The Art Of Zero Stress Wedding Photography with Taylor Jackson

Taylor Jackson: [00:00:00] I, have a few more, a few more questions for the question. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: yeah. And, and what's the food like where I'm going? Taylor Jackson: Yeah. Taylor Jackson: If it's Outback Steakhouse, it's pretty convincing. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I mean, it's, they're consistent. So if you, if it's on Mars, you know it's gonna be consistent just like it's. Taylor Jackson: I wonder what the first chain will be on Mars. I bet it's a TGI Fridays. [00:01:00] Our guest today needs no introduction. You have probably seen his face, heard his voice, probably have seen one of his YouTube videos at some point. Taylor Jackson is an incredible person. If you don't already know him, I guess I'll give you an introduction, but Taylor started his creative journey Scott Wyden Kivowitz: with music photography, capturing Imageners of bands that he admired. However, his knack for photography didn't stay hidden for so long, friends started requesting him to cover their weddings. Igniting his passion for candid wedding photography, a niche he now excels in with over 90% of his wedding. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Pros being entirely candid, he's a trailblazer in the industry. Being the first photographer in the world to offer both photography and highlight film coverage single handedly. It's no wonder then that 80% of the couples that hire him for both services over the past 15 years, he has [00:02:00] photographed over 600 weddings, primarily in the Waterloo area, and has been featured in over 40 different wedding and photography magazines globally. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: In his personal life, Taylor is married to another incredible person, another guest of Workflows, Lindsay Coulter, and is the father to his puppy, their puppy. Richard, Taylor's a really fun person to talk to. There's always a lot of laughter. Without further ado, here's my conversation with my friend Taylor Jackson. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: What's up Taylor? Taylor Jackson: Thanks for having me. Taylor Jackson: Welcome to Lindsay's Plant Garden. My wife has created a beautiful if you're watching the video, we have a lot of plants and none, none of them are my doing. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: The funny thing is it's the same exact view from when Lindsay was on, Taylor Jackson: Yeah, it's our background Scott Wyden Kivowitz: it is a good background. Taylor Jackson: There we go. Ated monster. It's life. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Oh boy. This is gonna be a fun episode. This is gonna be a fun episode. [00:03:00] So how was your birthday? Taylor Jackson: It was good. Yeah, went to kind of Iceland as a pre birthday trip. Saw 24 hours of daylight, saw a volcano pop off, which was pretty crazy. And then came home. So now, now I'm here in front of the plants again. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: yeah. Iceland's Iceland's. Way better than the United States or Canada. In my opinion, as far as like scenic goes, I mean, Banff is cool of course, but Taylor Jackson: yeah, for, for buying beers. Banff is much cheaper than Iceland. It's like $15 for a beer at a bar in in Iceland. So that's the downside, I guess, is the doing activities. But you can always eat the hot dogs at the gas stations. That's the go-to. You get your duty free, so whatever, whatever you wanna drink the entire trip, duty free as soon as you exit the airplane basically. Taylor Jackson: And just eat gas station hotdog. They're amazing. They're high quality. I think they're lamb and pork, and it, it's a really, really nice hotdog ade, crunchy onions, fried onions, Taylor Jackson: fresh [00:04:00] onions. It's nice. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: All the onions, but, but no bloomin onion, that's for sure. That Taylor Jackson: No, maybe, maybe that's where the, where the love of it comes from. From Bloomin onion. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Could be. So let, let's dive right in. What is one thing that you do for the photographic process that has saved you time? --- Scott Wyden Kivowitz: First question I ask every single guest is, what is one thing you do for the photographic process behind the camera that has saved you time? Taylor Jackson: Hmm. So there's, I would say a number of things. Early, early on, I knew this isn't rapid fire, is it? I can come up with a three word answer if you want. I knew early, early on that I was going to be outsourcing my Editing. But this was, I started in 2005, so, Imagen did not exist yet. And I knew very early on that I was going to shoot with the intention that someone else could handle my workflow afterwards, and that I was always, I was gonna be me on the day. Taylor Jackson: I enjoy the day, I enjoy taking the pictures and being [00:05:00] part of the day and creating whatever it is that we create on wedding days. You never really know you have a. Pretty decent idea going in, but it's always a bit of a surprise. So I knew very early on that I was going to shoot with the intention that someone else was going to be processing my work. Taylor Jackson: And I think that that was a big mental hurdle that I got over pretty quickly because it was always kind of that key part of my business. But I can definitely see in people that I talk to that are kind of on the fence with going to Imagen to just. I don't know. It's, it's still a barrier that you don't wanna release that final control of your work. Taylor Jackson: And for me at least, that was kind of the key thing that I did in terms of, I guess making my workflow a little bit faster and better, and also making a more of a life that I enjoy too. So, I don't know if that answers officially the question, but I feel like that's the, the bigger answer. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, shooting with intention, shooting, knowing that, that you're about to outsource a, you know, a lot of the business to, whether it's Editing [00:06:00] or, or Culling, or. Books for your clients or whatever it is. Yeah, shooting with intention knowing what, where, how the rest, how the work, rest of your workflow is gonna be, is definitely you know, a good thing to, to save yourself time in camera, after camera, all, all that, all that stuff. What is one thing that you do for the business that saves you time or money? --- Scott Wyden Kivowitz: So we, we are gonna get to like specifically talking to about Imagen later on. But the next question I have for you is one thing you do for your business besides from outsourcing to Imagen what is one thing you do for your business that saves you time or money? Mm. Taylor Jackson: Hmm. I think hiring people saves. Technically both. So even though you're spending upfront to kind of buy your time back by hiring a bookkeeper and by hiring I also do video as well. So by hiring a video editor by, by hiring for the things that maybe [00:07:00] aren't making you as much money and actually investing in those, and basically finding a way to make that make sense and for it to be as efficient as possible for your business. Taylor Jackson: I would say that's kind of, one of the keys for me. