Daily Inspiration: Meet Ally & Andre Vega

Today we’d like to introduce you to Ally & Andre Vega.

Ally & Andre, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
It all started from a road trip we took back in 2015 to the Grand Canyon. Our love for traveling and documenting moments in our life quickly escalated to family and friends asking us to document moments in their lives. Our first wedding we ever worked was for a cousin who hosted a backyard wedding. I (Ally) helped Andre with posing and equipment which quickly led to us becoming a team. From that point on, we started to get more referrals, Andre invested in new camera gear and I learned how to use a camera to become his second shooter. Fast forward five years later, we are now a husband and wife photo+film team that have booked over 100 sessions such as weddings, engagements, lifestyle, family and maternity photos!

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
For the most part, yes! But nothing is ever perfect, am I right? Three years into our business, Andre was diagnosed with testicular cancer and everything sort of went on pause. No one ever plans for something like this to happen so when we found out, it hit us very unexpectedly. We weren’t sure how long or how bad it really was but luckily, the month he was diagnosed and had surgery, we had no weddings booked. Which helped out a lot because he was able to rest and recover without having to worry about anything business-wise. Financially, it did take a toll on our business and personal life but Andre never once complained. That’s just the type of person he is. Since then, Andre has been cancer-free for two years now and is stronger than ever! Other than good ol’ testicular cancer, other struggles we faced in the beginning of our business was building our clientele. It wasn’t until our second year in that we started to see an increase in referrals and bookings. But hey, we all start somewhere and we are super proud on how far we have come!

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?
We are a professional husband and wife wedding photography and videography team that captures life’s greatest moments and adventures. Although we take photos for family, maternity and lifestyle during wedding off-season, our specialty is wedding photography and videography. There’s something about meeting new couples and spending the day with them that brings us so much joy. What sets us apart from other professionals is instead of showing up to do a job, we do our best to experience the day with the couple and capture every moment as natural as possible. What we are most proud of is the relationships we build with our all our clients, often leading us to capturing their future life events (maternity & family). There’s nothing more rewarding than being trusted with these life events and hearing how comfortable we make our clients feel. Our clients really do become good friends of ours and we wouldn’t trade that for the world!

How do you define success?
We define success by happiness. Creating work that truly makes us happy has always been our number one goal. It’s too easy to get caught up in social media likes and follows but what really matters is that you are creating images for your couples and yourself. They are going to be the ones looking back at your photos for years and years as a source of joy and happiness.

Contact Info:

• Email: [email protected]
• Website: http://www.allyandandre.com
• Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/allyandandre/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuFi95z3MFuzG0wpzFM9YDw

Image Credits
Seth Sanker Ally & Andre Vega