Meet Autumn Stankay | Photographer

We had the good fortune of connecting with Autumn Stankay and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Autumn, why did you decide to pursue a creative path?
My life has always been destined for a creativity. Daily tasks as a child were always made easier for me when I made it more creative, fun or outside the box. In 1988 I got my first camera, I was six. I valued every click on that shutter and was sure to savor every frame on the roll of film. I didn’t needlessly snap everything I saw like most children with a first time camera. I made that roll last for weeks, finding just the right thing to capture. It was just a little over a decade later when I got my first non-plastic (LOL) camera that would take me into my career. As a high school student, I excelled and was expected to pick a four year college based on my grades. But nothing interested me, except the idea of being paid to turn my hobby into a career. So a life in photography as a career was born. I knew that my life would be fulfilled if I could be creative on a daily basis. Aside from that initial reason to pursue this career, I found a silver lining shortly after opening my doors in 2004. This was the beauty of being a business owner, and thus in control of my time and my life. I found this incredibly empowering and the freedom that has come from that in my life is something I would never give up. And now in my young 40’s I can look back and see my 20’s and 30’s, although difficult at times, to be the best life I could have lived. I look forward to the next few decades of continuing my craft and improving myself as a photographer and business owner everyday.

What sets you apart in your industry?
My photography began in the dying age of film, so my first year in business was when the very first digital SLR cameras became widely used and affordable to the world. In those early days of digital professional photography, it was uncharted waters to a certain extent. There were not social media platforms yet, so it was a point of time where old-school marketing and advertising was still number one but beginning into the new marketing ways of being spread by social networks. In fact, portrait studios with film were phasing into digital so everything was changing in the art of photography as well. Cameras were different, lighting was changing from flash to LED, and more. It was ALL new. Prior to this crack in the timeline of photography, a portrait session was photographed on a roll of medium format film with just 10 shots on a roll. So the typical smile-at-the-camera portrait was about all you would get. Staged, stiff posing was the norm. But suddenly there was a new way of shooting, that did not cost money on every click. This meant that candid style photography and more experimentation was able to unfold. Then, there was the most obvious change in photography – we could now see the image as we photographed it. That enabled us to challenge our minds with endless creativity and not worry if we mess up, or need to change the lighting over and over to get it right. This led to the boom in photography, the number of photographers grew by an enormous margin. By 2010, the competition in my field was nothing like when I started and social media suddenly was the way to let the world know you exist. For me, I was ready to embrace it all, but knew that the way I began marketing myself would always remain most important – which is networking. Getting to know my community through volunteer work, networking, and old fashioned referrals through knowing the people I live and work around. This is truly what built my career and still keeps it going strong today. As an artist, I am set apart from my current competition because of the history of learning on film, growing through the changes in the industry, and shaping everything I photograph through that lens – no pun intended!

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
I am based in a smaller community outside of Pittsburgh, PA. If I had a friend visiting us, I would spend a day in my town of Greensburg visiting our local coffee shop and privately owned favorite restaurant in downtown next to our courthouse. A small walk around town to visit some shops, our amazing art museum, and meet the great people who run the businesses here would follow. On the next day we would venture east for at least two days to the Laurel Highlands, just a half hour from here. In this beautiful part of Pennsylvania you can see famous sites like Frank Lloyd Wright’s Falling Water, and parks like Ohiopyle known for white water rafting. We could bike the Allegheny Passage, hike the mountains, or stop in the town on Ligonier. Recently voted top small town in America. Before ending the week with my visiting friends, I would take them just 40 minutes in the opposite direction of Greensburg to downtown Pittsburgh. Showing them the history of Pittsburgh would entail a ride up the incline to Mt Washington, a visit to Point State Park, a walk through the Strip District, and some off the beaten path stops like the Andy Warhol Museum or Aviary.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
My husband, Bill, deserves so much credit for where I am today, he is my high school sweetheart and was my boyfriend at the time of me trying to figure out where to go in my life. If it weren’t for him encouraging me to pursue this career, I would not have had the courage to even try. In 2004 It was a very different field from today. Film photography and portrait studios were incredibly difficult and expensive to start up, as opposed to today where picking up a digital camera can almost qualify you as a professional without much instruction or experience. Bill gave me the support I needed to be confident, and push through times that seemed hard to continue moving forward. In addition, he jumped right in to help as my assistant for many years and learned photography himself so that I could have a wonderful team of two to provide my clients exceptional service.

Website: www.skysightphotography.com

Instagram: @skysight.photography

Linkedin: Autumn Stankay

Facebook: www.facebook.com/skysightphotography