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Is. Is not, not, I mean, Tim has made appearances on your, on your YouTube videos, of course. Is Tim your video editor as well? Taylor Jackson: No he, we shoot together. He is like proper full-time. He does, I'm gonna say about half photography and half video. He doesn't, I don't think he likes the hybrid style. So I do both photography and video as one human. He also can but I think he likes to kind of silo it either as he is the video shooter or the photographer for the day now. Taylor Jackson: So. But yeah, he's he's busy. So he does all of that. And then I have my friend Tyler, so whenever we all work together, we're filming a video in two hours from now. And it's gonna be Tim, Tyler and Taylor all filming a YouTube video. But Tyler's my editor for video. [00:08:00] He does a lot of the YouTube content, most of it as well as kinda my wedding day stuff as well. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: You, you guys definitely need a shirt that all three of you wear that just says t, t, t, and just make it a thing. So that when you're all Yeah. Yeah, you know, hiring people. So I, I mean, you, you have to identify of course, like, you know, from the beginning or as you grow at least at a minimum. Like who, what, what, what do I suck at or what do I love doing the most? Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Like either end of the spectrum and. Find that medium of, okay, here's where I need to, to, to find a person to, to handle that so I don't have to think about it anymore, type of thing. So yeah, it's how, how early on did you start hiring somebody to, to take on stuff? Taylor Jackson: I think year two. So to talk about, [00:09:00] apparently I'm a dinosaur now. So I started my photography business before Lightroom existed. So if you had a Mac, you could use Aperture, but if you did not have a Mac, you had to basically use Photoshop and go image by image. So you would load an image in and you'd be like, I think this is, this is roughly what it did for the last one. Taylor Jackson: And you'd save that image out and you would load a new one and you'd throw your totally right actions pack or whatever you have on your Imageners. And workflow was a nightmare. So I think year one I did that. And in that time it would actually probably take you 20 to 30 hours to process a wedding properly. Taylor Jackson: And depending on variables, like if it got dark out and incandescent lights came on, you would go back through your gallery and there would be massive shifts from your white balances and just the way that you're processing Imageners. So you would, you'd get to the end, you'd be like finally done, and then you'd look at the gallery the next day and you'd be like, wow, this is massively inconsistent. Taylor Jackson: And you would go back and you'd do it all again. So I think by year two I had enough volume that it, in my mindset, it was kind of like, I know how much I'm gonna pay an editor. [00:10:00] Maybe they're gonna cost me maybe $10,000 over the year. So if I can book two more weddings to cover that cost, that's what I'm gonna do. Taylor Jackson: So year two, I just kind of focus a little bit harder on marketing and again, knew that I was gonna be buying my time back that way. So, yeah, pretty early on is kind of when I made that decision and by year two now it's like obviously so much easier cuz you're in full control and you don't have to hire somebody and train them or at least get some like, test stuff back that you can just do it all yourself right now. Taylor Jackson: Which is a heck of a lot less of a, a buried entry for it. But yeah, it was it was early on it was, it was I think a smart decision. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I think there was, there's a really a valuable lesson there that you just shared, which is if you're going to hire somebody or outsource something externally and there's that added, there's gonna be that added cost. It doesn't mean that you have to eat that cost in your business. You could find [00:11:00] ways to recoup that cost, whether it's upsells, whether it's finding new clients. You know, get those, your recurring clients to come back for another session. Whatever it is, you don't have to eat the costs. You can find ways to, to, to have that covered by your clients in theory. So. Taylor Jackson: I think one of the easier ways I guess maybe to speak specifically to Imagen, sorry, for just making this all about you guys. One of the easy ways would be now, so you sell a wedding and now it's a hundred dollars upgrade to get some sneak Previews or whatever, hate saying sneak peeks to get some preview Imageners like. Taylor Jackson: The day after the wedding, and you can basically use that to cover your cost of the product very easily, and also make some, some bonus money too. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Totally. Totally. Yeah. So talking about Editing, let's again, forget, Imagen exists for a second. What is one thing that you do for editing that has saved you time? --- Scott Wyden Kivowitz: What is one thing you do for Editing? I. Or have done prior to, to Imagen that has saved [00:12:00] you saved you time. Taylor Jackson: I think getting my preset really dialed helps a lot. I use three presets depending on the venue that I'm at. So if I'm some, like we had a castle venue that was very incand destiny and kind of warm. So I'd kinda have one preset. I also shoot the same venues over and over and over again. So they're dialed specifically for those venues. Taylor Jackson: And then I have one for kind of that green space winery. And then I have just kind of a, a general one as well getting those dialed that I could just apply the preset on the entire gallery. Okay. And it would pretty much, I would say take it like 90% of the way. As long as you're shooting very correctly in camera. Taylor Jackson: I'm also shooting video, so I have to shoot that, that I have way less leverage. I'm not shooting RAW video. So I basically have, I'm shooting JPEGs in video, so I have to do that, right? So I might as well do the, the photography side a hundred percent correctly as well, which means not being lazy with white balances and getting the exposure right. Taylor Jackson: Or as best I [00:13:00] can. In most situations you can, every now and then you get hit with like a weird situation where the couples getting married in a really dark, shadowy environment. And then the beautiful landscape is all bright color and, and full sun behind them. So something like that, you kinda have to aim for the middle and know that you have the highlight data and that you have the shadow data, but, In pretty much every other normal wedding case you have the ability to get it pretty much a hundred percent correct in camera and that speeds everything up significantly when you get back to post Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Awesome. So I'm glad you mentioned presets. Taylor Jackson: I. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: You, Imagen's new Lite Personal AI Profiles --- Scott Wyden Kivowitz: you kind of segued segued me right into something I wanted to share, not only with you for the first time ever, but to all the workflows listeners. This is either rolling out now because we're recording this. Mid-July, but the episode's actually airing in September. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: So this is rolling out either now or it is officially out right now. I can't predict the future, but we have [00:14:00] a feature we're calling light Personal AI Profile. Taylor Jackson: Okay. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: So, Historically, since Imagen has existed, you needed 3000, or oh, it used to be 5,000. Now it's 3000. We're always working to reduce that to previous edits in order to create a personal ai AI Profile, which has made it, you know, easy for some, especially white photographer. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: It's more difficult for others, but for those photographers with a preset that they've built over time or a preset they purchased at some point that wanna build a Personal AI Profile. The light Personal AI Profile will allow you to choose your Lightroom preset as in a similar way as you choose your Lightroom catalog. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: You know, it browse your computer, drag and drop, whatever. And then it shows you a scale of like warmth and color, color, balance and all that stuff. And basically we're using [00:15:00] AI to build a. Personal, AI, Profile based on your, literally your Lightroom preset that you're using or have used on a regular basis. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: So we're making it very easy. It takes about 30 seconds. And I think the turnaround, the actual turnaround be once you get past this like onboarding workflow, which is a beautiful thing that, that, that our, our developers have built. That takes about 30 seconds to get through, and then it's faster to create the Personal, AI Profile with the light version versus it learning from all of your edits, because now it's just basing it on the data in this preset file. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: And then your, your personalization beyond that. So for example, if you if you purchased a preset that was a film replication, but you like it, but you don't like how warm it is. You were literally just [00:16:00] dragging that Lightroom preset and say, I like to, I like him. A little cooler. Go through this, this onboarding wizard, and now you've got your Personal AI. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Profile. Taylor Jackson: Yeah, that sounds amazing. I, so the way that I use Imagen is still that I will still use one of the talent profiles and I'll apply my preset on top. Because again, I use multiple different presets. So this sounds kind of down my alley, I suppose. I also trust. You guys because you have hun like you've edited hundreds of thousands of Imageners and you kind of know generally what that image should look like and to just be able to add my preset onto something that's, that hyper consistent I'm excited about. Taylor Jackson: So thumbs up for that I will be using it for sure. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: That's cool. Yeah. Yeah. What? And it's anybody who's ever bought a Taylor Jackson Lightroom preset. Can now utilize that, you know, in their Imagen account in order to, you know, edit with your Lightroom preset style. But you [00:17:00] know, that high, high accuracy, high consistency of what Imagen's able to produce every single time, you know, so just, it's gonna be cool. Taylor Jackson: Yeah. No, that's awesome. I'm happy that you guys developed that cuz I feel like that's something that def is definitely going to be like, like again, it just makes the onboarding process even easier. No longer do you have to, well you don't have to train a human, but no longer do you even have to train the system and you're just kind of good to go based on something that you already are comfortable with, that you're not using someone else's talent profile and modifying it, that you're actually just. Taylor Jackson: Using your own profile. So I feel like artist wise, that feels a little bit better as well, that I'm not using John Branch and modifying that to, to make my own Imageners so, Scott Wyden Kivowitz: And what what else is really cool is that once you have it done and you're using it, You can upload your final edit in order to turn it, to, turn it into basically fine tune it and turn it into a regular Personal, AI Profile. So it's not like a one and done, it's not just us applying the preset. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: It's us literally [00:18:00] doing what we would do normally and allowing the AI to, to to keep learning, to get smarter, to see how you shift and adapt and change. It'll do it all with you. So, yeah, it's Taylor Jackson: excited. Thanks for sharing that with me. Now I have to keep it a secret for Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Now you're, yeah. Yes you do. Okay, so, we've talked about you know, photographic process, the business Editing. What is one thing that you do after a session that has increased business? --- Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Now, what is one thing you do after a session, you know, that has increased business for you? Taylor Jackson: So from a business point and also a mental standpoint, I think I process everything as fast as I can now. So I get home from a wedding and I will do my best to basically have, so a wedding here. Typically ends, my coverage probably ends around like 10 o'clock, so I'm usually home by about 10:30 and by about. Taylor Jackson: Midnight, I [00:19:00] would say. I have everything downloaded to my hard drives and also uploaded to Imagen. Then I go to sleep, wake up the next morning. Even though it only takes a few minutes for Imagen to process I wake up in the morning with fresh eyes and just kind of go through everything. And that means the next day my entire gallery from that wedding is done. Taylor Jackson: And from a business standpoint, this is obviously great because I can send preview images and I can get those images to my couple. Pretty quickly, and they're able to kind of use their wedding announcement as my images rather than a cell phone photo or something from one of their friends. Taylor Jackson: And so that's obviously good for, for incoming tags coming back to me. But more importantly, I think for me to just know that I have the final gallery online that I've gone through. I have all the family formals, I have all the Imageners, I have every section of the day, and I've been through it multiple times. Taylor Jackson: I think that helps my mental stress out a lot. I used to, I travel a lot, so I was definitely a person that I would be, I don't know, on a flight [00:20:00] somewhere and I'd be like, I know I have that backed up, but like, do I really have that backed up? Should I really format these cards that are in here without, like verifying at my computer that I, in fact have all of this done And now just having everything online I dunno, it makes my mental stress load a lot less. Taylor Jackson: So, yeah, I'm pretty much, I could deliver the wedding day or the wedding gallery the day after the wedding. I don't, I feel like there needs to be like a little bit of space for that. But I will send them Previews and I feel like that's done a lot of good things for for business and I feel like it's slowly becoming kind of the standard for, for wedding photography as well. Taylor Jackson: So, yeah. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Nice. Backup to Imagen Cloud --- Scott Wyden Kivowitz: You mentioned your concern about, Backing up and do I wipe the memory card? Am I sure that it's backed up? All that stuff. So Imagen has backups now. Taylor Jackson: I didn't know if that was, that was public or not. That's good. I like that. Definitely anything. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: by, by the time this episode airs. Taylor Jackson: [00:21:00] I don't actually, so this is a, an honest question. I don't actually know. So does that mean that when I'm uploading my, is it the smaller size DNGs that they're being backed up Taylor Jackson: for me Or high res? Okay. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Or, or optimized com, like, so we've got three versions. Basically. got everybody who wants, has access to the free, low res highly compressed backups, right? And then there's two high res option, sort of like what Google Photos does with their ba, with their storage. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Is kind of like that. We're offering a compressed RAW file. It's still like, I was seeing like nine megabyte RAW files Taylor Jackson: Nice. