Steve F.
I'm a family guy, the most important thing to me is my wife & four boys. After that, I am definitely a photographer. It's not something I do on weekends or "after work". It is my work. I provide for my family of six entirely with photography. Clients often remark on how hard I work, but I just ridiculously love what I do, and I'm scared to death of making boring photos.
COMMUNICATION is the most important ingredient to great photography, which is why I will ask you to send me example photos that illustrate what you have in your mind for our project together.
Good photography is properly exposed, lit & composed. Really good photography is creative & often takes hard work or risk. GREAT photography is all that and full of real emotion. Real smiles. Real intimacy. Real love. Most folks aren't comfortable showing emotions in front of a lens. The best photographers know how to draw those feelings out, to get people to relax, to be themselves.
I don't wear trendy hats or Elton John glasses. But I do bring professional lights & modifiers to get the editorial "magazine quality" you see throughout my portfolio. I've spent year$$$ shrinking my lights down so they're portable yet powerful.
Literally the smartest thing I have ever done was to propose to my wife on bended knee atop the great Mayan pyramid in Chichen Itza. My life has had great meaning & purpose ever since.
I've traveled around the globe three times, most recently with my 4 boys and wife in the summer of 2019. I've visited 26 countries, speak very bad Chinese & even worse Spanish, am an adventurous eater, have rock climbed 5.10c, have floated the Grand Canyon several times, hitch-hiked from Colorado to Alaska & back, worked in a salmon cannery, worked in the oil fields as a roustabout then as a "ginzledick" (when the whole time I thought I was a "worm" 0_o), built a bicycle from parts then rode it from Colorado to Minnesota to work as a counselor at a camp for deaf kids, supervised building trails in RMNP with a crew of deaf high school kids, was reckless enough to think I could move 2,000 miles to start an Internet email company (& did). I have a high tolerance for risk, have earned been taxed given away spent & lost on Wall Street a great deal of money. I once invited John Stossel to keynote a national conference for people who stutter, he accepted & I was honored to introduce him to 600 of my people. I am a 250 hour complex-certified VFR pilot, was SCUBA certified by a hard-drinking Brit in Thailand, rode my bicycle alone on the 3rd-World-Scary no-guardrail dynamite-blasting under-construction far-from-Beijing-extortionist-Communist-Party-Member thousand-foot-drop dirt road in Tiger Leaping Gorge, hopped freight trains from Wyoming to Chicago & read Atlas Shrugged to pass the time, have attended CATO University five times (slow learner 0_0), slept in dirt floor huts throughout Asia, downed coconut whiskey with Mr Beedee on a Sri Lankan train, sky dived, bungee jumped, busted lots of bones snowboarding & mountain biking & ultimate Frisbee-ing (& once i just fell out of a house).
I'm annoyingly well informed on history & liberty, but I never talk politics on the job, unless you want to & even then probably not. My biggest hero is my wife Christina. I would do anything to protect her & my children. Other heroes include Locke, Montesquieu, Bastiat, Mason, Jefferson, Douglas, Sowell, Friedman, fifty other champions of liberty, & the Chinese dude stopping tanks while holding his groceries.
I thank God every day for the countless blessings He has given me, including my family, my health, my freedoms, the many friends & family who've helped me along the way, His forgiveness, and my ability to support my little platoon making beautiful photos documenting your life.
Featured as one of the Best photographers in Las Vegas
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Canon EOS 5D Mark III
Canon 24-105mm f/4 | Canon 70-200mm f/2.8 | Sigma 14-24mm f/2.8
More about Steve F....
What do you love about your job?
The freedom. The collaboration. The constant challenge and requirement to always learn, the impossibility of mastery.
In some fields some people can advance shockingly fast and far on a silver tongue and great smile with not a lot of "there" there. But no matter how silver tongued, at the end of the day there is the photographer's portfolio and there it is. We can produce the quality of work you're looking for, or we cannot. Our portfolio is the simple truth.
