Category Archives: Photo Shyster

Photo Shyster: Luminus Photography in Dayton, OH, Lumitouch in Central Florida aka Tanya & Josue

Gallery March 3, 2020 photostealers

Website: https://luminusphoto.com/
Luminus Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/luminus_photography
Lumitouch Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lumitouchcolor/
Light it Up Workshops: https://luminusphoto.com/workshops/
Wedding Wire: https://www.weddingwire.com/biz/luminus-photography-dayton/9ca2f3a400dfb177.html

THIS PHOTOGRAPHER HAS NOT STOLEN PHOTOS

This is yet another submission for the Photo Shyster division. Buckle up because it’s a freaking ride.

Luminus Photography used to go by Carter Creativ and was a photography and cinematography team of Tanya Carter and Orlando Maldonado. While they advertised themselves as a “husband and wife” team, they were never married, only engaged.

Tanya is a MagMod Ambassador and Luminus as a team has a series of workshops they are booking for 2020. Tanya was also featured as a “How I Shot It” photographer on the MagMod You Tube.

Currently there are about a dozen photography and videography clients waiting for products that I am aware of, potentially more.

There are also photographers and videographers who were hired as additional staff who were not paid. Often these photographers were sent in without letting the clients know in advance and their work was not equal to the work Luminus advertised.

They are also booking workshops and advertising themselves as a team but according to both Tanya and Orlando, they have split up and are no longer in business together.

The more and more I’ve dug into this mess, the more apparent it has become that it’s a dumpster fire.

What spurred my decision to make a post is that one of the clients affected by this debacle originally hired another photographer I featured here – Choose 21 – and hired Luminus after reading that Choose 21 was no showing/not delivering files/had stolen content making up their portfolio.

If you want to kick me a dollar to help keep this site running (really it just goes to my lawyer lol) click here. If you want to support this site through Patreon and get early access to blog posts and more click here.

Update 3/5/2020 – I feel like this guy right now trying to explain everything that has happened with this company. Updates are at the bottom of the post.

Update 3/26/2020 – No videos have been delivered, communication is minimal at best and often coming via group chats with Tanya, Orlando and Trevor from MagMod. Click the update to go to the details.

Update 1/20/2022 – No clients that I am aware of ever received their products and the ones waiting for refunds that hadn’t received them yet from Tanya never got them.

Apparently now Tanya is ‘tiktok’ famous for being in love with her son’s friend. They go by Tanya & Josue and have been featured on Snapchat’s “Love Don’t Judge” series.

Also, sadly, some clients chose to believe Tanya when she informed them that I was lying and booked her for weddings after this post went live. They are also now joining the other clients from this post waiting for their products. For one wedding she ended up taking photos on her phone because her only memory card ‘failed’ and she missed a lot of photos when she went to the store to buy a new one. No professional photographer should EVER shoot a wedding with one card on hand. Ever.

At this point in time, as far as I am aware, there are still clients from all the way back to 2019 waiting for images and/or video.

If there is interest I can add to the bottom a bigger update detailing more of what has gone down since the last update here in March 2020. Just know if you’re reading this, per Tanya, you are a demonic follower of mine. Welcome!

Continue reading Photo Shyster: Luminus Photography in Dayton, OH, Lumitouch in Central Florida aka Tanya & Josue →

Photo Shyster

Photo Shyster: Amy Rushbrook aka Life: Unmade in Melbourne, Australia

February 13, 2020 photostealers

Website: http://amyrushbrookphoto.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/amyrushbrookphoto/

THIS IS NOT A PHOTOGRAPHER WHO HAS STOLEN IMAGES

This is another entry into the “Photo Shyster” division as she has allegedly been not delivering images to clients and not delivering goods for workshops that have been purchased.

Since there are many prongs to this story I’m going to attempt to separate them as best I can.

This is a VERY long read without photos. However, I had to be wordy to properly cover the story in full. Scroll to the bottom if you are a victim and want to know what you can/should be doing to protect yourself going forward.

Update 3/1/2020:

I’ve been meaning to update this post since more has been brought to light. Updated to add photos, more details etc. since it was claimed I didn’t have any proof this happened.

While I do have the multiple conversations that have taken place privately with Amy’s victims to back up my words I am not posting anything that hasn’t been posted publicly, especially since someone has begun to threaten me over this post.

I am willing take the fall for this and don’t want anything else to happen to the victims who were brave enough to come forward. Please know I wouldn’t go forth with this post without ample proof this is what is taking place.

Continue reading Photo Shyster: Amy Rushbrook aka Life: Unmade in Melbourne, Australia →

Information, Photo Shyster

Fotofigo Photo Editing

November 20, 2019 photostealers

Website: https://www.fotofigo.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/fotofigophotoediting/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/fotofigophotoediting/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/fotofigophoto

This is allegedly an online digital photo editing company.

