Today's Guest: Randy McDougal of Pro Images Wedding Photography in Murfreesboro, Tennessee
Today's Host: John Bentley
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Randy McDougal Expert PageANNOUNCER: Welcome to the VTalk Radio Bridal Spotlight brought to you by www.morephotos.com helping professional photographers with all their internet needs. Now here's your host, John Bentley.
JOHN: Welcome to More Photos Radio. This it the Photography Spotlight and on today's program we have Murfreesburo, Tennessee, Photographer, Randy McDougal, of Pro Images Wedding Photography joining us today. Welcome to the program, Randy.
RANDY: Thank you.
JOHN: Well it's a pleasure to have you here. I've been checking out your photography business online, and I like what I see, Randy. Tell our listening audience a little bit about Pro Images Wedding Photography.
RANDY: Well I've been a wedding photographer for about 25 plus years, maybe a little longer than that. I've photographed; I've done lab work; just about anything you can do in photography, and I just seem to have a knack for capturing people. I try to see, you know, try to pose them too much, but for weddings especially let things happen and then see things past what I actually photograph and then create what I call works of art, and that's why I call, you know, photography is a form of art especially now days.
JOHN: Well I've seen some of your photographs on your website, and I will attest that you definitely have an artist view with your picture taking. Now your main focus is weddings so let's talk a little bit about wedding photography. What do you find to be the most difficult hurdle for you as a wedding photographer going into an event?
RANDY: I don't know. I've done this for so long that the most strenuous thing is to be late, but I've never been late except for George Jones one time had an accident in Franklin on a bridge and caused me to be an hour late, and I called the client, and we weren't late for the ceremony...we just did some preliminary shots, but I made it about 45 minutes later, but the hardest thing is just getting people to relax. I try to tell them to enjoy it and don't worry about the photographs. We have a preliminary meeting the week or two before the wedding, and we'll sit down and we sort of have an outline of what we're going to do. It's not written in stone, of course, you've got to be able to flow. Things do change and happen at weddings, but I try to reassure them, you know, like a boy scout. You're prepared to handle anything, but mostly it's just people trying to relax, and I'm pretty good. I laugh with them and joke and just try to not make it so scary for them and not to be so scared when they're being photographed and relaxed. And 95% of the time that usually works.
JOHN: Now when you do a wedding, do you take another photographer with you?
RANDY: Some times I do now. Some of the weddings we've done are a little small so we don't. We try to be as cost efficient as possible. I usually bring an assistant with me. I'm very particular sometimes about poses and stuff when we're doing the formals. I notice detail. Over the years, I've just noticed a lot of details of things in the background, the dress...the way it flows, the lighting. I'll change things like that and always watching your time, because weddings you don't have all day like you do a commercial shoot where you can redo something and then look at it and go back and redo it again. It has to be good so there's a lot of pressure there, but usually I work better under pressure to be honest with you. I focus so hard at that point, and I just go in the mode where I have nothing on my mind. I'm just looking at my people, my subjects, that I'm photographing, keeping in mind my time lines and stuff cause you have to do it with quality and you have to do it in a timely fashion. Those two things I've just become so used to it. I hear some people say they're frightened, because they're doing a wedding. I can remember my first wedding. I was nervous and scared to death. I was actually shaking, but now, don't get me wrong, I'm not so confident that I'm arrogant about, because I go through checks. I go through double checks. I check my cameras. I check everything, because I don't like equipment surprises. We've had some camera failures, but we've always caught it, because we've been prepared. I want to focus on the art of the photography not the equipment. So I really check myself out and my equipment and everything before we go do a shoot and make sure everything is working and once in a while you do get thrown a curve, but generally the time lines and trying to get people, because people want to look natural looking, and I hate that artificial looking forced pose. One client may be able to do a pose or something and another client may not be able to. I just depends. It's personalities. You're dealing with all your subjects.
JOHN: Now you mentioned equipment. Obviously you have back up equipment. What is your primary camera?
RANDY: I'm using Nikons. I've got a D200, a couple of those, and I'm fixin to purchase in the spring the D700 which you can do up to ISO 6400 with little noise levels affects and the technology I've seen it when I first got into digital. You could tell digital just by a glance, but now it's so hard to. The quality in resolution of the lenses and the cameras and everything, it's just gotten so much better. It's been a true industry change, and I've seen where we used to use the old CPS films from Kodak, and you had to ship them to the lab like in the evening because you'd have color shifts if the film got too hot and a good thing with digital that I like, also being a lab man and having all that experience is I can check my stuff as I go to make sure when I'm photographing something we're capturing what we want, and of course, the first thing we do is back everything up. So I believe it's actually a safer medium than film. I've got some friends that are professional photographers that just don't think digital is there, but I disagree with them, and I think it's also safer than film.
JOHN: Sure. Now, Randy, we have to take a break here, but before we do that why don't you give your website and contact information.
RANDY: Yes. It's www.proimagesphotography.net. My name is Randy McDougal. The phone number is (615) 890-2803 and you can email me from my website.
JOHN: We're going to take a break. We're speaking to Murfreesburo, Tennessee, Photographer, Randy McDougal, of Pro Images Wedding Photography, and you're listening to the More Photos Radio Photography Spotlight, we'll be right back.
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ANNOUNCER: We now return you to More Photos Radio Photography Spotlight with your host, John Bentley.
