Meet Dylan Burr | Photographer

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

Hi Dylan, what role has risk played in your life or career?
The way I think in terms of risk is what am I willing to lose completely. What am I really risking for this? In terms of starting my own business and doing my own thing, I think it was rather low risk. I didn’t go into debt buying all the expensive gear I read you need. I started with what I had and as I developed my technique certain things made sense to buy cause I actually used them. I rented and tested before buying. I sell what I don’t use. All while only buying things I need and can afford at the time. Being debt free is a key. In the beginning I was only comfortable risking my time. I made some good money doing an architectural gig and was offered a spot in a very popular art gallery downtown that I had to pay for the space and materials. I had always wanted to get my work in a gallery and thought it was worth the risk to use the architectural gig money to pay to be in a gallery for a year. Did it pay off? No. Well, sort of. I made some great connections, got to try and test my theory about gallery work, and most importantly… I learned a TON! Nothing is worse than always wishing you should have tried to do something. Now, on the other hand, I could have certainly just paid to have my work in the gallery without that big gig. But that would be real risk. I would be burning money I didn’t have in hopes of making some in an avenue that I really can’t control. That takes money away from my family. A risk I am not willing to make. Calculated risk.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
Woah that’s a loaded question. I guess it depends on what you are asking about: my wedding photography, portraits, wet plate collodion, animation, my music. I have my hands in a bunch of things. Some of them make money, others don’t. They all tend to have some overlap into each other and definitely compliment each other. I think what helps me as a creative is finding inspiration in all sorts of things and deep diving into them and exploring. Then taking what I enjoyed from that and putting it together. Its always good to build. develop and add new skills. Was it easy? Some of it. Unless the payoff is great enough I generally will just move on and take what I can from the experience is something is hard or I just don’t enjoy it. If my heart isn’t into something its not worth forcing it. It kills my creativity and motivation to do anything. What I have learned along the way is to follow your heart and listen to your mind. I had a band in Chicago and we did some great things and learned so much. We worked really hard with it for a number of years trying to “make it.” Only to realize that wasn’t what we really wanted. We met many famous and well known musicians and talked with them about their lives and how they made money. Most were scary stories about lives I didn’t want to lead. Many still had full-time jobs and ones they could quit easily to go on a tour in a van for a few months. I wanted a family and be a full time Dad. I wanted better stability than that. It felt like a weird game of luck to be “discovered” and many of those bands who were on labels and had bunches of fans and played festivals were still struggling and broke. So my music is something I do for me and if something bigger comes from it, great! But I am not going to sacrifice the important things in my life in something I can’t control or have an affect on. I really love photographing weddings and portraits. I get to know my clients, we become friends and I get to create personal work that means something to them and their family. Something lasting. I am fortunate enough to get paid to do it. It never gets old or less fun. I also love staying in touch with my couples and photographing their new families and see their kids grow up. Something I didn’t anticipate but really enjoy.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
Well lately I would take my best friend out to play Disc Golf. I picked it up during the Covid shutdown and I’ve lost my mind. So we would hit up a few courses around Denver here and maybe a few in the mountains for some high mountain fun. If I eat or go anywhere these days I want to be outside… its going to be a bit of a bummer this winter I am sure.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
When I was starting out I jumped into all things photography to learn all I could. I went to photography meetup shootouts, I met with a few smug mug groups and met some very key people, and met with some long-time photographers in my area at the time. Darby Mouritsen of https://www.darbym.com/ was one of the first great people I met and really helped me. She ran the North Denver SmugMug group. We would meet once a month or so and share work, challenges, have some speakers. All sorts of stuff. It was really good to get out of head and meet other people and get their advice. It was also good for motivation and good competition. Darby and I have worked a lot together helping each other when we can and became good friends. Its sort of a shame the groups died. They really helped me. Another photographer I met was Jack Dean. He mainly did senior portraits at the time and he really gave me a good deep dive into his process. Again, just good to see how someone else set up their business. You never know what little nugget you will take away and apply to yourself. The downtown Denver SmugMug group was great as well. I met several great people who I ended up working with and became good good friends. Always great to have people to bounce ideas off of who will understand and give you good perspective. Sarah Roshan, Meredith Harris, Ryan Murphy, Addison Gumbert, Laura Pearson, Lily Black, Jason Grubb, Travis Broxton, Jason Kim, David Townsend, Jensen Sutta so many

Website: https://www.dylanburr.com, https://coloradoportrait.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dylanburr_weddings/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dylanburrweddings/
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCyJ1k2Sff6sXJNbgc5q6J8Q?

Image Credits
Dylan Burr, Ryan Murphy