Hello and welcome! My name is Becky McHaffie with Photography by Rebecca McHaffie. For this first video/blog, I just wanted to introduce myself and give you an idea of my background and what I do.

First and foremost, I am a wife and mom. I met my husband in marching band my freshman year of high school. He was a junior and had a job at the local grocery store, which made him just about the coolest person ever. Fast forward to now, we have been married for 18 years and have 4 kids, ages 15 down to 9.


My kids are the reason I got into photography. I started off taking my boys to JC Penny and Picture People once a year for photos. Not knocking them at all, but once baby number 3 rolled around, it was HARD to get them in for photos. I had a Nikon Coolpix of some sort at the time and took a ton of pictures. My husband thought I could do a good job on my own, so he upgraded me to an entry-level DSLR with two kit lenses. He found a Black Friday Best Buy special and brought me home a Nikon D3300. I still have and love this camera, and you will see it in upcoming videos and posts.


While teaching myself the camera and surviving the day with 4 young kiddos in the house, I also made the insane decision to go back to school to SLOWLY finish my business degree. I received my associate's degree in 2019 and then FINALLY completed my bachelor's in 2023. The pandemic led to a full-time day job I didn’t even know I wanted. A friend of mine said, “Hey, don’t you have an associate's? We need paraprofessionals.” This started off my career in education. I have been working as a special education paraprofessional in an online school for ALMOST 4 years. I LOVE my job! I work with special education teachers to support our students inside of general education classrooms. I have also just begun work on my Masters in Instructional Design and Technology.


All of these things come together with my photography. My favorite types of photography are families and children. I do family portraits. I do a little volume photography in the form of preschool and youth sports leagues. I have also done a little food and product photography.


Here is my disclaimer going forward for the rest of my videos and posts. I am not a tech expert! I am mostly self-taught when it comes to photography. I learned through YouTube videos, blogs, some paid courses, an in-person course at my local community college (side note, check into your local community college because these are a GREAT way to get started).


What works for me MAY not be the CORRECT way. I am always learning and improving my knowledge of photography! I am open to any tips and tricks and knowledge that you would like to pass on to me! I am also open to questions! I will do my best to dig and find answers to help! I am so excited for you to start your photography journey with me!