Life & Work with Jake Schneider of Dayton, Ohio

Today we’d like to introduce you to Jake Schneider

Hi Jake, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
Yeah! I started way back in High school with a Canon AE-1, just taking snapshots around town and of random things! I did step away from film photography for a year or two, but in 2020 I really got back into it. So much so that I started taking professional photos in 2021! At that time, 100 percent of my work was on film, but thanks to the Darke County Parks earlier this year, I signed a contract to be their photographer. Which has opened so many doors and has helped me step out into the community! I’ve met a ton of people who have shared their stories especially when I carry my Leica with me! With the change in my practices, most of my film photos are for my personal projects, and my digital work is for the paid gigs!!!

It has been a crazy 3 years since really working on composition and framing has changed my photography, also all the editing from those photos has made me a better photographer!

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
The road has been a bit rough, I think most of it had to do with my personal opinion on myself. I didn’t start sharing my photos until late 2022-early 2023, I was always afraid of critique, but I found with attending a local photo club that I should have been attending and sharing my photos a lot sooner. I learned so much from those other photographers!

Another struggle I had was getting in the door, a lot of places around the town I live in don’t have nor have the budget to have a photographer on staff, and a lot of photographers around the area already have the gig that they have been working at for years. It’s a challenge, but I try to make my work stand out from the other guys!

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I’m a professional photographer! I specialize in analog photography! I’m known for walking around town with my Leica M3 and for my black and white photographs!

What I am most proud of? I’d have to say the support from my friends and family, since really working on my photography the support has been unreal! I’m so proud of the friends that I have and the supportive parents backing me up! It really means the world!

I think what sets me apart from the others is my style, I really embrace Robert Capa’s mentality of ” If you’re pictures are not good enough, you aren’t enough…” I like being in the middle of it all, I like the upclose wide angle shots, makes you really feel apart of the scene.

How do you think about happiness?
What makes me happy is the act of taking the perfect photo, going home, developing the roll, and seeing it appear on the negative. It’s truly magic that we are able to capture these images on physical mediums. Really brings joy every time I have the opportunity to capture these moments, I’m very lucky!

Pricing:

• Portrait Work $250 per session
• Event Photography $350 per event
• Photojournalism assignments *E-mail

Contact Info:

• Website: https://sites.google.com/view/jake-schneider-/portfolio
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jakesphoto_/
• Facebook: https://m.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61563766810776