What types of shoots have you done and how did you make them special?
COUPLES - I've photographed hundreds and hundreds of elopements and couple's shoots all over Vegas. I make 'em all special 'cuz I bring professional lighting so you look mahvelous and I know how to get you all smoochie and giggly and relaxed.
FOOD - I love chefs, and entrepreneurs. I have so much respect for the unique and wide-ranging skills they have. They are craftsmen & women, they are artists, they are risk takers, they are sober hard-headed business managers, they are personnel experts, they are entrepreneurs, they are preservers or culture as they push that same culture to new places. I love chefs. I've photographed thousands of plates of food at hundreds of restaurants for Amazon and Uber and Beat Bobby Flay etc. I make it special 'cuz I bring amazing compact professional lighting, and often I stream the photos live to an iPad so my clients see what's going on with big photos and we collaborate.
EVENTS & PARTIES - This is one of my main sources of income. I've photographed every size trade show and convention and expo and party imaginable. I make it special because I love the party, I draw energy from energized people and so I zoom around like a 6 year old, and we all have fun together. I also bring tiny lights I put up discreetly that give everything that professional *pop* and *zing*.
HEADSHOTS - This is another major source of my income. I've studied with the best, Mr Headshot himself Peter Hurley in his NYC studio, where he charges his headshot clients $3,000, so whatever I charge you is a freaking steal. I always use superb lighting. I can create any style you want. And I know all the weird tricks headshot photographers use to get you to your best shape, face and expression. "Turtle" anyone? "Subway sandwich". "Squinch". I'll explain when you get here.
TRADESHOW TRAFFIC GENERATION - I am a nationally recognized expert at generating huge lines to your tradeshow and expo booth. I've figured out the 5 secrets to producing a first-rate headshot lounge with real-time social sharing at your expo and tradeshow booth, to fill your booth with leads and prospects all day long. There is no better way to attract crazy crowds of captive visitors to your booth than with a superbly produced headshot lounge from an expert.
PRODUCT - Need your products to look sexy and amazing for Amazon or eBay. Right here. I've invested in the training and gear so that I get 'er done.
EDITORIAL / PORTRAITS / LIFESTYLE PORTRAITS - I LOVE shooting people in their environment - their home, their business, in and around the town they call home. My work has appeared on many magazine covers and books. Again with the lights and the assistant and the energy we smash it. Let's do this.
Awards, honors, and recognitions received
I've never submitted any of my work for any contests because I'm shy or something. I have received several unsolicited awards, like Top 23 Wedding Photographers in Las Vegas by Expertise https://www.expertise.com/nv/las-vegas/wedding-photography and Couple's Choice Award from Wedding Wire every year I was doing weddings and tons of 5-star reviews from former clients. But I'm shy, and I like my portfolio to speak for me.
A fun fact about this photographer
I seem to be living life backwards. Most of my bucket list stuff is already checked off as I've been chasing adrenaline and excitement and freedom (mixed with responsibility) since I went off to college in Boulder a long time ago. I recently saw one of those memes going around Twitter listing 30 bucket list things you wanna do before you die and the only one I hadn't done or experienced is get a tattoo. Fly a plane. Scuba dive in Vietnam & Thailand. Hitchhike up the AlCan to work in a cannery. Ride my bicycle across America. Rock climb 5.10c. Build and sleep in an igloo. Circle the globe 3 times. Ride my bicycle across China for 10 weeks. Eat weird food like brains. Earn lots of money. Lose lots of money. Visit 49 states. Travel to 26 countries and more cities than I can remember. That kind of stuff. The best thing I've ever done, though, was to get married and have four boys, who are the joy and fascination of my life.
Another fun fact, back when I was a computer geek I studied really hard for a test to certify my knowledge of the email system formerly known as Novell Groupwise (big in the 90s) and I really hoped I'd passed. The guy who wrote the test, and later hired me, told me that I had gotten the highest score in the nation. Which is one reason he hired me. It pays to study!
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