Welcome back, everyone. Today we have on the show, Jay from JW Collier Photography. Jay, welcome to the show. Thank you, thank you. Awesome, well, it's great to have you. I am a big fan of your work. And so it's, you know, it's really great to be able to have you here on the show. But I guess just for our guests, why don't you just briefly kind of give a little bit of a background on yourself, your work, how you got into photography and weddings and all that. Yeah, so yeah, thank you. First of all, thank you for having me. Secondly, yeah, I've been doing photography professionally for about five years now. I initially got into photography because I was making like YouTube tech reviews, like everybody else. And from there, like it just became like, what can I learn more about the camera and how can I make these videos better? And I kind of realized that I just liked the cameras more than I liked making videos. So then I started taking pictures of myself and I was doing like men's fashion Instagram, taking pictures of myself. That was pretty fun. But then friends started to ask me to take pictures of them. So then one thing kind of led to another, you know, you take pictures of somebody and they're like, oh yeah, my kids need pictures. And then, oh, family pictures. And then finally somebody who's like a wedding. So it just kind of went up and up and up from there. And I studied at the prestigious YouTube university to learn everything that I knew. I feel like I always tell people like YouTube and like raw confidence will give you the ability to shoot a wedding. Because, yeah, no, you can watch Taylor Jackson and see what a whole wedding day looks like. Every wedding is borderline the same. And as long as you know what's gonna happen next, most of the time, you're pretty good. You're pretty good. And then you just take that confidence and once you're not worrying about what shot comes next, you're in good shape. But anyway, tandish. I got started shooting weddings, shot one of my friend's sister's weddings and that was like my first wedding. And then from there just, you know, started building a business from there. So I've been, you know, doing weddings for probably the past four years and I've just grown from there. It's been good. Awesome, man. So you do a good portion of weddings, but you also do white portraits, engagements, things like that. Yeah, so I do mostly weddings, but, you know, since I kind of started out in fashion, I still do have like, you know, time to do like the creative work and stuff like that where I can. And there's definitely a blur in between on like, you know, doing fashion photography and doing weddings and kind of my photography kind of meets in the middle with that. But yeah, I really love couples. I think like if I could, I would do just like only couples photography and I think I would really enjoy that, but I'm still figuring out how to swing that. I mean, and I can definitely see the fashion and kind of, I guess, fine art also aspect of your work. I think you have a lot of that. Yeah, I guess tell us a little bit about like your style and kind of how you evolved into that. Yeah, so my style now, I look at it like documentary or journalistic wedding photography, mostly because I tell my couples every meeting, I say that I want to show you what happened and not what I made happen. That's like the most important thing to me. I like cringe every time someone's like, oh, stop, wait there, stop, wait for the picture. I'm like, no, no, please never stop, never stop. Do your thing, do your thing. Like I just hate faked things. I love authentic expressions and real emotions. And the more of that that I can get the better. And most of that's accomplished by just like being a friend with the camera at the wedding. So I try to like really build relationships with the people that I'm shooting weddings with, because to me, it's important that like everything that you see is what actually happened that day. And if I'm just hanging out, then I'm just like cousin Jay with the camera and I can just be a part of that. And you can't make those connections with people unless you like understand like who the people are and why. And that's something that you just pick up along the way, but it's yeah, super important to me. Gotcha. Now, do you typically do like a Zoom call with before they book you or how does your process work? So booking for me, typically like a Zoom call or a phone call, just spending on availability with people. And then the most important thing for me is engagement shoots. They're included in all my packages because I want them to experience shooting with me because even if that's the same as other people, still it's about the connection with me. I'm always telling people like, you shouldn't care in the end of the day, like so many photographers are good, right? But you have to hire somebody that you're willing to just hang out with for eight hours and that's more important. So like building that relationship is like the biggest thing for me. And that's why getting to that engagement session is like the most important because then I can actually face-to-face and have real conversations and get a better feel for who they are. Gotcha. That makes sense because that's what I asked about. A lot of photographers will say, oh, I always do a Zoom call or someone just do a phone call. But the goal is to just get to know the couple, build a relationship. But for you, you have that engagement included in the package. What do you, just out of curiosity, what do you do as a videographer, sometimes I'll get clients who hire just