There is one mistake that refuses to leave my mind, despite it maybe not being the most disruptive to my work, it sits in my consciousness because it was perhaps the first big oopsie I had done when working for someone else.
At the time, I had just begun doing paid event photography work for some clients. Nothing too much or too high paying, just some deeds for family friends for a few bucks here and there. Gig by gig, I began to just think higher and higher of myself. I was having really difficulty delivering work that clients would really like, and though I spent a lot of time touching up my work, capturing itself at events was never a challenge. However, at the peak of the moment I sat where my ass needed to be thrown off and humbled, just that happened.
My friend’s father owns an event videography and photography company. I had known this for a while and had always been interested in maybe joining him on a gig. So I asked my friend if he could ask his dad if there were any events coming up that I could maybe slide into.
“I think a photographer dropped from one of the events he’s doing, a wedding or something.” is what he came back to me with. Perfect, I thought to myself, so I emailed his father and offered my hand in ‘sub-contractory’ to him (along with supplemental photos of the 1 wedding I had shot beforehand).
The wedding went not as planned, I had jumped the gun in what I believed my capability was. It was an absolutely massive party, bigger than any wedding I had been to in my life, and probably at least 10 fold the size of the only one I had previously worked on. Though that wasn’t too big of an issue, it was actually plus in some ways. The biggest nerve racking part for me was the other photographers and videographers there. They were way out of my league in skill and equipment. They swooped in and out of areas capturing left and right with the swiftness of a bird and the speed and stealth of a cat. I stumbled around the crowded hot spots and sheepishly asked to take photos of people. Though my work wasn’t as clean and stellar as the other professionals there, I still managed to get some stuff. But the oopsie came towards the end of the night. There was a big surprise choreographed dance that the bride and the groom were going to perform at in the middle of the giant dance area that the event capturers were notified of before hand. As we gathered to our discussed between each other spots, the dance began, and quickly a large crowd formed around the 2 of them.
My camera battery died 15 seconds later. I panicked and looked around at the dense wall of bodies that separate me and an extra battery in my camera bag. I forced my way through the crowd, definitely bothering many of them (and being very unlike both a cat and a bird). I came back and the climax of the evening had finished, my sd card empty of the entire moment.
I told the other photographers and they were ensuring me that it didn’t matter, they got great shots and coverage of it. I told my friends father after the event and he told me “it’s fine”. But he never reached out to me again unsurprisingly. My ass got extremely humbled that evening, and it completely changed my routine for event work. Not only do I study hard for what the event may look like, but I triple prepare not only for the full event, but before each moment that may come up too.