Today we’d like to introduce you to Christopher Wells
Hi Christopher, 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 I grew up in a suburb outside of Detroit, Michigan actually. Detroit, in this time, was an interesting place to grow up because it is a city that, at one time, was one of the economic powerhouses of the world, but after the automotive industry left, it now is a place where every street corner shows a memory of what was once a booming, modern metropolis and is now a bit of a ghost town. Tall, gothic skyscrapers filled with empty units and entire neighborhoods filled with these huge 1950s houses that were all completely abandoned, burned down, and boarded up. Growing up in and around this definitely had an impact on me. Actually, I think everyone who was raised in that area, inherited a sense of despair maybe, but we Detroiters also have a sense of just put your head down and work through anything that makes us very resilient people, I believe.
Anyway, growing up there I actually developed a real love for the city of Detroit and found inspiration among the wreckage in that place. That was where my journey as a creative began as well. When I was around 17, I started making short form video content, mostly abstract stuff just playing around and teaching myself how to use programs like photoshop, aftereffects and other editing software. It was just for fun until I decided to submit myself into the admittance process for a major art school in Detroit, which is one of the most prestigious in the country actually. I didn’t have a portfolio ready for them to review with my application so I locked myself in my room for a week and created 5 little videos that I felt just represented where my skill was at that time and just decided to just submit and see what would happen. I went in for the interview and sat there watching it with the interviewer and can remember feeling really unsure if what I made was any good or not. They must have seen something in it though because they not only accepted me into the program but offered me the maximum available credit with a merit scholarship based on the work I had done. I actually was going through some personal life problems at the time, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to even go to college at that point, but I was so encouraged by that result that I decided start marketing myself as someone who knew how to edit photos and videos and started looking for gigs and work wherever I could find it. I did everything from editing videos for other videographers, shooting weddings and events, directing and producing music videos, and eventually landed on real estate and architectural photography as my niche and that is what I am doing today!
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?
It has not been a smooth road. Like I said about growing up in that part of the country where the economy was not good at all, it was also during the financial crisis, that followed 2008, when I was first starting to look for work, so really as far back as I can remember I just felt like I was in stressful financial situations and always kind of struggling to make ends meet. In parts of the country where poverty is a big problem you also get a lot of other problems that are kind of like side effects that come with that. One that hit my area really hard was the opioid epidemic. I had a lot of friends go down that road after high school, and in the first half of my 20s I had just lost my father to alcoholism and then lost my best friend in an alcohol related accident, and then for a few years after that it seemed like friends were just dropping like flies all around me in my area. So, I experienced a lot of loss in my early life as an adult and eventually found myself in a place where I, myself was really lost, and just kind of without any direction or purpose and felt very alone in the world. One thing that stayed with me throughout all this though, was I always had a sense that there would be better days ahead and there was a better life out there for me if I could find my way through this dark time. I became very set on doing whatever it took to create the life I wanted for myself and decided to not become a victim of my circumstances.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
So now I really only do real estate photography. I found this niche a few years ago and right away kind of fell in love with it. I have always had a great admiration of architecture and design and when I discovered that I could use my skills as a photographer and video creator to help with the process of marketing and selling houses, I felt like I had finally found my space where I could get really good at this thing and it’s been really fun to get better and grow my customer base here in Central Florida. I think I am known for taking exceptionally good photos of interesting houses. Most real estate photographers go for a more technical approach, and I see a lot of listings end up looking exactly the same. What I try to do is to use more advanced photography techniques to capture a sense of what the house makes you feel like. I believe that when people are house shopping and looking at listings, and they see really powerful photography, it makes them feel more connected to the house and allows them to kind of envision how their life could be there.
Are there any apps, books, podcasts, blogs or other resources you think our readers should check out?
Jordan Peterson, his podcasts and his book “12 rules for life” have been really powerful for me, especially when I was in tough times and needed to kind of pull myself up and rebuild. I love comedy podcasts too, my go to ones right now to have on in the background while I’m editing are Kill Tony, Flagrant, and Theo Vons show.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://epixhomephoto.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/epixhomephoto/
Image Credits
Christopher Wells
EPIX Real Estate Media
