Career Deep Dive #5: Industrial Photography
So Tara, how did you get started in Construction photography?
I did a little bit here and there because I was like, “oh, wow, that's so cool.” It didn't really like process in my mind so much about it, it took a couple more times of me taking some cool photos to be like “oh, wow I can take really cool photos”
Wow what a crazy way to stumble into it.
I just went to social media with it and I started posting my photos and I never really told stories about any of it.
I love that. Now Is this your full-time gig now?
Yeah, It's what I do full-time. I wanna say I've been doing this for seven years and probably the first two years I still worked at other places.
I knew in my heart this is where I wanted to be, it felt like a dream that I could never really attain. Luckily, I was able to get hired onto a job that I've been on for four years. And that's the MCTC job in San Diego. Stacy and Whitbeck was the contractor out there that hired me.
That's incredible! What did that job consist of?
It was a 12 mile long trolley with bridges and railroad just a gnarly, gnarly project. And they hired me to document 329 workers printing 8x10 photos of each worker. Then it became all their crews and then all the subcontractors and just progression photos. It just developed from me shooting the workers into the whole thing and we've been working on a book for that project, like a yearbook style book, like a coffee table book. Yeah, It's been incredible.
Did you reach out to them? Or were you just posting stuff and they reached out? How did you get that first big job?
LinkedIn was that kind of my “in” with the contractors and stuff. One of the guys with Stacy and Whitback reached out and asked if I could put a proposal together for working down in San Diego.
It really just started as photographing just the workers. And it really, it just developed into a four year long project.
From almost the ground up it's been so amazing. But I've done like five or six stadiums all in California. Yeah, a lot of topping out ceremonies, which are always really cool to be invited to.
How do those go? I imagine they are a massive party! I mean, you have to be proud of what you did right?
Those are fun and can get wild! I love topping out ceremonies. It's just food usually, the contractors feed you and you all sign the beam and then they raise the last beam and put it up there!
Lemme transition to this: What does a day look like for you? Is every day different?
Every day is actually different. If I'm going out in the field I'm up at 3:30 in the morning.
I get all my camera gear together. Depending on where I'm going and how cold it's gonna be, I grab my cold gear. Then go to the job site. If there's a safety meeting in the morning, I’ll attend the safety meeting.
Otherwise I just start shooting as soon as I'm on site and bullshitting with the guys a little bit so they know I'm there and taking their pictures. I mean it's, I don't know, it's hard to describe.
Yeah, I know. Cause in my head, I imagine it's like right place, right time type thing
Yeah I'm just constantly going. Like it's really rare that you see me sitting in one spot for too long. I don't ever try to do that unless I want to get something like some video or something. And I just do the whole span of the job site.
But I am constantly on the move, constantly trying to get different angles and views and who's doing what and where are we at, where can I go and where can't I go? That kind of stuff
Are there many people doing what you're doing? It seems pretty niche, but it seems like a really cool niche, right? That I think a lot of people should explore.
It's funny, when I first started doing this, I had a couple people ask me for advice on how to get on a job site. I'm like, all right, this is what I did. But it helps to know people though.
There are no other ironworker daughters out there that do what I do. That is dedicated to just the trades. Because of my background and my family and where I come from, that in itself, ain't nobody out there like that.
That's a great selling point! Now let's get into retirement. Being self-employed, what does retirement look like for you?
Luckily when I was working for the union, I did have a pension there that is still there and I'm not putting into it anymore, but it still gains interest.
And, so that is part of retirement. It's not much, but it's something. But currently, I don't have a plan.
Hey, and that's alright! That's what we're trying to bring to light here is the pitfalls with self-employment. No one is perfect, but you gotta keep your eye on the ball at the end of the day
I love what I do and I wouldn't change it for anything. I wish that I had all those benefits from when I was in the union. But when you're a small business owner like I am. It's hard, I don't have a boss that tells me to do anything.
Cause there's plenty of opportunity to create retirement in what I do. I try to like, try to explain this to people, like I'm singing and dancing and playing the guitar and the drums at the same time. I’m the whole band!
But I wouldn't do it if I didn't love it, and with retirement, God, that's such a good question. You're gonna really make me put to action now on my retirement!
I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that! Let's put it this way, what do you envision for the next five years? Do you ever plan on being able to hire somebody and then you could divide and conquer?
That's a tough question.
I actually fear that. This is not something that I would just send anybody to go do, period. You have to have the right head game and physical game to be in it, and I trust myself.
People know me and they rely on me for that. I know my shit, and that I'm not gonna walk out onto a job site and “Joe” myself up and then sue somebody cuz I just hurt myself on their job. You know what I mean?
Those thoughts screw with me a lot because all of that comes with more insurance. I do have those aspirations. I would love to be bigger. I would love to have all those things but, that fear of like liability because this is dangerous shit.
Gotcha, so let's get to the uncomfortable part, money! How much were you able to make in your first year in business? How much can someone expect to make now that you're experienced?
I think someone like me could definitely make a fuck ton of money.
I'm not kidding. What I've made, Yeah. When I first started, I made 50,000 my first year. And then the following year I made almost 90,000. Then Covid hit, right? And that kind of screwed up and slowed things down for me. But things have definitely picked back up and were in the swing of things.
There is a huge potential to make money in this industry though.
Wow, Just in your first two years to be able to pull that off is incredible! Hats off to you. If somebody wants to follow in your footsteps how should they do that? What pitfalls should they avoid?
I would say stay out of politics. I would say stay away from that kind of stuff because really it could be damaging. Yeah, absolutely. Local unions have a lot of growth and power depending on who you're dealing with. And I don't know, I don't wanna say too much, but I've definitely had some interesting experiences.
Just, it's a lot of hustle, constant keeping up with your clients and. I generally don't solicit my work. It comes to me. When I first started, I was soliciting a lot of work and I got rejected a lot, and that hurt me personally.
It really affected me. It was hard. It was weird to comprehend because coming from working in an office to then being self-employed, self-driven. No one's telling me what to do anymore. Like I gotta tell myself what to do. And yeah, having that ambition and drive is so important.
I am always curious about this. How do you handle your Work/Life balance with your job?
It's tough. I'm a single parent, so I rely on my mom to help me out a lot and it's a give and take situation here. It works out pretty well until we all get sick and then that sucks! It's a difficult one to juggle as a single parent, trying to run my own business and still go pick up my kid and be present and all of that. It's a struggle, but we've been able to just maintain it and I have to save my money accordingly too.
I can't spend my money like it's coming in all the time, being right self-employed. I'm relying on these contracts with these clients or contractors or whatever. It's a lot to juggle.
Tara, thank you so much for coming on and telling everyone your story and really peeking behind the curtain a little bit. I will be following you closely and look forward to seeing you grow.
Of course! Thank you so much for highlighting my story.
Website: https://ucp.photos/
Instagram: @UCPtara
