people and it's landed me a lot of different commercial jobs, chocolate, trucks, just a little bit of everything we've photographed.
JOHN: I'm going to take a little break here, Mark, but before we do that, would you share your website address and contact information for our listening audience.
MARK: It's Youngblood Studios, phone number of (301) 739-7250.
JOHN: Is that youngbloodstudios.com?
MARK: Yes, youngbloodstudios.com.
JOHN: Great. We are in the studio today with Hagerstown, Maryland, photographer, Mark Youngblood, of Youngblood Studios, and you are listening to VTalk Radio's Photography Spotlight. We're going to step aside for these important messages. Do stay tuned.
ANNOUNCER: This VTalk Radio Spotlight is sponsored by morephotos.com, the online photo sales solution to professional photographers worldwide.
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ANNOUNCER: Did you ever wonder why the groom is supposed to carry the bride over the threshold? What does the saying something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue mean? Visit www.weddingdetails.com and click on the lore and tradition section. We've got culture and tradition information from around the world. Visit www.weddingdetails.com tonight.
ANNOUNCER: We now return you to VTalk Radio's Photographer Spotlight with your host, John Bentley.
JOHN: We are back in the studio with Hagerstown, Maryland, photographer, Mark Youngblood, of Youngblood Studios and you're listening to VTalk Radio's Photography Spotlight. Welcome back to the program, Mark.
MARK: Thanks.
JOHN: Now we've been talking about your photography business there in Hagerstown, Maryland. I suspect that you do business in the surrounding area too. Tell us a little bit about some of the communities that you service.
MARK: We're in Washington County. A couple of the counties that border me are Frederick County, also up into Pennsylvania. We're on the Mason-Dixon line up into Pennsylvania and also even into the Washington DC-Baltimore area also. So I have a good many communities that we service. Actually I travel just about any where. We were in Mazatlan, Mexico, not too long ago for a wedding, so.
JOHN: Sweet.
MARK: Have camera, will travel.
JOHN: Yep, there you go. What about banquet halls? Are there any facilities in the area that you use or like to use?
MARK: Courtland Mansion here in Hagerstown has a real nice banquet hall that I like to work at. It's real close to the catholic church here in town and it makes it real nice when you're less than five minutes from the banquet hall to the church, but I do like working there.
JOHN: Let's talk a little bit about you. Why did you decide to get into the photography business in the first place, Mark?
MARK: Long time ago when I graduated high school, I got a camera as a graduation present from high school and at that point I was enrolled as an engineering major to start my first year of college, but I couldn't learn enough about photography. So I scrapped my engineering and just started studying photography, pursued my career. I have a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Photography. I started out working in photo labs so I know that end of the business also, and I would always accept the calls where they were looking for a freelance photographer to photograph various things and just kept taking those jobs and it got to the point where I didn't need my regular full time job, because I had so many photography jobs and then one January my employer did me a favor and laid me off and that was 15 years ago.
JOHN: And you haven't looked back since!
MARK: Haven't looked back since!
JOHN: That's great. Now, are you involved in any photo organizations? Anything like that, Mark?
MARK: I'm a member of Professional Photographers of America and Wedding & Portrait Photographers International which is coming up in March. I really enjoy print competitions. I was just getting my prints together for that.
JOHN: Have you gotten any awards for any of your prints?
MARK: Actually, with Maryland Professional Photographers, I've been portrait photographer of the year for the last three years. I really like competing with my portraits. Last year in WPPI, I had two prints hang there, and I've had numerous prints hang at PPA also.
JOHN: Great. That's good to have that kind of stuff under your belt. Now when you go into a photo session, what do you think is the most important goal? What are you looking for. What are you trying to achieve as a photographer?
MARK: Capture the emotion of the person that I'm photographing, making them at ease. I really hate portraits that having the client down smiling looking at the camera, that's not what my photography is about. Actually documenting time, how the person actually feels that day. Making them feel good about their selves.
JOHN: And what do you think makes your services unique and what separates you from the competition, Mark?
MARK: Just my personal service. I would say 90% of my customers are all referrals that when a person comes to see me to have my portrait done, that I've met them some other time either photographed them before I know them within the community and they've heard a good recommendation about me. With my wedding photography, meeting the bride and groom probably four or five times even before their wedding day comes around so that by the time I get to photographing their wedding, I'm not only their photographer, but I've become pretty good friends with the couple. It just makes them at ease, come their wedding day and feel like a friends taking their photographs rather than just somebody they had hired and he's there for one day and you never see him again.
JOHN: Yeah, sure. What do you think the future holds for Youngblood Studios?
MARK: Just growing my wedding business. We do about 30 weddings a year not looking to hire any other photographers or anything like that, but just perfecting my craft. There's always new albums, different things coming out. Just staying in tune with the changing trends within the photography business.
JOHN: Well I want to thank you for joining us today on VTalk Radio's Photography Spotlight, Mark.
MARK: Thanks for having me.
JOHN: Before I let you go, would you kindly give your website address and contact information one more time for our listening audience.
MARK: Ok, it's youngbloodstudios.com, area code 301-739-7250.
JOHN: We have been in the studio with Hagerstown, Maryland, photographer, Mark Youngblood, of Youngblood Studios and you've been listening to VTalk Radio's Photography Spotlight. I'm your host, John Bentley, and from engineer, Damien Allen, we'd like to say, Thanks for joining in today. Have a great afternoon.
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