Meet Olivia and Bryan McCracken | Wedding and Elopement Photographers

We had the good fortune of connecting with Olivia and Bryan McCracken, a wife and husband team, and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Olivia and Bryan, what is the most important factor behind your success?
The most important factor behind our success is that it never was about the brand. We’re relationship driven people. It has always been about the relationships.

As a child sitting on the kitchen floor with sunshine streaming through the windows, I (Olivia) pull out piles of old family photos. I would sit there on the floor for hours. Lost in in the nostalgia and the moments frozen in those photos. Those kitchen floor photos are part of my family’s legacy.

Now, Bryan and I create those moments of nostalgia for others. We truly invest in each of our couples- getting to know if they prefer The Office or Parks and Recreation, understanding if they are introverts, extroverts, or somewhere in-between, and even meeting them for drinks where we don’t talk about anything to do with their wedding day. Truly learning what is important to them in everyday life enables us to capture the feelings, not just pretty pictures, on their wedding day. The feelings frozen in a photograph is what leads to nostalgia.

That’s where the success of our business started. We understood nostalgia and legacy. It’s the combination of those things and of us desperately wanting that for others that has enabled us to be where we are at.

We’re in a beautiful position because of our passion of creating a nostalgic legacy for other people. So their kids can one day too sit on the kitchen floor reliving or seeing the story of the people they love most.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
Something that sets us apart from other photographers is that our focus is the real, authentic moments. We don’t do stiff posing. Rather, we set our couples up to simply interact with each other. And THOSE are the moments we capture. We’ve heard time and time again that people are drawn into our images because of how they feel like a little sliver of time was captured. We’re proud that our passion for evoking nostalgia is forever frozen in these photographs. And the best part- we get to do it together as wife and husband!

The years that we struggled most is where we compared ourselves to what other photographers were doing. Envy turned to frustration about why we weren’t getting more weddings. We had our eyes on everyone else rather than focusing inward we hit absolute rock bottom. Our envy of others literally led to Bryan having to donate plasma as a means to afford simple groceries. Meanwhile Olivia would scrape under the car seats for spare change in order to tick that needle just to the right of the E on the gas gage.

That rock bottom led to a nationwide move from Bryan’s home of Colorado to Olivia’s home of Wisconsin. It was humbling. If it weren’t for the generous love of and support of family, we never would have been able to leave. It was in Wisconsin that we finally had space to hone in on what we personally love doing- pouring into other people. We want others to feel seen.

With the help of an INCREDIBLE business coach (shoutout to Cassie Schmidt, Creative Business Coach and Strategist [and also one of most genuine humans we’ve ever met]) , she helped us realize that that love for others is our superpower. We didn’t have to be envious because we have something really special. Relationship centered shouldn’t just be reserved for our personal lives- that’s what the center of our business should be.

With that mindset shift we really began focusing on our love of capturing genuine moments for others by truly getting to know them for who they were, rather than worrying so much about crunching numbers or what others in the industry were doing. It was about the people, not the business.

THAT is what led us to where we are today. We’re incredibly proud that we now book out years ahead of time because couples are that genuinely excited to find someone who isn’t just there to take a pretty picture, but there to truly know them for who they are.

One of the coolest things about all of this is that clients fly us back out to Colorado- the place where we originally hit rock bottom- in order to capture their intimate, real moments. We’ve come full circle and I don’t think we’ll ever stop being humbled by that.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
We LOVE Manitou Springs. It’s charming and eclectic. It’s where we had some of our very first dates together. Though tiny, it certainly gets to be quite a tourist destination, so we highly recommend going on a week day or right away in the morning. One of our very favorite places in Manitou is the Mona Lisa fondue restaurant. We had gone there on our 6 month dating anniversary (approximately a lifetime ago) and their fresh salad with heavenly jalapeno roasted pumpkin seeds lives on our taste buds even to this day.

Ivywild school in Colorado Springs is a hidden gem that we cannot get enough of. It was once a school that now hosts a coffee shop with a bar for mixed drinks, the Principal’s Office. It even has a whiskey house and brewery. All taking place in the old classrooms with the same wooden creaking floors of the original building. It’s off the beaten track and is honestly one of the most unique places we’ve ever been too. Long hours have been spent there over coffee, drinks, and board games.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
Olivia- My brother’s wedding photographer- Kim Wilson. When I was 15 years old, my oldest brother got married. He told Kim that his little sister (me) had just gotten her first digital camera and asked if she had any tips for me. Bless Kim’s heart because through all my photos of my dogs in the backyard, she somehow saw that I had a big heart for capturing moments, not just taking a pretty picture. She brought me on board as a second photographer at weddings and I instantly knew that’s what I wanted to do – tell someone’s story. Even as an angsty teen, she took time to work with me, teaching me different types of lighting and techniques. But the most important thing I learned from her is to believe in myself. Don’t worry about what everyone else is doing; rather, hone your own skills.

Bryan – My one and only Olivia. She has taught be all that I know when it comes to photography. I started joining her as a gear assistant when we first started dating and from there I blinked and found myself with a camera in my hands commanding a wedding party to attack hug a beaming married couple on their wedding day. Olivia continues to blow me away at each and every wedding. I’ve been along with her at almost every shoot for the past 8 years and I can say without a shadow of a doubt is that Olivia is constantly growing and ever changing, honing her skills every day. She inspires me to push myself with photography, my career and my personal goals in all the best ways possible.

Website: https://oandbphotoco.com/

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