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: from we converted into DNG, which is basically what safe space, and we shrink them down just a, just a hair. And then we have full high res backups, so you can choose which version of the high res backups you want. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Which is cool. Taylor Jackson: So that makes my life happy too. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah. So write on Taylor Jackson: solving all my problems. [00:22:00] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: or Editing. Yeah. It's, it's, as you're doing it, we're solving your problem and we're, we're your disaster recovery solution. So lots Taylor Jackson: I like that. It's it's nice when all-in-one solutions actually make sense rather than just like one company trying to do like a hundred different things and it's like, why are you also like a CRM now? I don't understand. But I feel like this all, like, the photos are going to you guys anyways, so it makes total sense and yeah, excited to use that too. Taylor Jackson: That's awesome. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah. And we don't take you away from, from, you know, from anything. Like we're just being a part of it. Right. We're just giving you the, it's. Fits naturally into, into that workflow already. Taylor Jackson: Mm-hmm. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: so, gonna go very off topic for a second before we get back on topic. This is my favorite part. Pick a color Taylor Jackson: I'm gonna go green. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: going green. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I think Lindsay went, went orange. Okay. I'm gonna shuffle and you're gonna tell me when to Yeah, they are. Yeah. Yeah, we, yeah. By the way, [00:23:00] you notice our shirts are almost matching too. I think yours is a little. A little more green, or it could be reflecting off those beautiful plants. But Taylor Jackson: know. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: yeah. I'm gonna shuffle you. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Tell me when to stop. Taylor Jackson: All right. Are you shuffling? Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I'm going through 'em. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Taylor Jackson: Stop now. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Okay. Stop, stop, stop. Okay, here we go. My next question to you is, oh, this is good. Would you accept a fatal mission in exchange for a lifetime of support for your family? Taylor Jackson: Yeah, probably. Is it a cool mission because then that's like a Yeah, for sure. But if it's like a really lame mission, I don't, I don't know. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I mean, I don't know. Maybe if it says you're gonna be the first man on Mars, but you're not coming back. Taylor Jackson: But also, I guess, so the, the the thing that I assume that might not be correct is this, like the world ends if I don't do this mission or do I just, If I just don't go, everything is fine and I can continue his [00:24:00] life as normal, then I might pick life as normal. I'm going Scott Wyden Kivowitz: It also depends, like, can I, can I bring a camera with me? But will that live on after I'm already gone Taylor Jackson: Yeah, Taylor Jackson: so there's, It's Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I mean, it, it would make sense for it to be like, if it's, it's super hot on Mars. Right. During, at least during the day. Right. So, it would make sense for it to be like some, something with like a fiery sauce, like a Taco Bell type of situation, Taylor Jackson: that'd be good, but I can pretty much guarantee it's gonna be a Mr. Beast Burger with a Feast Bowls grocery store. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah, yeah. Maybe, maybe, maybe. Or an Amazon go, you know, you Taylor Jackson: Yeah. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: walk in and. Okay. So, back to workflows. Can you share an outlined breakdown of your workflow from lead to delivery? --- Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Can you share an outline, breakdown of your workflow from lead to delivery? 30,000 foot view down just a bunch of bullet points lead to delivery. Taylor Jackson: Lead to delivery. So I so I, I can kind of walk, I'll walk through the business side of things and then I'll walk through kind [00:25:00] of the technical with kinda my backup process. It shouldn't take more than four and a half, five hours to finish this Taylor Jackson: we're Scott Wyden Kivowitz: we're Taylor Jackson: good. Taylor Jackson: explanation. So one of the massive changes that I made from a lead's point of view is that I actually now have all of my pricing public. Taylor Jackson: Which means I get significantly less inquiries overall, but when I do get them so I use I'm part owner of a company called Focal book focal.com, and I use one of their websites and basically somebody just clicks the button to request a book. For the wedding date. So I'm not necessarily getting an inquiry. Taylor Jackson: I'm getting like a, an actual booking request. And I can say if, if we have like very, if basically like by having prices public, it means that you're gonna have way less tire kickers. That there's nobody gonna be coming in and. Just gonna wanna ask you 150 questions. You're very much burning the potential that somebody may come in and they may fall in love with you, and they might find the budget, even though they didn't [00:26:00] have the budget to begin with. Taylor Jackson: You are attracting only people that have the budget right now and can click the, like basically buy now button and. The back and forth in terms of emails. I counted the other day. I do about 16 total emails with my couples now. So I send them eight emails. They send me eight emails or eight email and that's it. Taylor Jackson: So it's pretty, and that includes the entire wedding day. So up to the wedding day is like 16 email total. So that has made my life very happy that my email box is not clogged up. That. The type of client that it seems to be attracting by having prices public are very self-sufficient. They want the thing. Taylor Jackson: They're not gonna ask questions and I show up to their day, we do the thing. So that has, I guess, drastically changed over last year. Last year. Prior to that, it was the back and forth email that they would send me an email, I would send them the PDF for my pricing, and they would decide if they wanted to get back to me at [00:27:00] that point. Taylor Jackson: And. From there, it's typically into a phone call meeting. I think that changed over 2020 that I used to do in-person meetings maybe half the time. I don't think I've done an in-person meeting since 2020 now. My phone calls are usually 10 to 15 minutes. They're pretty quick. It's for the most part my couples just want to reaffirm that. Taylor Jackson: In fact, I am a real person. I guess I should also kinda caveat this with the fact that I have a ton of content. Of me and my face on video. So if they wanna do a deep dive into like my YouTube channel, maybe they're not there for the wedding photography education, but they can see that I do exist in real life and, and I'm not gonna scam them. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: and they know your personality very well because they've. You know, likely watch your videos, Taylor Jackson: yeah, exactly. