Wow- that's a loaded question. There are actually a lot of challenges. Giving up your weekends, long days, heavy equipment, traveling alone, never-ending editing, quickbooks. But I think the most difficult thing for me has been balancing my business/passion with who I am apart from that. It seems extra easy in this profession to lose sight of anything else that matters in life and give everything in you to following this dream. It is super rewarding thus super addicting. I have had to be very determined to set aside time to focus on my marriage, my friends, my family. It's not easy, I struggle a lot. So that would be my answer.

Well my first handful were friends of friends who felt confident enough in me to hire me with no wedding experience to speak of. I charged them very little and did my very best. Luckily they were not total train wrecks so they referred me to their friends and it kind-of just flowed from there.

For me it wasn't much of a choice. I was so busy that I literally could not do both anymore. So I made the decision that if I wanted to be full-time I had to set my prices at what they needed to be to sustain a business (and pay myself a salary). Therefore once I felt confident enough to charge those prices I was able to quit my part-time job. It wasn't really a risk at that point because I had done the budget and knew I was going to be a-o-k. So many photographers price themselves arbitrarily or based on the competition but that is completely irresponsible. The only way to know you are ready to go full-time is to actually do the math. Hope that helps!

I actually don't pay a ton of attention to where I am pointing it, but its definitely not straight up and down. It's usually somewhere between 45-90 degrees. And I meter color at box speed. Hope that helps!

Yes, all of my canon lenses work great on my eos. The focus isn't perfect but it's not any more perfect on digi. Comparing the EOS to the Contax is tough because they are completely different formats. The Contax is medium format so the image quality and DOF is something you could never achieve with a 35mm camera. But I love both!

I don't do anything to my film in post besides maybe a curve adjustment. I love portra 800 so I have not really tried anything else in 800.

Well I always seem to have a few bags, but I bring two digital camera bodies and two film bodies. The 5d MKii, classic 5d, a Contax 645 and Canon eos. I also bring canon lenses: 35mm 1.4, 50mm 1.2 , 85mm 1.2, 135mm 2.0 and 200mm 2.8. Oh and the Contax has a Zeiss 80mm. I carry three Canon speed lights, two light stands and a whole bunch of batteries. Also more film than I will ever use in a wedding but better safe than sorry!

I'm sure there are. I'm a part of several groups but I wouldn't classify them as small or just for beginners. Try checking out some Flickr groups.

Nope, the only filter I have on any of my lenses is a UV mainly just to protect the lens from bumps, drops and scratches.

Sometimes.

When I first started I did get a bit carried away on processing because I was shooting all digital and shooting jpeg vs. raw. As far as style, I never set out to have a certain "style" I just photographed what inspired me and I still take that approach now.

Thanks, I actually get this question quite a bit, I'd say it's a combination of exposure, lens selection and composition. When shooting digital, I shoot RAW and do as little editing as possible, mainly just exposure and white balance if necessary.

Well I haven't seen digital processing that can truly achieve the same look as film yet but the new VSCO does a pretty god job. However, the depth of field of medium format and the exposure latitude film offers are a large part of the softness you are noticing as well.

Well I actually jumped in headfirst and bought the Contax as my first real film camera. Not long after, I ended up getting the EOS3 and I do use that with my 50 1.2 quite a bit!

Since I learned what it took to run a business I have always prcied myself based on this formula (gross cost of running my business for the year) divided by (number of weddings I can shoot that year) = price per wedding. I decided before going full time that if I couldn't book that number of weddings at that price then I needed to find another career. So for me, that amounted to a steadily increasing price structure that I have been consistent with over the past couple of years. As a result, I did not feel the need to increase my prices much to cover film. I look at my use of film for weddings not as a profit loss but instead as something I absolutely needed to do for myself and my clients. Constantly seeking to improve my craft and deliver the most beautiful images possible is my responsibility at any pricing structure and film helps me to do that. I don't really allow cost to be an issue. Sticking with my earlier decision, if my pricing doesn't afford me the opportunity to offer my best possible product, then I need to raise my pricing or quit. As far as how quickly I integrated it, it is still a process and currently, it's different for every wedding. If it's a daytime outdoor wedding I shoot as much film as I can whereas my indoor nighttime weddings are more of a digi/film mix. I really hope I answered your questions, I think the real answer just depends on where your pricing is currently and how you arrived there.

As of now I have not used it with film. I am not a fan of off-camera flash (on digital) because I have not had much luck with reliable remote transmitters. However, I did just buy some new ones that seem to work well so I may start to venture down that road with film. I do always make sure I have a flash on and off of the camera so I can slow my shutter to avoid the dark bottom as well as allow for plenty of ambient light.

I actually have not ventured too far into using film in this way yet. I dabbled a little with it at the last two weddings Ali Harper and I shot together and we just metered it in camera on the eos and with the handheld on the contax both turned out ok but I am not positive on our settings. Sorry, not much help there...sometimes the color of the light at receptions is just purely terrible. I think the LED does a pretty good job of overpowering ambient in a lot of cases but I haven't used it enough yet to say for certain.

Thanks! I sure did, thankfully I had a handful of friends who fielded some very amatuer questions for me as I was getting started. Sometimes it is as simple as which color film stock or scanner fits my style, best metering techniques for black and white film, or what happens when I accidentally forget what I rated the film at. That's why the best thing for me was going to Film is Not Dead because it opened up a huge network of people going down the same road, asking the same questions and those people are how I am able to do any of this.

Yes, I have only been shooting film since last summer. Client-wise, it's been somewhat irrelevant. Until very recently, no one hired me with the expectation of film in their wedding collection so it was up to me which medium I chose. I think to some degree it will be that way for a while as I have no plans to go 100% in either direction in the near future. They are booking me for a certain aesthetic and film simply allows me to achieve that more easily. Win for me = win for them. However, I have been very intentional about communicating why I choose to use film so most of them are almost as excited as I am about it.

The FIND lab is part of Jon's world but he doesn't actually process the scans himself. He has a team of expert staff who handle that for him. However, I do believe it is currently only open to past and future FIND workshop attendees.