Flashes Photography

By Lynne Eodice

WPPI member Teri Lowery is the owner and principle photographer of Flashes Photography, a wedding and portrait studio located in Kansas City, Missouri. Her studio has been in business for eight years, and Teri’s creative, fashion-magazine style of photography is very much in demand.

Teri’s passion for photography goes back to childhood. “I’ve loved taking pictures since I was a little girl,” she declares. Her mother was the youngest of 14 children, and the one photo of her grandmother that all of Teri’s aunts own was taken by Teri when she was in the sixth grade. “It was literally a point-and-shoot camera,” she recalls fondly. She later attended college, but never considered becoming a photographer. After she got married and had children, she was inspired to pick up a camera once again. When her daughter Brooke was two years old, several people approached Teri about having Brooke do some modeling for them.

Teri knew she could take her daughter’s own promotional pictures, and she sent these images off to a modeling agency that wanted to sign Brooke up immediately. When Teri told the agency owner that she had taken the images for Brooke’s composite card, the owner declared, “I’m sending my models to you,” thus launching Teri’s career. “I guess you could say that I started out as a model photographer,” she says. Then her doctor’s sister asked Teri to shoot her wedding. Teri was hesitant at first, but after giving it some thought, she photographed the event after all. “Then I shot a family member’s wedding and everybody loved all the pictures. I just went in and shot this wedding the way I would want mine shot.” From then on, Teri became a wedding photographer, “and never looked back.”

Going the Extra Mile

Teri says that brides approach her because of her artistic eye. “I did camera tilts before they were popular,” she comments. She describes her shooting style as “having a magazine look, but very creative.” And although she acknowledges that wedding photojournalism is popular, she says that a lack of interaction doesn’t do a bride justice. She goes the extra mile to make her subjects look their best on the day of the wedding, a trait she attributes to having photographed models. “I always take my bride’s powder and lip gloss with me so I can touch her up throughout the day.”

Teri says she also likes to capture a wedding party when they’re having fun. “I give them ideas and talk to them. I get a much better reaction from my subjects when they’re all relaxed,” she explains. Besides making brides look beautiful, she also loves shooting on location. “Kansas City ranks second in the world for fountains—only Rome has more fountains than we do.” She also loves photographing old buildings, brick walls and staircases. Teri’s mentors include Joe Buissink (“I think he’s a wonderful photographer”), Bambi Cantrell, Kevin Kubota (“His Photoshop techniques are really great”), and Gary Fong.

WPPI Involvement

“I love WPPI,” Teri asserts, adding that the organization has been very supportive of her business. She’s been a member since 2002, and says, “This is the first organization where I’ve felt right at home.” She loves the group’s energy and says she’s been inspired at WPPI Conventions like never before. “I would encourage all photographers—both new and old to the business—to not miss out on WPPI, because you’ll meet like-minded people who are excited about life and their passion in photography.”

Teri states, “I’m in love with shooting weddings because I can be as creative as I want to be and there’s no limit. My brides trust me and are excited to have me photograph their special day.” This year, she has 47 weddings scheduled, and she also does a few family portraits and seniors, as well. In addition to her wedding clientele, Teri still photographs models on a regular basis. In the future, she says she’d like to cut back a little on her wedding schedule, but thoroughly enjoys what she does. “I have such great brides. I love the enthusiasm of a wedding day, and I love the idea that I just got the most unbelievable pictures.”

Making a Wedding Day Special

Teri reports that the wedding industry is very good in her area, and her most popular wedding package is her “Emerald Package,” with a price tag of $4875. She also offers elegant coffee-table-style books to her wedding couples. “We design them here—I don’t send them out to an album company.” Albums Unlimited and Queensberry do the mounting for her. “Nine times out of ten, brides prefer ordering my coffee-table books to traditional wedding albums. This way, they don’t have an album that is just like everybody else’s.”

Teri employs two other photographers and has trained them to produce work similar to hers. “Between the two of them, they have about 27 weddings scheduled this year,” Teri says. These photographers always work with assistants, whom Teri also trains. “If a wedding dress or veil needs straightening, the assistant is there to take care of those problems,” she explains. Since weddings comprise the majority of her business, she works primarily on location. However, she sometimes utilizes a home-based studio, and she uses a backyard waterfall in her couples photography. Close to home, she also has a lake at her disposal.

Teri does several destination weddings a year. “My first was Miami Beach,” she says. The couple was from New York and hired her after seeing her website. She’s also photographed weddings at Disney World in Florida, as well as at locations in Hawaii, the Caribbean and California. Teri says she’s often hired after people view her website, which serves as a very important marketing tool for her, although she gets many clients through word of mouth. “I believe my site makes me stand out from my competitors,” she says. She posts a lot of fun, artistic images. Teri’s bridal photos have also appeared on seven covers of Perfect Wedding Guide, a national magazine.

Workflow

Teri shoots with the Nikon D200 DSLR and a variety of Nikkor lenses, including fisheye, wide-angle and portrait lenses, and a Fujifilm S2 FinePix Pro (she owns three S2 camera bodies). After she shoots the wedding, she downloads her cards and backs up her images at least three times. Her assistant fills out a checklist to make sure everything is in order, and this list goes into the client’s folder, as well as information on which card she photographed the wedding.

From there, she edits her images. “At each wedding, we shoot anywhere from 800 to 1300 images, and out of that, 200 will be edited.” She sometimes enhances photos with blurs and various Photoshop actions that she’s created. “I use a variety of techniques to make those photos really fabulous.” The images are sent to H&H and McKenna Pro labs, where they create a proof magazine for her, and then she schedules a time for the clients to come in.

“We seat them in a nicely furnished studio with large prints on the walls and a big-screen television. They watch a slide show of my favorite images of their wedding day, and by then a lot the brides are crying,” Teri says. She gives the couple their magazine, an album-planning worksheet and an order form. That day, their pictures also go online on the Flashes Photography website. “I never put their pictures online until the magazine is in their hands,” she adds. She also offers her clients 15% off for the first two weeks, and says that her orders are very good. “After one year, I allow my clients to buy their copyrights,” she adds.

Flashes Photography is clearly successful because of Teri Lowery’s business savvy and passion for photography. “I am so thankful to do something that I love with all my heart,” she says. “I can easily see myself taking pictures until I’m 75 or 80.”

To learn more about Flashes Photography, visit www.flashesphotography.com.

For eight years, Lynne was feature editor for Petersen’s PHOTOgraphic. In addition to having articles and photos published in Rangefinder, her images have appeared in an instructional guide called The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Photography, and she’s contributed stories to Canon Insight and Family Photo magazines, and www.takegreatpictures.com, a photo community website.