Your wedding day is actually all about you and I ask a lot of questions to get to know you which helps when I’m taking photos, particularly your couples portraits. So it’s only fair that you know a little about me too so this time, ‘It’s all about me’.
Me and my family
I live just outside of Malton with my husband Rich and our 4 children. I say children but they are all young adults now hence the reason for a new and updated about me page.
My 2 eldest girls Joella and Georgina are now working and finding their way in the world. Both have plans to join the NHS in the future as a paramedic and a nurse but I’ve encouraged them to work for a year or two first, save a bit of money and find out who they are and who they want to be.
My son, Emerson, has special needs. At the age of nearly 3 he was diagnosed with classic autism, sensory processing disorder and learning disabilities. He is now 18 and has been non-verbal from the age of 15 months, he still makes plenty of noise though. Rich is his full time carer, a challenging role it would have to be said but he’s an expert at his job. My youngest, Ellsa, is half way through her A-Levels and has plans to study medicine.
Rich and I have been married for 12 years and together for 26. We met when we both worked at Yorkshire Trading Company, a bit of a whirlwind really in that we met one day and moved in together just 2 weeks later. Amazingly there hasn’t been a day in those 26 years that we haven’t spoken to each other. He’s the other half of me, my best friend and my biggest supporter.
Rich and I had been supported by the benefits system for a long time, we had the kids very close together (4 in 4 years) and with Emerson needing extra help there came a point where Rich had to give up work to help me care for him. We are so very lucky to live in a country that allows us to do that but also it’s such a struggle making ends meet and sometimes quite soul destroying.
There is a huge amount of negativity comes from people when you live on benefits so my goal was to work hard and hopefully one day make us both self sufficient and in a position to give a bit back.
The Olden days
I left school at 15 with appalling Gcse results and worked on a dairy farm and sheep farm. Up at 6 every morning 6 days a week to milk cows and then farm labour through the day. I attended Agricultural College for 2 years as I’d wanted to be a farmer since being little, I still have my Britains Farm toys in a box upstairs.
I’ve worked at a riding school, a butchers, I’ve been a bingo caller, a hotel cleaner, a shop assistant, worked in a scampi factory (only lasted 2 days) and a pub manager. I’ve always had a dog in my life and we share our home with Ziggy who’s a Lurcher and Oscar our phenomenally handsome Labrador.
My children have inherited my love of animals and between them they have 2 guineapigs, a bearded dragon, a Leopard Gecko and tropical fish.
Likes and dislikes
I love beefy Monster Munch and Scampi and Lemon Nik Naks and I don’t like hairy fruit, namely gooseberries and peaches. I love sunrises and shoes and flowers, I don’t like my windows being dirty or bent bristles on a toothbrush. I love the couples who trusted me to photograph their wedding day and many have become friends. I like being at home and am happy in my own company but love that our kids still gather around us for a chat about their day. I love photographing people and their personalities, I love photographing dogs, horses and landscapes. I am passionate about photographing weddings.
My other job
I run a studio in Kirkbymoorside called The Dugout. It is underneath the Memorial Hall and is my own space that I love. Here I do family photoshoots, dogs, Christmas shoots, maternity and boudoir. The studio journey has been a tough one for me I’m not going to lie. Some photographers soak up the lighting techniques, but they have taken me a long time to learn and you will often find me in there practicing with various objects (and Rich) with an aim to perfecting the craft. This is where my stubbornness to give up comes into it’s own. I will only move on from something and decide it’s not for me once I’ve learnt how to do it.
People booking studio shoots used to fill me with. It is now something I absolutely love. Studio photography sessions finish with me designing albums and printing photographs for my clients to display in their homes. How humbling is that !
My passion for weddings
So, onto the main part of my life, my wedding photography and how it came about. I don’t have a cute little story about my great uncle giving me a camera for my 4th birthday and my vocation was set. It actually didn’t occur to me to become a wedding photographer until I became one.