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: least at least a dozen of them. Taylor Jackson: Yeah, so they it's a pretty quick process usually for booking. From inquiry to booking now is in some cases like three hours if I'm at my computer and I [00:28:00] respond if I'm not at my computer, it's like a maximum of like two days maybe now. So that's really, really nice. And from there I would say 25% of my couples get engagement sessions now. Taylor Jackson: So most of them get the hybrid photo, video package, and a lot of them, Take the engagement session out. They think it's weird to just go and do photos for no reason. So that's also been a massive shift that I've been seeing over maybe the past five years. Before, and maybe not before 2020, but like 2018, I would say probably 60 70% of my couples did engagement sessions and now it's kind of just completely flipped. Taylor Jackson: So I don't do a lot of those. I go to the wedding day I do the thing so. Take the pictures, do the video, come home download everything. I guess we'll do the technical here quickly too. So I shoot everything to two cards. I never pull those cards outta my camera. All day I come home, I download those cards and [00:29:00] I put them on two drives. Taylor Jackson: So one is a working drive, one is a backup drive, and I drag them from the cards to each of those drives individually, not just like copying my backup over to one in case I. For some reason, miss something or maybe find or crashed out. And I will actually just sit there and I will watch them. So I just, I don't like do anything else. Taylor Jackson: I watch the, watch the thing, maybe I watch like a YouTube video on one screen. then I go through and I verify that yes, in fact there is everything there. And I match the file numbers with the cards to make sure that yes, the math, maths, and the number of Imageners is correct. From there, I never touched that backup drive again. Taylor Jackson: I work for my working drive. It's a solid state drive. I'll build my my Smart Previews in Lightroom and I will upload it to Imagen that evening. Basically after that, I guess maybe this part of my workflow changes. Right now I do offsite JPEG backup only cuz my internet here in Canada, it's like, it's fine, but it's not doing high res Roth files. Taylor Jackson: So I [00:30:00] upload JPEGs only again shooting them as correct as I possibly can. In my camera and the like, realistically, if I lost all the RAW files, I could, I could go from the JPEGs, it would be no problem. But it's just nice to have an offsite backup. Also within like, as it's kind of going to Imagen it's also going offsite. Taylor Jackson: Although maybe that will change now. So, another kind of workflow tweak that makes things a bit easier. After that, I, again, as I mentioned, kind of put the gallery entirely together. The next day and have that online, but not sending to the client usually until about maybe three weeks. Send some preview, ImagenAI's. Taylor Jackson: Anything I'm excited about, I usually send to them. If it's surrounding like a Mother's Day or Father's Day or something, I usually keep that in mind and I send kind of the appropriate ImagenAI's so that they have more things to share. And after that, that's typically it. Send the gallery, send the video. Taylor Jackson: Life is nice. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: The the, the 16 emails [00:31:00] that you mentioned, how are any of those automated? Are they all manually done with, like templates or how do you, how do you structure those? Taylor Jackson: It's kind of a mix. I do have some templates but I would say most of it, It's pretty much like one line communications now. And then it's usually, so I also I, as I mentioned, shoot kinda the same venues over and over and over again, and I've selected those venues intentionally. I'm preferred vendor at them and I'll pretty much only work at those venues unless something comes in that's really cool and everything happens on site there. Taylor Jackson: So I pretty much only need a starting time. So if they say be at the hotel for. 11:00 AM I know exactly how the rest of that day goes, and I don't have any questions to ask them. Assuming everything's happening at that spot I do maybe two or three. If I'm shooting like a 40 or 50 wedding season, maybe three of those are gonna be church weddings that are offsite that adds kind of that. Taylor Jackson: [00:32:00] Additional logistic to it, but otherwise, maybe I'm doing, getting ready photos at the couple's house. Maybe I'm doing them at one location and never moving, but I pretty much need two, like two times. And then they'll usually just kind of attach the PDF of their final day. But yeah, I have very limited questions because they also, I think, hire me because I'm the expert at those venues as well. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah. Yeah. I think that's also a good lesson to learn it for, for a lot of the, the, the listeners is that, you know, as you, you know, continue in your career and build your business and grow and grow and grow, you, you get to know the venues that you love to shoot at. If you can get on the preferred vendor list, that obviously will help increase your business dramatically, but also makes it so that you have to guess less you, you're gonna know how things roll at that, at that venue which could, like you said, make your communication with the venue and your clients much [00:33:00] smoother, Taylor Jackson: Yeah, and I feel, I feel like it all kind of is very weirdly circular in the fact that the type of couple that is going to just click the buy button on a photographer's website is also a very likely couple to book at these venues that is kind of like this all-in-one solution that they can just say, One wedding, please, 120 guests, and then they hire a florist and they kind of put their personal touch on it. Taylor Jackson: But it seems like all of these things have kind of gone together to make a business that I very much like mental load. Going to a wedding day is like, I don't know, I'm not stressed at all. I used to be so stressed, especially if I had to like drive to 15 different locations on the wedding day. Taylor Jackson: Like so much could go wrong. And now stress level is like zero going into wedding days. So I feel like I make. Way better work. I'm just generally like a nicer more, I guess in, in the, in the space aware of what's going on so that I can actually get those moments that maybe I would've [00:34:00] missed 10 years ago if I was stressed and just like be like, I need to get to the ceremony right now. Taylor Jackson: Like, I need to leave, I need to be, be, gotta beat the limo, gotta gotta find parking downtown Toronto. Now it's just like I can be with the, if it's a, there is a bride, I can be with the bride and her dad like, Three minutes before the wedding and I can get some candid coverage out there, and then I can just walk into the, to the ceremony and I can get the shots of them coming down there. Taylor Jackson: Like it's, I don't know, makes my life, my life is happier now, I think than 15 years ago before I kind of really started fine tuning all of this stuff to make a business that I wanted. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: It's a, it's a learning curve for everybody and eventually you get to where you, where you wanna be, and you've definitely done that for yourself, which is, which is fantastic. And I'm sure you still have more places you want to go, but never ends. So let's talk about AI for a minute. Ai obviously, as you've said, like years ago, None of this existed, right? Scott Wyden Kivowitz: None so much was, was not possible that [00:35:00] it's possible now, or you had to rely on humans, which take a lot more time and and whatnot. What does the future of AI in photography look like to you? --- Scott Wyden Kivowitz: But what does the future of AI look like to Scott Wyden Kivowitz: you? Taylor Jackson: It, specifically within the wedding space, it's very fortunate that I feel like that we're kind of protected. I think from the, the bigger AI shift in photography that's actually going to be like generated Imageners and all of that side of things for like head shots. Like there's gonna definitely be some changes. Taylor Jackson: On the wedding side of things, I feel like we're weirdly, I. Kind of okay. Because we are creating real work for real couples and I think that there will continue to be a market for that, which is awesome. And I feel like all of the tools over the past, even like three years have. Really kind of taken businesses and workflows from like, kind of okay to something that you actually kind of get a life back now. Taylor Jackson: That you can, you can have a little bit of a summer, [00:36:00] even though you're still shooting like 30 or 40 weddings that Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday you can actually go out and have a bit of a vacation, which is pretty nice. I think that that's kinda the biggest shift that I've seen and it's. Kind of all about picking the tools and the pieces that work the best for you and make the most sense in building your behind the scenes business on So yeah, there's, there's gonna be a ton of tools coming that are just going to speed our workflows up a lot. And then I think one of the things that's maybe outside of that is like attracting those ideal clients that maybe. Communicate with you as much as you'd like them to communicate with. And that's gonna be one of those pieces as well, that AI probably can kind of solve with templates and responses, but might not be able to do as as accurately as you could. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: So moving back to where, where did I wanna go? Because now you gave me a second thing I wanted to bring up again. So the first thing [00:37:00] was, shoot, I forgot what it was. Oh, what, what? Okay, I'm gonna go on to the second thing cause I can't remember what the first thing was. So, so AI could, in theory, analyze your business, analyze your location, and figure out the best way for you to market to. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Your target market? I could see, oh, I figured now I remember what this is, the first thing was. So I do think that like, that is something that AI could get to at some point, whether it's its own service, whether it's part of something else. I think like what Focals doing, for example, for the websites, part of things with AI is a good move in like sort of that direction, you know, helping to get the content that you're putting out there on your site to be more tailored to to your, your target market. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: The other thing I wanted to mention was you mentioned headshots. So there was a discussion in the Imagen Community. If you're not in the Imagen community, if you're listening and not there, please go. [00:38:00] And that discussion was actually about generative ai and is it going to damage any of the industry? Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Like is it going to, to take away jobs or anything like that? And there was a pretty heavy duty. Couple comments about headshot specifically that some Imageners think that headshot photographers are actually at risk. Do you, how do you feel about that, do you think? Because it is getting pretty darn close to me. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: It's not quite there yet, but how do you feel about that as far as like headshot specifically? Taylor Jackson: I've used two services now where you upload like, I think 10 or 20 of your. Photos of you in different positions. Not just like 10 or 15 selfies, but like 10 or 15 Imageners of you in like full body, half body. And it will just basically generate a hundred headshot sell like Instagram style Imageners for you. Taylor Jackson: And you [00:39:00] can put them in whether you want to be like a fitness influencer, you want them all to be sporting related. And as of like July of this year, and this is obviously gonna change like with. Before this episode's even out, if it generates 108 of them are totally usable and could pass off completely as myself. Taylor Jackson: So like 8% is kind of what I figured that a lot of them, they still does bizarre, strange stuff. You also kinda have to work within the limitations that it's not gonna, as of right now, it's not gonna make your, your beautiful hands look exactly as they, they do in real life yet. But for Imageners that might not have your hands in them. Taylor Jackson: It's gonna do a pretty good job of just like your face. So, I would say I would be a little bit nervous if I was maybe in the headshot space. I would figure out how I could kind of implement this and I could be on kind of the, the edge with this as it comes in that if I could be building a business around the fact that like, Hey, you're gonna come in for a headshot session, you're gonna spend 15 minutes here, I'm gonna get [00:40:00] all of the data that I need, and then I'm gonna give you a thousand Imageners and you can just kind of pick your favorites. Taylor Jackson: Maybe that's a new viable. Business model before it really kind of gets easily in the hands of everyone. But I could see that being an issue. I think in terms of wedding photography, one of the things that I am uncertain about this time is that we noticed it whenever I forget whatever the company was, that everyone started using kind of their head shots and everyone was like in space and stuff like that. Taylor Jackson: But I saw a lot of photographers. Using those AI ImagenAI's as their display photos very, very quickly cuz it's just that better than real life version of you. And if the photographers are the ones already using these Imageners that are not real Imageners it's a bit of a weird thing. So Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah. It's, it's a, it's a sign, Taylor Jackson: Hmm. Taylor Jackson: And then I don't know where the, where the line's gonna be with with wedding couples that [00:41:00] obviously like in one of the systems I talked about, there's actually a generate wedding. It'll give you like all your wedding photos with your partner. And I don't know where the line is gonna be with that yet. Taylor Jackson: It could like, definitely if I don't have a budget for my wedding and I want some nice photos of myself and my partner, like. I Taylor Jackson: can do that in 10 minutes. Like yeah, but is it real? Is it like actually the Taylor Jackson: suit or the dress? Like yeah. Taylor Jackson: but some people might not care. I don't know. And also like from the, the point of view of like, if you can have a better than real life version of yourself out there on the internet, like if you could have a very nice wedding in Hawaii and never have to. Taylor Jackson: To leave Ohio. I don't know. So that is future to be determined, I think for us as wedding photographers. I think we'll be pretty good for a little while. But yeah, no predict in the future. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah. I don't know if you saw [00:42:00] or follow Shutter Fest, but we were, so Christine and I were at Shutter Fest and something that was definitely a talking point at the event and in their Facebook group was that all of the speaker banners that are, you know, hanging from this, from the ceiling were all generated by ai. And I Taylor Jackson: they've already done the, Scott Wyden Kivowitz: oh yeah, this is like Shutter Fest using AI for all their speakers. So you're talking however many banners. Let's say there was 80, cause I don't know how many speakers there were. I would say maybe five of them actually looked like the speakers. So it was, you know, it was, they was, they were pretty far out there. