I met this photographer at the new Paris easter charity event. I donated $35 to get one 8x10 and then we ordered pictures after the fact. I finally got the pictures the other day and angry, so angry in fact it woke me up this morning and now I'm leaving my first review on anything ever. We arrive for our appointment at the fire house, we are directed to the room where we will be getting pictured and I met the photographer. The photographer felt like an ametuer, we just pointed at the backdrop and said over there. I ran my own photo shoot, how am I supposed to do that from the lens side of the camera? He offered zero direction to pose us for portraits. He just stood there and pushed the shutter button, I could have got the same pictures with a timer and tripod. After I tried to direct us blindly thorough the photo shoot, he asked me if we were done. A photographer needs to direct his portrait subjects, this photographers specially seems to be active "in the moment" shots, not portraits. I left feeling very disappointed and worried I just paid $35 for garbage pictures. That was the scope of his work, now on to the business part. A couple days later we got the water marked pictures, I only had 7 to choose from even though he took more. I know he picked the best ones, but they are my pictures and I should get to choose what is best. Well we made our decision and placed the order. It took a week for our transaction to be denied, we resubmitted with no changes in our end and then he finally took him money, but I had a whole lot of anxiety about how not legitimate this photographer seemed. Next on to the product. Our $35 donation afforded is 1 8x10, and my wife purchased a package as a father's day gift, so I'm unaware of how much they cost. So I was suppose to get: 1 8x10 (free with the donation) Package, on a separate picture 1 8x10 2 5x7 8 wallet Well the wallets and 5x7 were off the right picture, but the 8x10 was the same as my free one, meaning three sent me three wrong 8x10 and sent a duplicate of one I already had received a few days prior as my free one. The whole this felt so ametuer and unprofessional that I didn't know he had 20 years experience until I looked him up. None of that experience show at all on any of my levels of interaction with this studio. Was he not taking his work seriously because it was charity work? We paid him for pictures after that so he making money on top of whatever the firehouse paid him. I went in expecting a cheap photo shoot, like the worse experience from sears or something, but It didn't even live up to the garbage I was expecting. I will be calling the fire house to tell them all of this as well so this doesn't happen again. I wonder if I'm alone in this experience, or if this is how he runs all his business practices. All I know is I'll be avoiding Joshua Smith photography like the plague. With the outfits, donation, and picture pack we bought, my wife spent over$150 on this for my father's day gift, not counting framing and mounting. This was my first father's day gift I had ever received and this studio ruined the entire event for me. read more