One of my daughters was having physio at the time and the physiotherapist mentioned that her husband was a wedding videographer. He had seen some of the photos I’d put on facebook and did I fancy having a go. We did 3 weddings together and he told me I wasn’t very good and should stick to photographs but not wedding photographs. Luckily I’m quite stubborn and negativity fuels my fire so when an advert popped up on facebook asking for a cheap photographer I replied and got the job.
My first wedding was on the 12th March 2016 and Angela Waites Photography was born. I photographed 11 weddings that year, learnt a lot, loved every minute and finally realised, at the age of 42 that this was what I wanted to be. This was probably when the hard work really started. You can’t mess around with peoples weddings day, it’s a one time thing. I knew I had huge gaps in my knowledge and also my equipment wasn’t to the standard it needed to be. So began my education both in honing my photography skills and learning how to run a business.
My education has still been my biggest investment to date, good education isn’t cheap and cheap education isn’t good but I am asking couples to trust me with one of the most important days of their lives, you can’t fake it till you make it.
Days off
I have to make myself have spare time and do struggle with my work/life balance. I’m an “all in” kind of girl and always have been. I’m very dedicated to whatever it is I’m doing and my business is just the same. I do work every day be that editing photos, working on my website and social media posts or doing admin. Rich has learned this over the years and organises little trips away for us both occasionally. Granted I take my camera and they end up being busman’s holidays but he enjoys it as much as I do and we natter away while I take landscape photos.
I got into landscape photography about 5 years ago, and I’m not a professional landscape photographer by any stretch. It couldn’t be a career choice for me but I absolutely love doing it and that’s what matters. I love books, I read every day. We’ve recently moved house and at last count I had over 900 that had to be packed into boxes. I have got a Kindle now though so hopefully that backbreaking number won’t grow.
I write poems and have kept a diary every day for over 20 years. I’m not very technical, hence the need for so many flash courses, and all my bookings are done with a diary, a wall planner and a pencil. I’m possibly an old fashioned girl at heart, I value things like politeness, kindness, gratitude and love.
The business
Building a business isn’t easy but if you love what you do that takes a lot of the pain away. The statistics show that most wedding photographers don’t make it past 3 years and I can understand that. A professional camera costs around £3000 for the body alone. You need 3 of these and that’s before you start buying lenses, flashes, cards, batteries, tripods and a great big bag to carry it all in.
We took a big gamble back then, borrowing money we couldn’t afford, to buy my kit and then as the bookings kept coming in I upgraded when I could. I invested in a business course, quite a lot of flash courses and also some landscape photography courses when I realised that my wedding photos incorporate landscapes. Also the places that couples have decided to hold their wedding day. At the time of typing I have now photographed 400 weddings and have loved every single one.
How I work
So what type of photographer am I ? You will here words like photojournalistic, documentary, editorial, plandid (even spellcheck doesn’t like that one, it’s meant to mean planned candid) when searching for your photographer.
Predominantly I’m relaxed, I photograph a wedding day as it happens. However I stand by my thoughts that staged family photos and a big group photo are as important now as they were in the “olden days”. I take my couple off for 20 minutes for a couples portrait session which also allows them some precious time together before they are swallowed up by their guests.
I have held babies, wiped noses, cleaned up sick, sewn up dresses, fastened buttonholes, wiped tears, reapplied lipstick, mended a broken heel and pulled pants out of bottoms, who needs a wedgie when they’re walking up the aisle. I hope I’m a calming influence on what can be an overwhelming day, I truly love what I do and I hope that shows in my work.
Finishing up
Well if you made it to the end of this blog, which kid of turned into a novel, that’s hopefully given you a small insight into who I am, how I work and how much I love what I do. I am always genuinely thrilled when someone books me to photograph their wedding day and the buzz and excitement as I drive to a wedding is still with me and I hope it always will be.
Thanks for reading
Ange x
