By: Larry Dennis II (Fall 2019 Captured by Kate Photography Intern)
Today November 11th, 2019 around 8:00 am is the coldest day in Charleston South Carolina, but like most Wednesdays, I do my intern/ assistant work for Kate. Like always Brody, the family dog is at the front door, greeting you with a friendly bark and toy in his mouth. And the newest family member, little baby Sadie is here to greet me as well at the start of our interview.
I took photography with Evan Sheppard and fell in love with the final class project and continued to shoot from that point on every day. He would bump into me around campus and asked if I would be interested in assisting a professional photographer. I jumped at the chance to get hands-on time and see what an actual photographer does and not just read about in books or online videos.
I’ve been assisting Kate since middle August of this year. My first job with her was published as the cover photo in Charleston Magazine. The story was a center article for the October issue. In this interview, my goals are to find out the roots of her beginning career path and what tips I could incorporate into my own career as a photographer.
Kate Thornton has been a photographer for over 20 plus years in the Charleston area, but to understand her business and career path, you must start from the beginning. In her hometown of Richmond, Virginia, Kate had childhood ambitions of becoming a fashion designer. In 1996 she moved to Charleston South Carolina to attend the College of Charleston, she hadn’t locked down a career path just yet, but knew she was a very visual person. During her junior year of college, a friend introduced her to the official Grateful Dead photographer that toured with the band. He showed her that you don’t have to be tied down to an office; you could actually do something you’re passionate about as a job. She knew she wanted to be in action and took all the photojournalist classes in college and graduated with the Class of 2000 with a Mass Communication Degree.
Being a beach girl and joining the sailing team at the College of Charleston she met two friends that were from St. Thomas, Virgin Island, and this friendship would prove to be vital in the next phase of her career. After graduation, Kate was unable to land a photography job here in Charleston, but if you know Kate will not stop her. Kate then moved to St. Thomas Island for a year and got a job as a wedding videographer. She built up her portfolio with shooting three weddings a day at all the beautiful, exotic, and breath-taking locations the island had to offer. But she also continued to shoot stills on her off time because that’s where her true passion was. During this time in 2000, the tabloid magazine, The Globe, used her photos for an article, and this was her first actual paid job with many more to come.
She moved back to her hometown to figure out her next step and choose to become a photojournalist for a local newspaper called the Progress Index in Petersburg, Virginia, as a part-timer. While there, she worked her way up the ranks and became full-time. But being a true beach girl, she missed Charleston and in 2003, moved back to South Carolina.
Her first job in Charleston was in Mt. Pleasant for Portrait Innovations, and this is where she would cut her teeth in the business side of photography. She learned about sales, shooting more for the clients, and different tips and tricks to posing families and large groups that she continues to use to this day. After eight months into this job, Kate had learned as much as she needed and continued to her next phase in her career.
While in the Virgin Islands she had already thought of the name of her soon to be business and grabbed the domain name. So, in 2004, Captured by Kate was officially ready for business. Currently she has Captured by Kate and Kate Thornton Photography, one dedicated to weddings and families the other towards editorial and candid moments with an updated blog and social media accounts to keep her clients updated on her current and upcoming projects in the future.
Her typical day to day task is answering e-mails at 6:00 am in the morning, working on marketing with sending out Mailchimp, and updating her blogs. Editing is next, and since it comes easy to her, she will listen to podcasts or music to set the vibe of the task. Towards the end of the day, she will work on social media and submitting photographs to magazines.
When it comes to business and greatest failures, she wishes she had followed more of her intuition. Like learning social media early on with Instagram and Facebook or buying a really good lens like the canon 70-200 early on the lens, she really wanted.
Her biggest success is being published in the National Geographic Magazine, The New York Times, and having been sent around the world to capture photos. In her job field education-wise, she gained the fundamentals in school and honed her skills in the real world. Some great advice is she feels you should go to school for business and not for photography. With the business degree, you would learn about the ins and outs, what to charge, insurance, and just things creatives don’t think about.
She’s a member of a lot of groups local and worldwide. As a member of the Charleston Junior League, she helps mentor young women in the community and gives back, American Society of Media Photographers, and The National Press Photographers Association. Most of these groups have fees and dues and monthly meetings to keep members updated. These groups help protect photographers’ rights in congress, lawsuits, and contracts that creatives would never think of. These groups are good to network and meet your peers and learn pricing structure, photos techniques, and gain bonds that could benefit each other.
When it’s time to meet new clients, she takes them out to lunch or coffee to discuss their needs and wants from the upcoming project and to get the vibe for the event. Once the event is in place, she has all of her prices and structure online on her website. She keeps in contact with clients checking in until the wedding date approaches.
The skillset that makes her stand out from others and is very reliable and on top of things. She’s been a photographer for over 20 years and plans weddings in advance of a year. All of these tasks take a person to be on top of it all and have constant great reviews and working relationships.
She sees the future of photography going more into video because people want the storytelling aspect of the event, not just photos and more mirrorless cameras and smaller lens. She loves the flexibility of her current career and set her own hours. As a mom, her family time is important to her. But the downside is booking weddings and events a year in the advice she misses some of her family and friends' weddings and big life events.
Over the years she has had different addresses for her business. Having shared workspaces, office buildings in downtown Charleston, in the beginning, were a great idea. It was great to have these locations in the start but now, since a lot more work is done and displayed online traffic, and she had fewer and fewer show up to her office. Now she just keeps a P.O. Box to keep her business and personal mail separate.
Over the years her pricing structure has changed as she’s talked to different photographers and bounced different ideas. She is also working on her Sales strategy by listening to better sales podcast, and maybe hiring a salesperson in the near future.
There’s no definitive way she gets her new customers it’s always something different. She ranked high on Google search, word of mouth, and being referred to from other brides, Instagram, and mail chimp, all combined to help her in marketing. She’s not big on using social media, but in 2019 she knows people want to see any and everything of your life and work before they hire you or meet in person. Social Media is important to different age groups, but to another group being on time and prepared. Being published in credited magazines is helpful as well.
This interview helped me learn so much more quickly about Kate. We work together now but I have so much more insight. From first-hand experience, if you look like a photographer with the gear and you're on time, you are treated like a professional. Even if you’re just a student and never been published.
I’ve learned that I need to become a member of some groups with my peers because learning from others and creating bonds could lead to other opinions and ideas I never thought of. Also, as she stated before, to learn from her mistake and listen to my intuition and instinct. I always wanted to do I.T. and cybersecurity but my intuition said to say yes to Evans offer and here I am now on the path to a career that I’m passionate about.
