by Liz LaBianca
Please welcome Tulsa photographer, April Nienhuis. In addition to her photography business, April is also a mentor at Clickin Moms, the Assistant Editor of the CMblog, and is available for custom mentoring sessions. April’s generosity and advice in this Photographers Who Inspire interview is great example of the resources available to Clickin Moms members. If you’re not already a member, be sure to join today.
Who was your original inspiration when you started your business? Who inspires you now?
Andrea Murphy (www.amurphyphoto.com) is and was one of my biggest inspirations. I second shoot weddings for her and not only is she a wonderful photographer but she’s also a fantastic business woman. She’s always generous with her knowledge and encourages me in business. Other photographers I love are Jerry Ghionis, Bobbi + Mike, Elizabeth Messina, pretty much all the photographers in CMpro, and so many others.
What was the hardest part of starting your own business? What do you wish you would have known?
Pricing. I spent so much time stressing over pricing only to realize a year later that I was charging way too little. I wish I had asked someone for guidance with my pricing and held off on business for another year or two so that I could better develop my skills.
Tell us about your favorite lens and why it is #1 in your camera bag over your other lenses.
The Canon 100L is my absolute favorite lens. Not only is it a great macro lens but it’s also beautiful for portraits. The quality, color, and contrast is superior to many of the other L lenses I’ve used. It doesn’t get near the praise it deserves.
Going Pro is the essential guide to leaping successfully into any genre of professional photography. Industry powerhouses Scott Bourne and Skip Cohen share invaluable advice on defining your niche, putting together a portfolio, pricing and showing your work, marketing, positioning your brand, and, most important, building an online social media platform from the ground up.
A personal and inspirational guide and adventure into photographing your family and inviting time to breathe, time to love, and time to embrace what you have. An invitation to explore your creativity, whilst also recording the moments that your heart tells you that you must.
A guide to the next big thing in wedding imagery that shows wedding photographers of various levels how to evolve past photojournalism to the higher-end, more stylised look brides want, with specific design, composition, posing and lighting techniques that makes any bride’s wedding photos look like the pages of a glossy lifestyle magazine. Thanks to 
Based on more than forty interviews with Jobs conducted over two years—as well as interviews with more than a hundred family members, friends, adversaries, competitors, and colleagues—Walter Isaacson has written a riveting story of the roller-coaster life and searingly intense personality of a creative entrepreneur whose passion for perfection and ferocious drive revolutionized six industries: personal computers, animated movies, music, phones, tablet computing, and digital publishing.
In The Gifts of Imperfection, Brené Brown, shares ten guideposts on the power of Wholehearted living—a way of engaging with the world from a place of worthiness.In her ten guideposts, Brown engages our minds, hearts, and spirits as she explores how we can cultivate the courage, compassion, and connection to wake up in the morning and think, “No matter what gets done and how much is left undone, I am enough,” and to go to bed at night thinking, “Yes, I am sometimes afraid, but I am also brave. And, yes, I am imperfect and vulnerable, but that doesn’t change the truth that I am worthy of love and belonging.”
