Meet Shannon Evans | Dallas Photographer

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

Hi Shannon, looking back, what do you think was the most difficult decision you’ve had to make?
The hardest decision I make over and over again is the decision to say “no” and stand firm on my boundaries. Obviously a main goal for every business is bringing joy and quality service to your customers or clients. However, bowing down under pressure or allowing for boundaries to be crossed breaks trust and can sometimes reduce the overall quality of service in the end. Saying “no” and sticking to simply offering what I know I am able and advertise to do saves myself, my current clientele, and any future clients I might work with!

Can you give our readers an introduction to your business? Maybe you can share a bit about what you do and what sets you apart from others?

Shannon Evans Photography officially began in the fall of 2021 right after moving to Dallas. I applied for an LLC, got approved, and poured more of myself into this love of mine. Up to this point, photography had been more of a hobby for me. It was something my husband and I enjoyed together every now and then as I was a busy full-time Speech-Language Pathologist in the hospital setting. There was never time for my dream until now. With babies of our own, time is still limited. I desire more for this business in the future, but for now I love our children and revel in all opportunities I am entrusted with to take pictures for families like mine around Dallas! 

Recently I’ve been booking more maternity and newborn photography sessions and I think with me being a newer mom myself I’m really able to connect with these women, their families, and the unique needs of being a parent. It’s one thing to be a good artist, but to be able to connect and empathize with another is truly priceless. It’s more than just a perfect picture, it’s the whole experience and the connection from the start that matters the most and makes that picture mean so much more! I’m excited for relationships built and just getting to love on more moms and their families as they try to slow down and soak in as much of the new life they hold in their hands as they can. Life rushes us along all too much and for a second, these families can tune out and simply gaze into the beauty and miracle of the life God created through them. Then, they get a snapshot of them making that memory that they can keep forever so what’s better than that!?

If I’m honest, there are 1,000 photographers in Dallas that are probably better at the business side of things than I am. I don’t have much of a background in business so yes the business world is a huge learning curve I’m often struggling to trend over, but it’s super rewarding in the end. I wish the business side of photography didn’t take up so much time and all I had to do is what you see on Instagram, but you have to work for what you want!

The main lesson I’ve learned so far relates back to the question about the hardest decision I make, which is saying “no” and holding fast to good boundaries. I’ve learned the hard way what not saying “no” is like and usually it means working for little to no money, longer hours, and simply an inability to completely make others happy. In the end, I’m an artist with a specific style and skillset and can’t stress the importance of doing your homework on your photographer if you are a pursuing client. Look at the work they are proudly showing off. This is a photographer’s best stuff! So, if you have hesitations about what you see or want a different style, keep looking until you find one that suits you vs. asking a photographer to try and copy another photographer’s style.

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?
Great question, I feel like the options are endless. Where to begin? My husband, Trevor, and I met at a coffee shop and one of our favorite things to do still is try new shops together. When we moved here, someone gave us a huge list of places to try and that’s what we did for the first few months after moving to Dallas until…. LDU Coffee. Quite frankly I have no idea what LDU stands for, but if you haven’t been to LDU Coffee, I think you need to stop what you’re doing and run don’t walk to go try it out! It’s that good. We also really liked Serious Pizza in Deep Ellum and it lives up to it’s name because it’s freaking amazing and is some serious pizza y’all. You should see the size of those pies! If your’e looking for a healthy church, look no further than Watermark Community Church. There’s always something going on there throughout the week and if anything, they have a huge cafe area and a lot of people in the area come for coffee, hangouts, meetings, to work, etc.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
Man, this one took me a minute as I thought back on how many people have played even just a small role in the process. I won’t be able to cover or name them all, but more recently it has been a former Dallas photographer, Harlee, who owns and operates her own business, Lane Gray Photography, out of Lubbock Texas now. I met Harlee in passing for the first time at a friend’s wedding in early 2020 before the whole world shut down. I didn’t know her and wouldn’t really come to know her well until much later, but I remember seeing her and her second shooter arrive on the scene and thinking “Man, someday I want to be doing that. I want to be doing what she’s doing right now for my friend on one of the most important days of her life!” Fast forward about a year and I’ve now hired her to take my own maternity pictures for my husband and I. I thought, “I want to pick her brain. Maybe she’ll even let me tag along sometime to some of her sessions if I ask her!” I did pick her brain a little bit about what camera she had, how long she’d been a photographer, etc. but I did not ask to tag along. She hardly knew me and she was currently on the job working on what I had hired her for – maternity pictures, not a business deal. I admired her work and followed along online until I moved to Dallas in August 2021. At that point she had already left the area, but was still coming back for weddings and other sessions frequently. I knew I needed to ask her to mentor me and had nothing to lose, but maybe my pride if she said she didn’t offer mentorships. To my surprise though, we both communicated that we felt like God had given us some nudging in this direction. For me, I felt like now was the time to really go for it and invest in my desire to go bigger with my photography business and make is less of a hobby. For her, she felt God encouraging her to share more of her knowledge with others and give back in a sense she just didn’t know what that looked like. Since then, I’ve joined her for several weddings and bridal sessions and have learned so so much! So, thank you Harlee for letting me come join you and for giving me what you can. It all counts and makes a difference in my life as a young business owner.

Instagram: @shannonevans_photography