kind of at the last minute or many months after they're engaged, much closer to the wedding, do you still try to do the engagement shoot or how do you connect with couples in that way? Yeah, I actually still try and do the engagement shoot. And usually I'm just like, hey, like nothing else. Even if you already had an engagement shoot, it's more free photos. And it's more important to me that I just hang out with you than worrying about like scheduling a session. Like I actually just booked one last week where they live in Minneapolis, but the groom is from DC and they've already done an engagement shoot, but they're gonna be in town in February visiting the parents. And so I was like, yeah, let's meet up, let's do an engagement shoot then. And we can just, you know, it's more free photos, put it that way, look at it that way. And usually nobody turns that down. So it works out. And on the off chance that they just really don't want to, I'll usually, because it's baked into the package anyway, I'm a big proponent of giving people everything that they pay for. And so like, I'll let them use it for like, maybe they plan on having babies afterwards. They want an maternity session or they want to do an anniversary shoot the next year or something like that. So I just, you know, you still get to shoot regardless, but I'm gonna try my hardest to meet you before the wedding. Sure, for sure. Yeah, that's awesome. And I feel like that, you know, giving people what they paid for, giving people what they had their packages worth I really think that's, that's something that is not always present in our industry also. So I think it creates just that much more, like goodwill with couples. Yeah, yeah, definitely. For sure. But cool, man. So you're from, you're based in Bethesda, but you do work all across the DMV. Do you travel? Where do you most of your weddings take place? Most of the weddings, I feel like I tend to be in like DC or like Northern Virginia area the most, but I do travel around. I mean, if they want me to go, I'm there. I mean, I was in, you know, Georgia, New York, Jersey, some Philly stuff last year, this year, Texas, you know, I'll really go anywhere. I feel like a lot of the industry from the client side is like, unless you show that you're traveling, people don't think you're willing to travel. And I feel like all of us for the most part are like, please, buy me a plane ticket. Right. But, you know, it just comes down to like, you know, once you get that in your portfolio and people are like, oh, he's in DC, but here he is shooting in Texas. Like they start to figure out that you're willing to go and that helps. But yeah, based out of Bethesda, but I'll be anywhere. Right. So in terms of, I always like to ask people their favorite location to chat at. Would that be, you know, when you think about your, maybe a few of your favorites, local DC, DMB, or elsewhere? So favorite, anytime I can shoot in Shenandoah is always going to be my favorite. And that's not a venue in particular, but I just love, you know, like mountain elopement or like engagement sessions, stuff like that. But other than that, like actual venues, I really like Main Street Ballroom. It's in Ellicott City, Maryland. And they also, they have like another location in Baltimore. It's like another like ball something, something room or something, which I feel bad for not remembering, but their staff is amazing. And it's a really small venue, which I'm a big fan of. And it's just like super trendy and well decorated. And the lighting is perfect for someone that shoots like more moody because it's a lot of window light, you know, everything in there is like not so bright and awful in my opinion. So yeah, I just love all the natural light in there, which is really great. And then probably my favorite venue of all is the Inn at Vint Hill. And I actually, that's the one I was at last weekend or two weekends ago, it's in Warrenton, Virginia. I've done two weddings there and the owner is amazing. She's like the nicest human being on earth, super hospitable. The staff is really nice, really cordial. And they just have like such a versatile venue because you know, the ceremonies can be in multiple different places. Inside is just this big house. So obviously big house means windows and I love window light. And then there's just so much you can do there. So I really love that venue. I will shoot there anytime I get a chance. So yeah. That's awesome. Yeah, totally. Definitely, you know, Shenandoah and Warrenton and kind of West Leesburg, Gainesville kind of area. I love that area. I think, you know, as a videographer myself and just kind of as a creative, I think the venue itself is so vital to, I mean, definitely it determines how the, how the, you know, images, videos turn out. But more than that, I think it helps you push yourself or it inspires you and it helps you that much more creative to the day of the shoot or where you are shooting there. Absolutely. You know, you can, you know, at a hotel ballroom, you know, you can make it work, but it's not gonna, it's not always gonna, you know, bring out that creative side of you as much. Exactly, exactly. Yeah, but I guess so for you in terms of, in terms of, you know, your work, which has a lot of fashion and kind of artistic vibe to it. How do you continue to develop that? How do you continue to push yourself and kind of grow creatively and get that inspiration? Anything that you specifically do for that? So two things that have really improved and changed the way that I shoot. One is shooting film. That's changed everything about the