Julie Gayler
With a strong entrepreneurial spirit, Julie’s early career spans a variety of start-ups and support in various fields, including teaching, animal science, paralegal and autism therapy.
She formally opened her photography business in 2009, beginning her journey with landscape photography and exploring many genres over the years. She has years of experience with portraiture, documentary, weddings and events, real estate, and conceptual photography. This experience gives a powerful perspective for her work to express the many unique viewpoints and styles of her clients.
As a former military spouse, she has moved to many locations across the U.S. Her husband of nearly 12 years committed suicide in 2017, and she has become a passionate advocate for mental health, among creatives in particular.
Her greatest passion is building community and teaching others. This has transformed into coaching, supporting and encouraging a community of authentic support in the photography community called Seven Rising Studio.
She currently resides in Little Rock, Arkansas, but regularly travels across the United States for commissions and seminars. Currently she has been teaching off camera lighting to other photographers with the Speedlight Fundamentals team, with over 50 seminars to date.
You can find her at home in the country most days as a full-time homeschool mom to her four children (ages 14, 12, 10 and 7), and chasing their myriad of chickens.
Jean Prince
I’m a farm girl that grew up thinking that using the camera was for special family events and to get current photos of loved ones you didn’t get to see very often.
This was my thought process until I was middle aged and going through a divorce. I knew I needed a hobby to build myself back up so I chose Photography. I did my research on what kind of camera I could afford and decided to check out a Nikon and a Canon camera at our local photo store, Nikon won out and my photography journey began.
I joined a Photography Club in Little Rock, Arkansas called Arkansas Outdoor Photography Club (AOPC). The AOPC has meetings once a month and at that time had field trips every month. I learned so much from the members of this club and made lifelong friends. As I grew in my photography journey, I realized that I loved Wildlife photography. I grew up where hunting was a part of life to provide meat for our family, so I knew what it was like to be a hunter and just applied this concept to my Wildlife photography.
As time went on, I learned different genres of photography. As long as I am breathing, I endeavor to continue to learn more about all aspects of photography.
I love to chase the light to get the photo that I see in my mind. I will return to the same place at different times of the day and year to see how the light plays around my chosen subject.
My photography journey started in 1972 at the age of 11. I had a chance to develope and print a roll of B/W film and became hooked when I saw the image on the paper come alive in the developer.
Photography classes in high school, reading the Time-Life series on photography, reading magazines and trying to duplicate their photos formed the base of my knowledge pryrimid.
Now, well into digital photography, I continue to learn new and creative ways to make an image. Thats right we make images. We have a subject, and idea and a process. We put all of this together and create something special, we hope, to be shared for years.
I am always seeking a better image, chasing the perfect picture, hoping to catch the perfect light, the perfect shadow.