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: It was, it was, but at the same time it was obvious that it was intentional. To make it a talking point, get people talking about the banners, you know, how fun they are and stuff. But and it was fun. It was fun to walk around and be like, that does not look like soandso. That does not look like so-and-so, or, or like, damn, that made that, that made so-and-so look really good. Taylor Jackson: It [00:43:00] also depends on like the person that's generating it, that if they don't know you, Taylor Jackson: they could be like, I don't know, I'm looking at a picture of whoever, Vanessa Joy and next to ai, Vanessa Joy, maybe they look pretty similar to you if you don't actually know them in real life. So maybe that's part of the, part of the disconnect that you will get those eight out of a hundred Imageners that are like pretty accurate. Taylor Jackson: But I dunno, that's, that's crazy to did that though. That's that's interesting. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: So I'm gonna ask one more question impromptu before we dive into the last question. So. I just asked you about AI and photography, like you know, what you think for the future, but Imagen has just announced this workspace that we are doing where everything from backups and cooling and Editing, it's all this seamless thing where it's integrated with each other. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: We we can do things you know, coming in the future. We can send it off to your, your pick time or your pixie set or swift galleries or whatever it is that you're using for, for album design and, [00:44:00] and ips or, or, you know, just online galleries or whatever it is, or to your focal website potentially too, like, whatever. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Right. What does the future of photography workflows look like to you? --- Scott Wyden Kivowitz: What does the future of workflows in general, what does that look like to you? What, what kind of changes do you see coming? In to, to workflows in the future with all the new technology that has been coming and coming and coming over the past three years. Taylor Jackson: The the thing that I would love, and this might be copyright, Sam Hurd, I don't know. But basically as, as I'm shooting, I would love. To be shooting and having my camera, or even if it's like a Bluetooth thing to a device or whatever I would love to be taking pictures and I would love for it to be culling and selecting for me. Taylor Jackson: And then Editing. And then when I get home from the wedding day, just have the gallery online. That would be an ideal scenario. It will be probably a race to see what camera manufacturer puts, like [00:45:00] iOS or Android in their physical camera first. I feel like that'll be a huge shift. And if all of a sudden you have your sim card in your Nikon, or Canon or Sony, or Fuji, or Pentax or Olympus, if I miss anyone, someone's gonna be upset. Taylor Jackson: I don't think I missed any companies. Ricoh Minolta Yashica If that shift happens, I feel like that speeds our workflows up a lot. I will get nervous to the, I don't know, the, again, we don't know, but maybe that starts to devalue. The photography experience if layered with ai, that kind of like, as now currently you can just take a crappy cell phone image of something and run it through AI and it makes just like a, a beautiful, perfect version of that same scene. Taylor Jackson: And if there's that layer of AI and you're just kinda shooting with a phone or whatever maybe that is is gonna be a weird time for photography. So I think maybe now more [00:46:00] than ever, or it's always been important, but like, Really developing a personal brand. And when your clients are hiring you, they're hiring you because they want specifically you, I think is one of the keys. Taylor Jackson: And unfortunately one of those keys is probably get getting your face in front of a camera. Because as of right now, AI doesn't quite do that. It doesn't really match your I think legally there's some, there's some gray companies that'll do it, but you can generate your face. So you can have a talking head. Taylor Jackson: But they won't yet match your voice to your talking head due to deep fake concerns and whatnot. But at some point, yeah, you can probably just do a podcast and then it'll just make you a video of your talking head. So I think before that becomes a, an easy option for people to use. Like, just start now. Taylor Jackson: Getting somewhat comfortable in front of the camera. I'm still not that comfortable in front of the camera and I've been doing it for like 20 years now. But I'm a lot better than I was 20 years ago. I wouldn't consider myself good [00:47:00] enough to go on a national broadcast network and read from a teleprompter, but if I can, if I have final cut of my. Taylor Jackson: Project, I can put something together and there's gonna be a lot of crap in there and it's gonna be a lot of awkward stuff, but as long as I have final cut, I'm kind of comfortable with it. But I would say that that's gonna be one of the keys to make sure that when couples are hiring you or when you, your clients are hiring you, it's because they wanna work with you. Taylor Jackson: And that they kind of maybe on some level even want to brag about the fact that they get to work with you and they're gonna post that on social media and that, that you're the one that they want and it's not just a photographer at their wedding or. A headshot photographer, they want to be part of your world for a minute too. Taylor Jackson: So I think that's gonna be one of the big things to make sure that you pay attention to, regardless of what happens and how crazy things get in the future. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Nice. Well said. You know, the, the idea of shooting in Cameron, having it go up to whatever cloud Platform, you know, so, so Fuji Film, for example, [00:48:00] started this already, And Imagen it's been participating in that, but it still requires wifi. Do you think the, the necessity is that it is actually a cell phone connection, like a, a, a high speed 5g, 6g future 10 G, whatever the heck it is in the future connection rather than a wifi connection to, to the internet. Taylor Jackson: Yeah, but I, I feel like if they're on wifi now, that's gonna be the natural progression of it. That to make it one step easier is gonna be kind of moving into that. But then there'll also be weird other things, like in Canada we have, I think the, maybe the worst or second. Worst cell phone pricing in the world. Taylor Jackson: My bill is regularly, like three to $400 a month for my phone. Because we have two companies. We have Rogers and, and Bell, and they own all the telecoms. So our telecom is all privatized, so there's like no competition. So for an instance like that, it's whatever they're going to offer up in terms of like allowing me to do this. Taylor Jackson: And if I have [00:49:00] to run 80 gigs through. My 5G connection on a wedding day that is gonna be very expensive. Or they're gonna throttle it massively if you do like an unlimited package. So there will be technical concerns and constraints maybe, but I think that's where it will be headed. Hopefully in the future, but also like if everything can just be done on your device too that's also a very nice time that you don't like when you download the card that those are all your finals. Taylor Jackson: Or you don't even download the card, you just get home. But yeah, so I would say that's kind of where workflow could be, but then also that's something that I could have said in like 2015 and it still gets closer, but it was like, this is gonna happen in two years and then it didn't. So, Taylor Jackson: Yeah. Taylor Jackson: We'll see. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Maybe two years from today. Taylor Jackson: Yeah. Taylor Jackson: Realistically though Taylor Jackson: though Scott Wyden Kivowitz: So, last question for you is How did Imagen impact your life? --- Scott Wyden Kivowitz: How did Imagen. Impact your life. Taylor Jackson: wow, that's such an, [00:50:00] can we get like some soft orchestra music under this? Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah. Let's do it. Taylor Jackson: It. Taylor Jackson: so I would say the the biggest shift for me has been in terms of just stress load coming home from a wedding, knowing that I. Have everything done the next day motivates me to get it done also. So it's still kind of maybe in the, the fun times games thing where it's like kind of a game for me to get them processed and turned around as fast as I can. Taylor Jackson: So that has obviously helped me tremendously. The just the general consistency too. My galleries have gotten. Significantly more consistent since moving to Imagen. And it's just nice that everything is just kind of exactly as I would do it. So I don't feel like I'm doing a disservice to my clients. Taylor Jackson: If anything, I actually feel like I'm doing better for them by using Imagen and by just Havings just so fast. I think it's kind of end of the day. The thing for me is that it's [00:51:00] like the fastest workflow that I can. Imagen really? Yeah. See, I Taylor Jackson: Nice. Taylor Jackson: So yeah, that's kind of how it's changed, I guess my, my workflow and my mindset. Taylor Jackson: And yeah, it's like kind of a core piece of what I do now. And I also, I don't know, like yesterday, Lindsay was at a wedding and she processed everything like at the wedding day. So it's like really, really speeding things up and clearing out. Workflow problems like backlogs, like usually in recording this in July, usually I would have like maybe six or seven weddings that I still haven't delivered that I was waiting to get back from an editor. Taylor Jackson: And now all of them are, is done. So, Yeah, you get to enjoy your life a little bit more. You get to post a little bit more on social media because you don't owe people things that are overdue. Which is another thing that when we're traveling, it's like if I owe somebody a wedding gallery, like I'm not even gonna post about this trip. Taylor Jackson: Cause I don't want them to know that I'm like not doing their stuff. Whereas now before I go on a trip, just send that gallery off and, [00:52:00] and they can be happy and I could live my life and yeah, we weird social pressure, but. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Awesome. I'm so glad that we were able to to, to really help both, both you and Lindsay. Of course. I mean, I asked Lindsay the same question, like, you know, three weeks ago, four weeks ago, whenever I talked to her. And so it's, it's really nice that being able to help the two of you. I'm sure, I mean I obviously can't say, but I'm sure that all that time back has probably helped your relationship as well. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: You know, being able to, you guys are together all the time, working and traveling and doing all stuff, but like, I can only Imagen like not having to have that, that both of you having the, the calling and Editing pressure nonstop, you know, Taylor Jackson: Yeah, it's Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Made a nice impact. Taylor Jackson: it's nice to have a summer and. We, so Lindsay kind of did this, that she books off all the long weekends now and goes to the cottage. And that used to be like a pretty stressful time cuz she would be at the cottage trying to relax, but [00:53:00] then also knowing that she has the pressure of like maybe six weddings that she hasn't delivered and like 10 family shoots and like a couple branding sessions and now all of that is just done and you can just enjoy your life. Taylor Jackson: So, I guess modify the business as you want it to be, but know that. The workflow is just so much faster now that you can actually enjoy your life a little bit more in the summer and kind of peak season. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah. Awesome. Taylor, where can listeners learn more about you? Connect with you and of course, see your incredible photography. Taylor Jackson: I am, I would say just Instagram is maybe the easiest place to, to begin instagram.com/taylor Jackson. You can also search me on YouTube. There are, I think, a thousand videos almost up at this point, Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I was gonna say Taylor Jackson: the scenes wedding days. There's like a few. Yeah. Yeah, there's like full behind the scenes wedding days doing either photography or photo video coverage. Taylor Jackson: And all of my camera and lens reviews and everything go up there as well. So, lots over there. That's where I spend most of my, [00:54:00] my digital time. I would say Scott Wyden Kivowitz: The musical is a must watch. Taylor Jackson: yes, it didn't perform so well. Surprise every time we do something that's a passion project, it's always. Performs very poor, but we're we're happy that we made it and that you and 15 other people also enjoy it. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I, I see to me, I, I mean, I love all your videos, but when we, when we first met, I think I even told you how I've been following your videos since you've started and I've enjoyed 'em all, but like, I love these like completely different types when you do those, like, nobody's ever done that before and you actually took the time to find the music and write the words and actually, Seeing rap, do a little bit of this, a little bit of that, you know, it was, it's great. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: So I enjoyed it. Taylor Jackson: it's fun. It's like, I don't know, like anything in your business that if, if something seems like it might be interesting to you, you might as well go out and do it, cuz otherwise, [00:55:00] like you can't, if you wait for somebody else to do it, then I don't know you. It's not gonna be as fun. You gotta. Taylor Jackson: Take some risks sometimes, and sometimes they pay off. Sometimes they, this easily could have, like if this gets picked up by Broadway, like that could have been a whole new direction for my business. But we didn't know. We didn't know if it was going to not. It didn't spoiler, or it hasn't yet, I should say. Taylor Jackson: But yeah, it's fun to, to also have the time to be able to do things like that, that are just for fun projects that, you know, aren't going to necessarily appease the algorithm but are something that you just want to do and that you think are fun to kind of put out there in the world. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Bring smiles to people's faces, you know. A Taylor Jackson: Yeah, and confuse a lot of people in Scott Wyden Kivowitz: YouTube. Yeah. Well thank you so much for, for hopping on, for joining me and, and chatting about your workflows and all the fun stuff. And yeah, it. So we'll talk again. Taylor Jackson: Thanks so much for having me. Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Taylor, thank you so [00:56:00] much for that incredible conversation. I know there was so much in as far as takeaways go, and I can't wait for everybody to dig in and, and, and start implementing some of the things that you talked about.