Today we’d like to introduce you to Ashley Peralta.
Hi Ashley, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
So about 8/9 years ago, I actually became dual licensed as a Cosmetologist/Barber and worked in salons for almost five years. I feel like that really cultivated a creative side of me and has actually come in handy a few times on wedding days. Eventually, though, I realized that my passion wasn’t doing hair, so I had a few odd jobs for a little over a year while my husband Manny was pursuing his creative interests with Photography and Film.
The first wedding we ever did, Manny needed a second shooter so he set me up with his camera and told me when/what to film! Over the next couple months, we practiced a lot, we did a lot of free couples sessions, another wedding film, and our third wedding was for photo and video. I had to take lead on photo and Manny took lead on video, and I think that’s when I started realizing “hmm, I think I actually really like this.” I didn’t like it enough though to edit, I still had my own job with secure income, and I was just helping him on the side, not only with photographing and helping handle paperwork stuff. As we did more and more weddings, I started to really develop my creativity and take more of an interest in everything involved in our business.
So October of 2019 is when I started editing all my photography, and I learned and grew in my skills fast. At first, I was using Manny’s presets, but the more I edited, the more I experimented with different colors, editing styles, etc. until I found my own style. I’ve also experimented with family sessions, maternity, birth, portrait, real estate sessions and more, but weddings are my true passion. I feel most in my zone and happiest working when it’s a wedding day.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
Definitely not a smooth road. I mean, we’ve struggled in probably every aspect at some point along the way. There’s struggling to learn and perfect your craft (which is honestly a constant struggle), you should always be trying to get better to improve. But that was a huge struggle for me at first cause I initially was just trying to support my husband in his goals, so I definitely took it seriously, but not as seriously as I took learning and growing once it became my passion, you know?
There were a lot of technical things I had to learn, and it was a ton of work on top of working a regular job. There’s struggles with figuring out how to do the whole paperwork side of things, taxes, learning the business side of things. There’s a whole lot that goes into owning your own business that we didn’t know about or think about when we first started. There’s been learning hard lessons with clients who weren’t really the best fit for us.
And then to be super honest, there has been some really difficult moments for us just because you’re working with your spouse. You live together, you chill together. And you not only work together, but you’re “in the trenches” together trying to build a successful business with little business/marketing knowledge.
We’ve done a ton of work to build our communication as a couple and as business partners so that our lives can go smoother. We also have a toddler, she was born early 2019, and we actually went full time running our own business when she was two months old. So that added a whole new layer of struggles and stress, but she also gives us incredible motivation too.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
Iz and Liv Films is our company, we specialize in capturing high-end outdoor weddings both in photo and film. We’re a husband and wife team, so Manny does the video work and editing of the highlight films, and I do the photography. I typically take care of client communication, so I’m the main point of contact before and after the wedding, and I’m always available to our clients. We do lots of texting, not necessarily just about photo/video topics, but I love our clients, and we really are like besties on a wedding day, so I try to help out with anything and everything that I can.
We’re really good with helping our couples personalities shine through in their photos and highlight film. We do a lot of prompts as opposed to strict posing, which allows for tons of movement in photos, and allows our couples to just interact with each other as they normally do. We want to capture THEIR love, not a “perfect pose”. We are experts at making our couples comfortable, we really take pride in knowing that your photos are going to come out beautiful because when you shoot with us, you’ll forget the camera is there.
I think I’m most proud of the experience that we deliver to our couples. We try really hard on weddings days to not be controlling, and still speak up when needed to move along timelines, or get friends and family to cooperate. But we also have learned when to be flies on the wall and just capture the raw moments as they happen without interfering. We absolutely love the candid shots because those raw emotions when people aren’t worried about the camera is when we have often captured the most moving photos/video. That’s what we love.
One of the biggest things that really sets us apart from others is that we have a really solid team behind us. There’s a group of people we have on hand that we use on wedding days who aid in helping us to help our couples have an even smoother wedding day. On top of helping us with our stuff, they’ve carried purses, held phones, moved things from point A to B, gotten drinks and more.
Is there any advice you’d like to share with our readers who might just be starting out?
Seriously, just practice, practice, practice. Offer Free Sessions. Research and soak up all the information that you can. Offer to work for free with someone else. Create good friendships and Ask for Help. We’re self taught, we have a “YouTube education”. So we’ve both spent countless hours upon hours researching our craft, watching videos, practicing, learning by trial and error.
We’ve done a lot of free work in order to practice what we’re learning. Working with others for free or for cheap is great because you get a chance to work with different personalities and different styles of work, and you can also build really good working relationships that way too.
I’m honestly really grateful that Manny had already been doing photo and video for a couple years before me, so I almost had my own personal mentor. But I really wish I had been able to get out of my head earlier on, and know that I’m only going to get better by doing. You have to be bad at something before you can be subpar, and you have to be subpar before you can be really good. It’s okay to have to improve your skills. And when you make mistakes, it’s really hard to accept, but you’ll probably never make that same mistake again, so it’s a really good learning point. Literally, just do it. Keep doing it. Soak in information and apply it. You’re going to learn from every single session you do.
Contact Info:
- Email: izandlivfilms@gmail.com
- Website: https://izandlivfilms.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/izandliv_films/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/izandlivfilms/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/iminnaband1234/videos
Image Credits
EllaLu Photography Manny Peralta
