Sheyanne Petrovich, a senior from Oregon majoring in social work, said she started taking pictures when she was in high school, but in the last year she has started a full-time photography business. She credits her husband and a life-changing trip to China for inspiring her to make a career out of what used to be a hobby.
She said the people and the moments she captures are what motivate her to stay in the photography business. “You can feel overwhelmed. Instagram is a huge part of being a wedding photographer. Instagram can affect your self-esteem and self-doubt. There are times where it’s like, I don’t know if people like what I do.
“But every single time I send off a gallery, I get an email back where it’s like, ‘Oh my gosh, we’re going to treasure this forever. We’re so grateful for you.’ It’s gratifying, and it helps you see you’re making a difference in someone’s life. Because I did that for them, they’re going to have these memories forever.
“I love helping people, and I started to realize photography was a way to help people, and it made me happy.”
Jackie Tapia, a recent BYUH graduate and long-time friend of Petrovich, said, “I feel like she has always had this talent, but she’s never been brave enough to come out with it. Now she’s being recognized, not only in Hawaii, but around the world.
“She definitely has her own style. She loves couples. I think the great relationship she’s had in her marriage has allowed her to see that in other people’s relationships. She is very raw and she likes to show how real people are. She doesn’t try to fit an image, but create an image for the people she is shooting.”
Tapia explained how Petrovich fell in love with photography when she went to China to teach English with her husband. “When I met Sheyanne, she wanted to go into fashion. She loved designing clothing. I remember she would sketch a lot of things. She got married, and they immediately moved to China. When they were in China, she started photographing a lot. She started photographing landscapes, the city, and the kids.
“Even then she was good. I could see she had an artistic eye. When she came back a few months later, she just wanted to experiment. She asked if my roommate and I could go to the beach and have fun, but she would take pictures of it. Every time you are in front of a camera you can feel intimidated that you will have bad angles and bad shots, but since the first time she shot me I felt so comfortable. She was friendly behind the camera and she just made you laugh the whole time. It didn’t take her long to have a new creative idea on the spot.”
Petrovich said she was able to upgrade from a basic camera to a high-end camera for very cheap while in China. “That motivated me to start shooting so much more. For the six months we lived there I shot every single day. I was so happy.”
She said originally, she would photograph whatever she could get, but she soon realized she felt most inspired when she was shooting couples. “With couples I felt like I was doing my best work.”
She said she is different from other wedding photographers because, “I’ve noticed a lot that in the industry you want to have the perfect photo. Weddings, for example, you want to have the perfect arch and the girl in the designer dress. For me, my perfect is a couple who loves each other.
“My signature thing is the brides that tell me, ‘I’m really awkward and I’m going to need your help.’ I make those brides who feel like they’re super awkward see how beautiful they are just being natural, because I’m not forcing them to do a pose they would never do in real life. My photography is very real. It is them how they actually are.”
Speaking to her growth as a photographer, she said, “The things that made me grow were my first [photoshoots] that were just awful. Nobody teaches you about posing, so I would have them do those awkward poses. I would go and edit the photos and they would be super tense; their hands are in fists. I shot a lot of my friends for practice, and I would look at the photos and think, ‘That’s not them. I don’t feel like that’s who they are.’ Messing up really motivated me.”
Tapia explained how Petrovich has grown as a photographer and a person over the last year. “She is more confident in her own work. At first, she was very nervous about portraying her work to the public, but now she knows what she’s doing and she has more confidence in the skills she’s had all along. She’s always been capable of it. Every photoshoot is different. She’s creative according to every person she shoots. She tailors to the needs of the person or couple she photographs.”
She shared how on the night of her engagement, Petrovich was there to capture the moment, but captured so much more. “Every time I look through my proposal pictures, I relive the moment. I know in pictures you're supposed to remember certain things, but you really do remember more than just the picture with her photography.
“That day of the proposal, I didn’t know she was there. She was hiding. She kind of disappeared as I remember that moment, but she was able to capture everything I wanted to remember in that moment.”
Petrovich said her husband is one of her biggest supporters. She said he helps her remember how happy she is when she is shooting when she is overwhelmed and questioning if it is worth it to continue photography.
After she graduates, Petrovich said she hopes to continue to do photography forever. She explained how it is a very flexible profession, and it will allow her to be around for her future children.
Writer: Haeley van der Werf