way that I shot previously. And it's funny, like I always tell my couples that pick me for that reason, I'm like, scroll down. And when you scroll through my pictures, you can see where I started shooting film because the look is totally different. Everything I do like now is like emulating what film does. And even a lot of the way that I shoot is because film made me so much more patient. So that changed a lot of it. And then the second thing is street photography. I really don't post like the street photography that I do, but I go on walks a lot in the afternoon and just take pictures. And I think that street photography is the most similar to wedding photography of like any of the other parts of photography, just because like everything about street photography is just like candid. As it happens, you don't have control over it. When it's happened, you have to keep your head on a swivel at all times. And that's really how I look at wedding photography. I shoot a lot from the hip. Like I always have like that one uncle at the wedding who notices how sneaky I am trying to get pictures of people, but it's just because like, when you do this, people automatically are like, he's taking a picture of me. And so like the more practice in street photography that I've done, it's taught me how to catch those like pictures where people don't know that I'm taking pictures and I can get stuff like stealthily, you know? Yeah, yeah, I love it. Training yourself on the street so you can do it at weddings, I love it. Cool, man. Well, I know it's been, you know, it's been getting towards the end of our time here, but I guess to just to end, I always like to ask if, you know, in terms of maybe a couple who's looking to plan a wedding, looking to book a photographer, looking, you know, maybe looking at your work, we've looked at others also, any kind of word of advice or wisdom that you could share with a couple in that position looking for photography? Yeah, so I'll do two things. One, I already said before, no matter who you hire, and for all of your vendors, hire people, especially like photographer, videographer, planner, hire people that you wanna spend however long your wedding day is because you're gonna probably spend more time with them than you are your own family. So that personal connection is like paramount and it will make all the difference in your wedding day. And then secondly, one, ask all the questions that you can think of. There's like no amount of questions that are too many. And the more questions that you get answered, the more unknowns you can cross off your list, but definitely like come prepared and have questions, drill these people because we're all professionals. We all have, we all have like, you know, we should have the prepared answers to give you a response. So the more that you can kind of narrow down who you want by process of elimination, just be transparent with the people, let people know like what your deciding factors are, when you're choosing a photographer, videographer, and just make it clear to them because a lot of people are willing to, probably more willing to, you know, meet you in the middle on stuff that, you know, maybe you weren't aware of, but it's becoming kind of unfortunate piece of our industry that like ghosting is real. It's just like hinged dating apps on Bumble and Twitter and Tinder and stuff. Like don't ghost your vendors, that public service announcement, don't ghost your vendors. You know, if you want to break up with us, just tell us, you know, but yeah, that's all that, all that to say, yeah, just be honest with us. Yeah, for sure. And I think it comes down to what you said, you know, you work with someone you like and, you know, work with someone you really, you know, aren't going to enjoy with. And I think, I think, you know, it's like definitely true for all the vendors, but especially photo video, because like you said, you're with them eight hours in the day, you're with them more than your family. Just pretty much, just as much as your spouse, I guess between you and this photographer. So yeah, great, you know, great word of advice. Jay, I guess, yeah, just to wrap up, where can people find you? What's the best place to kind of check how you work and things like that? Yeah, so you can find me posting semi regularly on Instagram at j.w, j.w.collyer, C-O-L-L-L-I-E-R. My website, j.w.collyerphotography. And yeah, that's pretty much it. I'm on WeddingWire too. I don't pay for that because you shouldn't. Public service announcement. But yeah, you can find me on WeddingWire too, but I don't care about that. Just, you know, whatever. Find me on Instagram, but the easiest way, if you have questions, just reach out to me. I'm a very personable human being. Call me, text me, all my stuff is on all of my socials and my website. So just reach out and I don't bite. Yeah, good stuff, man. Well, you know, it was great having you on the show. Again, love your work, big fan. And keep doing what you're doing. Keep crushing it with, I guess, next year. How many weddings you got booked for next year? Next year, I think right now I'm sitting at like 11 or 12. I'm trying to get my numbers lower, you know, so I can not die. But also, you know, trying to book the right amount. Yeah, well, maybe we'll do wedding together sometime. Yeah, exactly. That'd be fun. That'd be fun, definitely. Cool, man. Well, I appreciate you being on the show once again. And for everyone, I will link Jay's info below so you can check out his work too. Thanks for having me. We'll wrap it up there. Thank you, Jay. All right, thanks, man.