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In the near future I will be offering portrait sessions. More often than not, the camera will be aimed at the kids.
Being a parent of three kids I know how fast they change. I also know that the photos you get sent home from school or the ones you try to get with your point-and-shoot camera are usually not what you want.
In these photo sessions I will come to you. I will make images of your kid in their world ... doing what they do ... wearing what they wear, just being themselves. Twenty years from now, are you going to remember them in a frilly dress or wearing a tie ... or are you going to remember them in a tee shirt and blue jeans?
Stay tuned, coming soon.
Most of the wedding gigs are on the weekends. The rest of the week I'm still making pictures. As I mentioned, I'm a full time newspaper photographer which has me shooting (including the weddings) sometimes seven days a week, often over 1000 per day. Even on the "off" days I'm in post production working the photos, building galleries and more often than not, trying to stay ahead of the curve with the constantly changing digital world.
While this blog is set up primarily for information on my Wedding Photojournalism, I will be updating during the week with images and situations I feel sheds a better light on what I'm all about.
This image was made as a state champion softball team gets ready to travel to Texas from NJ to compete in a national tournament. My job was to try to show the intensity of their workout. While most 16 year old girls are hitting the beach and hanging out, this group had their game face on.
Hey, and as far as the Weddings go, maybe this girl is a future client, ha.
I just got word that I've be accepted to the Wedding Photojournalists Association. This is big for me as their standards are very high and you have to go through a review process before they even consider you for membership. It took three weeks of to hear from them and I was getting a little concerned that I didn't have what it takes in their eyes. Click their logo on the upper left and check them out. You'll see some amazing work.
Normally, I'm not a big joiner of organizations, this is the only group I'm a member of at this point, but this group has raised the bar so high that I'm proud to be on board. They review your portfolio and will not even consider you for membership if any more then 20% of your displayed work (usually your web site/portfolio) is "set up" or staged in any way. This means no "look at the camera," no "smile", no "hold the flowers like this," no "look over here," during the dance. This means the story is told as it unfolds.
Anyway, I am honored to be part of the WPJA and hope to live up to their standards for my clients. I want the couples that I shoot to know that my style is that of a photojournalist. You get "Your Day" documented, from start to finish, in a photographic story, as it happens ... one frame at a time. Check their site and check my site and you'll see what this is all about.
Thanks, Tom
Welcome to the Tom Spader Photography Blog. I will be updating this with info of my work.
I am presently the head photographer for one of the Gannett NJ Newspapers. My work can be seen daily in the Ocean County Observer, based out of Toms River and the Asbury Park Press, Gannett's prize NJ paper, based out of Neptune.
Twenty years in the daily newspaper world has seasoned my photojournalistic skills and I am now using them to document the wedding day of selective couples looking for that non-posed, non-set up, formal type of wedding photography. The years shooting everyday, capturing moments as they happen, has prepared me for this growing trend in wedding photography. View my gallery and you'll see what I am talking about.
My wedding work has become my passion. It's such a pleasure to shoot at events were you are welcome. As a newspaper photographer, you are usually not very welcome, to the point where threats of violence, arrest and a lot of "please don't take my picture" are the norm. But, those years working that attitude has taught me to be in the right place at the right time, know my equipment and to always be ready. It has also taught me to see every scene as it own slice of life that can be captured, with an artistic touch, and shared for years to come.
That's a brief intro to where I'm coming from. Check my site. Contact me if you think I have what it takes to document "Your Day, as it happens, one frame at a time."
Thanks, Tom
In the near future I will be offering portrait sessions. More often than not, the camera will be aimed at the kids.