Under their table of contents on every page under “Navigation’ they have a “List of Photographers” which one would assume means this is a list of photographers they have served. At the top they claim this is just a collection of the best of the best but they have dozens of photographers listed with a gallery for each. In my opinion, they are alluding to these photographers using them by the way of the navigation, but they are attempting to skirt the issue by saying it’s a collection of the best photographers. Either way they are using their images without permission.

Many photographers I have reached out to have never heard of the company and never used them. They are also allegedly putting some images in galleries for photographers that the named photographer didn’t take. They haven’t had permission to create any of these listings from the photographers I have talked to so far.

To see if you are a photographer listed on their website go to this link: https://www.fotofigo.com/list-of-photographers

If you are one of their listed photographers and want your information taken down you can file a copyright takedown notice with their web host here: https://www.ovh.com/world/abuse/. Also make sure to document the theft with screen captures of your listing.

Please let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.

Photo Shyster

Photo Shyster: Jaime Lynn Photography in Flint, Michigan

Gallery March 20, 2019 photostealers

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Jaimelynnfoto/
Website: http://www.jaimelynnfoto.com/

THIS IS NOT A PHOTOGRAPHER WHO HAS STOLEN IMAGES

This started as one person posting their story of what they’ve endured after allegedly attempting to hire Jaime Lynn for a session and turned into a mess as more and more clients and fellow photographers chimed in with issues they’ve also had with Jaime but kept silent about because Jaime knows how to play her victim card well.

Since the reason for this blog is to protect photographers AND clients from hiring photographers who are not what they present themselves to be online, I decided to make an exception to the copyright infringement rule.

While Jaime Lynn is currently based in Flint, Michigan, she also has previously lived in and worked out of Omaha, Nebraska and Guadalajara, Mexico so I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s more stories to be told and people who are owed money and/or photos which is another reason I decided to go ahead and blog this so that there’s a central location to collect these stories.

Also, it’s my blog and I do what I want. 😝

Click on the case # for the screenshots or links about each incident I summarized (not all have them). In short, there’s a lot of people that Jaime owes money to or has left high and dry on wedding days. If you have a similar story to tell let me know and I will add your story to this post. I know these aren’t the only stories to be told.

Continue reading Photo Shyster: Jaime Lynn Photography in Flint, Michigan →

Lost Cause, Photo, Photo Shyster

CJ Photography aka Ryan Christoph Images AKA Chris Jones AKA White Anchor Films in Georgia

Gallery December 20, 2013 photostealers 3,131 Comments

Click here to go to the latest update (2/6/2020)

This one is probably going to ruffle some feathers as people are going to have opposing views on whether this is full-on theft or just a bit shady. Since more than 80% of the image (often near 100% of the image) is not CJ Photography’s original work AND since he’s presenting the image as entirely his own (without permission, I’ve checked in with the original photographers and outside of the stock agencies he’s not been granted permission to use the original works in this manner) I’m going ahead with this.

CJ has got some attention recently from running a camera giveaway that involved a like-a-thon on Facebook and his images caught a few people’s interest because they didn’t look natural although CJ claims them to be. Note that most of the images you are to share to win the camera aren’t his but that fact is buried but is there, kinda, so I’m not listing them. Combined with the fact that he’s less than a year into the business things started popping in people’s heads and at least two people have investigated and brought some info to me.

CJ aka Christopher Jones posts quite a lot of amazing images yet dodges every singe question about where his location was and how he found such amazing light. Instead he talks about his one-on-one classes he offers to learn how he works. This is what finally sent me to post here as I hear he runs a newbie photographer group and sells his workshops to them. Folks, you aren’t going to learn how to shoot like this because the shot is a composite that is heavily photoshopped. This isn’t out of camera work.

Yes some work here IS stock but some images he used are NOT stock and he did NOT get rights to use the images. Nor does it sound like he licensed them correctly but I am awaiting on replies in regards to that. I have been in contact with all of the photographers and most have got back to me already stating that Christopher Jones did NOT have permission to use their images in this manner.

Update 4/2016: Scroll to the bottom for the 4/2016 addition of the Ava Ryan Photography chapter to this book. TL;DR: Chris and his wife Erin are now running a company called Ava Ryan Photography. They started offering editing classes to photographers and opened up a mentoring group. People connected the dots as to who Chris is and have posted about it online. Somehow this was my fault. Now Erin is claiming that Chris has nothing to do with Ava Ryan and it is her business alone despite him using the Ava Ryan account to post as himself, he being included in the “About Us” page and multiple of Chris’s images being on the Ava Ryan galleries.

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This wall of shame is dedicated to photographers that feel that it's okay to steal others' work and post it as their own. Oh I'm sorry, it's okay to let their "web designer" do it.