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Rangefinder
Magazine Generation Next by Lorraine A. DarConte
“I got into photography because I didn’t want to be a parachute rigger,” laughs senior portrait photographer Ralph Romaguera, Sr., who joined the Navy with his best friend in the 1960s, and convinced the recruiter they knew something about photography to avoid jumping out of planes. “No way were we jumping out of any planes that could land on their own. We BS’d our way into the Navy [photo department], came out [educated], went to work for the local newspaper, then started shooting weddings as side jobs.” Romaguera opened his first portrait studio in 1971. “ We now have three studios and a lab. I’m in one studio with the lab, and the boys (his sons Ralph, Jr. and Ryan) run the other two. I have four awesome kids,” notes Romaguera, “two boys and two girls. We are primarily high school senior portrait photographers, plus we shoot events like proms, football teams, etc.” Romaguera and family are contract photographers and have a regular, yearly client base of approximately 1500 students. “New Orleans is a wonderful place to be in the school contract business because there are many private schools, and those are the types of contracts we mainly deal with. Where my mama bought an 8x10 of the tux and cap and gown shot, it’s almost impossible not to buy today’s expanded folio.
“ Today,” explains Romaguera, “senior portrait photography is much like a fashion modeling session. The students bring their cars, cheerleading outfits, ROTC uniforms, and other clothes [to pose in]. We usually schedule about 15–20 minutes per outfit. Two outfits are what we call the ‘basic session.’ It’s nothing for a senior to spend $600–$1000 on photos. Packages start in the low $100s and go up, in our case to $999.” Romaguera’s studios are 100 percent digital, and they have their own digital lab. “We use Kodak and Epson products and we are totally self-sufficient. We can print anything from a wallet to a 44-inch-by-whatever size print. We mainly use the Kodak 760 camera but we’re excited to see what the new Kodak 14N can do for us. We’re in the testing stage now and plan to buy a few more soon. One thing that’s really nice about our studios is we can work both indoors and outdoors. A lot of the students prefer the casual outdoor shots. Ryan’s studio is the biggest facility with a 50 x 50 camera room (with a mixture of Photogenic and Norman lighting equipment). We have a variety of indoor and outdoor backgrounds—and variety is the key.”
As contract studios, the Romaguera’s don’t do a lot of marketing. “We target a few schools and send out images so they can see the type of photography we do. Our direct mail, instead of being generic for the whole city, is targeted toward specific schools. It’s a great, fun business,” concludes Romaguera. “And it’s awesome to be working with your kids.” However, there are both pros and cons to working with family, though for the Romagueras, the pros outweigh the cons. States Ralph, Jr., who joined the family business at age 13, “When we’re sitting around the dinner table, we tend to talk business. We are together more than the aver-age family, which can be a pro and a con. It’s hard to separate business and pleasure sometimes; they tend to overlap, which can be a disadvantage because business takes precedence even during vacation,” adds brother Ryan, a full-time photographer for the past four years. “But you always have your family to count on when you’re in a jam,” says Ralph, Jr.
“ Being in the family business is nice and comfortable,” continues Ralph, Jr., who learned 90 percent of his photography skills from his father. “Dad’s the one that goes out and finds all the new toys and gadgets then comes back and teaches us. The other 10 percent I learned from classes, seminars and lectures.” Ryan came into the family business after college. “I’ve been shooting full-time for a little over four years, but I began shooting in high school.” Ryan studied business in college, with no immediate plans to go into the family trade. “There was an opportunity that presented itself at one of our studios for a fulltime photographer and I jumped on it. That was my way in. Plus, I had the opportunity to manage my own studio operation. I also learned hands-on from my father, plus attending seminars and programs like my brother. The good thing about having a father as a mentor is I have a teacher constantly correcting everything I do—mistakes and all, which puts me at a huge advantage over most photographers,” states Ryan. “But I still take courses and pursue competitive photographic competition to better my photography. I’m always trying to pick up things from other photographers; by no means do I know it all. I’ve only been in the business four years and am still scratching the surface.” As for the future of the Romaguera studios… “We’re still growing,” concludes Ryan. “I see [the business] becoming more and more profitable.” Lorraine A. DarConte is a freelance writer/photographer living in Tucson, Arizona. Her work has appeared in numerous publications including, The Rangefinder magazine, Studio Photography & Design, Newsday, and Tucson Visitors Guide.
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