Today we’d like to introduce you to Justin and Rickelle Hadley.
So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
Rickelle: We met at a bar. Justin was taking pictures with his hat and his mustache (two very prominent things about him at that time that really stood out to me), and I was watching him in aggravation because I had no idea who he was or why he was there shooting. A friend was performing with his band and I thought he hired some other guy (Justin) to shoot his show. I let it go. Three months later, the same friend was playing another show and I saw the same guy running around with a camera, hat, and mustache and thought, “What the hell?!” I approached Justin and asked him if he was a paid photographer there for the band (he later told me that he thought I was trying to hit on him). He said no, that he just likes bringing his camera around with him (which he still does to this day) and that my friend is his friend too. Feeling a little more relieved that my friend didn’t venture out for another photographer, I explained to Justin that I was a photographer as well. He asked me what kind of camera I had. “A Canon 5D Mark II,” I replied. That camera was newer and pretty great (he later told me that when I told him what kind of camera I had, it intimidated him). He then handed me his business card and asked for my card saying we could check out each other’s work (I later told him how that intimidated me because I had no business cards at that time and all I could give him was my name). However, he found me, we dated for a while, got married, went into business together, and here we are.
Justin: That’s very much how it happened. And I’m still pretty sure she was hitting on me.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
The beginning is never smooth, is it? The beginning to now has been a pretty typical series of events and yet very scary at times! First, school, which has ended up being more so a financial challenge than anything. Then, Justin was working for an editing company for a few years. When that company was bought by another who decided to have the editing done overseas, they told Justin they wanted him to be in more of a customer service type of position. Justin parted ways and we decided to go head first into our own photography/editing business instead of looking for another place of employment. It was super scary! We worked from home for three years and we ended up with so much editing work, we rarely had time to shoot and we were really missing it. We reached a point where we either needed to scale back the editing side of our business to make time for shooting or we needed to expand the editing to a point where we could hire a couple of people to help with some of the workload so that we could spend more time shooting. We chose the latter. Now we have a studio on the Marietta Square (another large, scary step for us) where we have enough room for a couple of computer stations and an area to do some shooting.
We’d love to hear more about your business.
Justin: We’re really all about storytelling. Stories are at the root of who we are and what we do. There is this compulsion that we feel to make compelling images. Rickelle sometimes will see an interesting location and can imagine an image with an accompanying narrative that just needs to be brought to life. It’s that same spirit that we bring to our commissioned work. Whether it’s a band, a theatre company, a real estate firm, a hair salon, or just a headshot, there’s a story in there.
We’re really proud of the fact that our individual strengths complement each other’s so well and our ability to play off of each other’s ideas really helps to flesh out a solid concept. While we haven’t really made any clearly defined roles for ourselves in our company, Rickelle usually finds herself playing more of the artistic director while I’m more on the technical side of things.
What were you like growing up?
Rickelle: I was a tomboy: I loved to climb trees, dig up rocks, catch bugs, roller skate, and ride my bike. I also hated dresses, though dresses are my favorite now! In middle school and high school, I ran around with disposable cameras. Sometime in high school, I got a Polaroid camera. I have always loved taking pictures and setting up interesting scenes to shoot; however, acting was my first passion. I did theater and small tv/movie roles for years and went through community college on an acting scholarship. I love mixing the idea of the theatrics with photography: the scenes, the vibes, different eras, etc.
Justin: I was all about comic books as a kid. I read them, I drew them, I collected trading cards, and I watched movies and TV shows about them. It’s hard to describe what my personality was like when I was younger, but I like to think I was pretty cool. Don’t we all, though? Maybe that just means I was naive. I don’t know. I DO know that in high school I realized that I liked punk rock and (pretending that I was good at) skateboarding and complaining about how much my parents didn’t get me (typical), which means I was about as cool as a 16-year-old could get. My coolness aside, reading those comic books and creating some of my own has had more of an impact on my life than anything else, I think. It’s where my urge to create and the bulk of my inspiration is rooted.
Contact Info:
- Address: 142 S. Park Square Suite C
Marietta, GA 30060 - Website: www.hadleysphoto.com
- Phone: 404-731-4006
- Email: info@hadleysphoto.com
- Instagram: Justin: justinmakephoto & Rickelle: rickelle_yeah
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/hadleysphoto/
Image Credit:
HADLEY(s) Photography
Dena Cox
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