JOHN: Welcome back to More Photos Radio Photography Spotlight. We are in the studio today with Randy McDougal. He is a Murfreesburo, Tennessee, photographer, and his photography business is called Pro Images Wedding Photography. Welcome back to the program, Randy.
RANDY:Thank you.
JOHN: We've been talking about wedding industry, because that's a big part of your business. You also do children's portraits don't you?
RANDY: Yes I do.
JOHN: And a very fine job you do of that. Tell us about your aristics being a children photographer.
RANDY: Well now days you have to be more creative to get the clientele and that's what I try to do, but I also enjoy photographing children. Especially the babies and stuff, because they are like little balls of clay. Those are fun to do. It's a lot of work usually we do a session in an hour and a half, but creating, again, the personalities. Little children have personalities and sometimes you can't get the shot you want, and you have to reschedule, but I enjoy photographing them different ways. Some are more formal. Some are just letting them go and do their thing outside and follow them and photograph them, and then talking to your clients here in Murfreesburo. Talk to them about what they're looking for, black and whites, they want an old look, do they want the photo journalist type, or they want more of a portrait, and that's what I try to do, and then I try to be more creative in that particular area that they're wanting and then we'll go back and create that. We'll soften some of the images a little bit, do some creative stuff with them, and blur out the background just a little bit not to over do it, you know, when I first got into it, I had a tenancy to over do that a little bit, but experience is a major advantage for someone, but I just love the different types of children that you see and you can be creative. When somebody says oh this is a nice portrait, oh you caught him and it's just a good feeling and there's a little story...this is a true story...as a matter of fact, we did photograph a family about two weeks ago in a little places called Kennasburg and it's a recreation of a small little town, it's got a creek, and it's got all kinds of things, and I had to photograph the family and her husband had a brain tumor and I did her sister's wedding, and she said she tracked me down and loved the way I looked at things as far as an eye. She said I had a wonderful eye, and so we talked for about 30 minutes and she wanted a certain feel, she wanted black and whites and black and whites with color in some different things, but not too posey looking, and so we went out there and I said, you know, if you're not happy with these, we'll put them online to sell, we'll redo them at no charge. So we got in there and I think it was three or four days later when I posted them up, two days after that she sent me an email and it almost made me cry because it was so...she said you caught everything and then she called me and told me that I caught everything that she wanted. I was way past her expectations, because she had something in mind and these mean so much to her, because her husband may not be here much longer, and I captured a family of four and we did all the things and she said, I hit the nail on the head, I hit the mark, and she didn't think any photographer here was able to do that, and she tracked me down to get me and she's so happy she found me. So things like that, you know, it's not medicine or anything, but it makes you feel good about yourself and you're heart warmed.
JOHN: Yeah, sure. Let's talk about the cities and communities in the area so maybe some people around the Tennessee area are looking for a photographer with a really professional experience, artistic look on things can find you. Tell me some of the cities and communities that you service.
RANDY: Ok. Of course we're in Murfreesburo, Tennessee, Nashville, Tennessee, Country Music USA as they say, also there's smaller towns Marna, Tennessee, it's right next to us. There's Franklin, Tennessee, where a lot of country music stars live. There's Shelbyville, Tennessee, where they have the walking horse celebrations every year. And there's a lot of small sub communities and so forth, and I actually have done a couple weddings in Centerville, Tennessee, this year from referrals. That's how I get my work mostly from referrals, but the whole state of Tennessee I cover. I've actually done weddings in Knoxville, Tennessee, even as far away as Memphis, Tennesse, and towns north and south of Nashville, even some out of state. But I love serving this area. I try to keep my practice down, of course, it's very competitive now days and you have to, but those are basically some of the communities that I serve.
JOHN: Now you also do some commercial photography?
RANDY: Yes. It's been awhile since I've done some, but I actually do in my hay day, I actually used to do a lot, and we've done some for some local like General Mills and so forth here in town, and again it goes to seeing things and you try to create art. Of course they've got very specific things they want to show for websites or for brochures. I've done that for clientele for brochures and so forth, and we'll go in there and we'll photograph the project...a lot of times it's on location and the client will have something in mind and it's usually an all day shoot, but it's just different companies that we'll service that need some product photography or they need some location shots for a brochure, you know, we fulfill those needs, and we do also some that need if for their website to promote their business.
JOHN: Well, Randy, we've have to wrap things up here. I would also like to ask you some of the events you cover before I let you go.
RANDY: Ok. Well I do company events where they have like parties and so forth, Christmas parties, gala events that the big corporations will have. Go in there and photograph their couples and do candids of the activities that are going on at the party or event. I've done them in Opryland Hotel. I do dances for high schools if they don't have a contract photographer and that's pretty much it as far as like events and so forth.
JOHN: Randy I really appreciate you joining us on the More Photos Radio Photography Spotlight today.
RANDY: Thank you for having me.
JOHN: Now I have to tell you folks if you want to find an artist who uses a camera, this is a great guy to look up and check out his photography, because he really has something going on here. Also I know Randy used to run his own lab so Randy's very up on all aspects of photography. Once again, Randy, I appreciate you joining us today on More Photos Radio Photography Spotlight.
RANDY: Well thanks for having me it's been a pleasure.
JOHN: This is John Bentley signing off. We've been speaking with Murfreesburo, Tennessee, Photographer, Randy McDougal, of Pro Images Wedding Photography, and you're listening to the More Photos Radio Photography Spotlight. Everyone have a great afternoon.
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