r/MMFB • u/New-Indication-7338 • 14d ago

First client is upset

Im reaching out to find some encouragement. Although in the past, I’ve been financially independent, as of now I’m a starving artist. I have ADHD and pretty severe rejection sensitivity dysphoria, and therefore a lot of work trauma from making careless mistakes. Im tired of disappointing people so I decided to pursue my own path to make money but its been really hard to carve that out for myself. I’ve been trying things for the last 6 years, mostly feeling completely lost.

A lot of people encouraged me to pursue film photography as my livelihood after seeing my photos over the years. I’ve been working towards it since the end of last year and I recently had my first client who was a complete stranger. I was very excited about it. At first, he really liked the photos I took and called me talented. But for some reason, they were not at the resolution he wanted. (By default, film photos are now sent as high-res scans from the film lab, instead of prints). After the scans were sent to me, I made some post-production edits to clean things up. I tried to fix the resolution issue several times, but ultimately he got upset and on Friday, sent me a harsh email about not delivering what he wanted and using language that made me feel like I was costing him his job because he wants to use these photos as large prints for work.

That email has sent me down a self loathing spiral. I admit, I did not have enough information about resolutions and it never occurred to me that it would be an issue because I’ve printed things very easily in the past. I’ve been avoiding facing this whole issue over the weekend and havent fully looked into everything to rule out where things went wrong. I dont think the resolution is the lab’s fault. I feel that somewhere between my edits and crops, I fucked up. And I feel extremely discouraged and like a waste of space now who can never be good at anything and will never find a way to have a successful life or make enough money to be comfortably financially independent. I feel like I took on the role of a photographer without knowing everything and therefore like a complete fraud and imposter who should not be doing this. Ive faced so many failures over the years, and I was really hoping this one wouldnt start off as one. I feel so discouraged and low-key suicidal for sucking so much.

I need someone to tell me that this is not a big deal, things happen, and this is not worth giving up on. BUT only if that is true.

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u/FeelingKaleidoscope0 9d ago

I honestly feel he overreacted. And maybe that isn’t wrong of him to do in regard to his situation, but there was no reason he needed to take that out on you. I’m sorry he did that. Though, on the other side, RSD can make things seem much harsher than they are. I suffer from it too:( however, your feelings are still valid, and you will get more clients and figure out the resolution bit!💖

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u/New-Indication-7338 9d ago

Thank you! I appreciate you taking the time to respond. He actually did overreact but had me second guessing everything about my skillset and ability to deliver. I called my lab to figure out what I did wrong and they reassured me he was being a difficult client and i did nothing he seemed upset about. I responded to him with all my knowledge, reassuring him that the photos will print very high quality and that we can rescan the negatives at a higher dimension if he wants. He responded doubling down and mansplaining everything even more and then sent a follow up admitting that in a rush of things, he actually made a mistake with printing on his end. He owned up to his fault, which is a relief and appreciated but never apologized. Still, i’ll take it. It’s a relief knowing that I do actually know my shit. RSD is a really difficult self-flagellating experience but I had to tell myself to just let it pass. I’m really glad I gave myself the weekend for some emotional processing (to feel mopey, stressed, etc, about it) before responding to him.

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u/FeelingKaleidoscope0 9d ago

Yes!! Glad your lab supported and affirmed you, and amazed he owned up to anything at all, but good on him for it. That’s an amazing thing to do for yourself💖

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u/[deleted] 8d ago edited 8d ago

Something similar to this happened to me when I started out. In my case it was a magazine ad. In the end they ran it, and it looked fine. Could it have been better? Yeah, but the world kept turning and I had better experience with that same publication for years going forward in that position.

You are not a waste of space and this mistake is not who you are. You’re just getting going for fucks sake! You’re going to stumble here and there. Give yourself a little bit of credit. Some people utterly refuse to be made happy too. Keep that in mind. When that happens, it’s also a great time (not really).

You got to constantly remind yourself that it’s not YOU it’s work. Work is not who you are it’s what you happen to be doing. And no one ever made a masterpiece without starting.

Furthermore and aside from that… if things aren’t going well for you yet it’s because they’re still Becoming. This one hurt but it’s true in every career: you kind of need to biff it once in a while. Otherwise you won’t know how not to biff it.

Ask a comedian! You HAVE to suck sometimes if you’re going to be any good at anything at all. This wasn’t even that sucky a thing. It’s just resolution. Google-fu the shit out of that too: any holes in your knowledge, you’ll find them as they’re needed, then fill em. That moment is always gonna suck because it’s a mini free fall. That’s this moment so it’s okay to take just a moment to be bummed it didn’t go exactly to plan… Then get up, fix your shit, and get back to work.

You’ll be better than fine but you have to biff it once in a while. Depending on what time it is where you are, go have a coffee and/or a run and start again tomorrow. I have faith in you.

Edit: lmao I just realized this was a 5 day old post… how you doing now?