I started Photo Stealers before Google Lens was a thing and it was all due to my ability to be able to guess who the original photographer on a thief’s website was. While there are SO MANY new photographers now that it’s impossible I am still often able to do this with photographers whose body of work I’m familiar with.
Case in point, Brooke Mayo.
Brooke is not only an immensely talented and AMAZING human, she was my wedding photographer and who I looked up to SO much when starting out and through to today. I love her work and who she is.
So when I came across this website I didn’t have to Google Lens shit, I knew in my soul that this was Brooke’s work (of course the one image he didn’t crop the logo out of helped prove me right). I also know Brooke and I verified that Vincent Gross was not her employee.
I’m guessing that Vincent is rebranding from Outer Banks Photography to Duck Photography to get away from the bad reviews out there but who knows really the thought behind it.
Also fun fact, I’ve actually met this guy. His (ex?) wife was an officiant at a wedding I photographed in the Outer Banks and lets just say he didn’t leave a favorable impression.
Case in point of why I do what I do, when searching to find the source link for the first image on Vincent’s page, the source URLs Google comes back with don’t link to Brooke despite the image being on her homepage. Google thinks the image belong to Vincent and may be punishing Brooke’s page for the duplicate content even though it’s her image.
I don’t know what Vincent’s intention was here but it’s kind of creepy to use a Brooke’s images AND images OF Brooke and her family/children.
I couldn’t sleep last night because my anxiety over this stupid AEllis case has been keeping me up the the past few days. I don’t know why, likely because it’s about a year since he started his reign of terror against me, but it has been a rough go the past couple weeks.
Since I’m my own worst enemy I started digging into my messages since I was awake anyway and started working on a new post.
Most of the ads by this fauxtographer are using stolen images. The differences in the ad imagery and her actual work is notable.
The reviews aren’t all sunshine and rainbows either. One review pointed out Belle Grace Photography was late to a session and refused to refund and someone commented that they agreed. There also appears to be issues with their ‘membership’ for $150 and the scheduling of said sessions.
Once the post went live she took the Facebook Page down for a bit then reposted it with this post.
Update 2/25/2025 – Christina, the owner of Belle Grace Photography, arrived in the Facebook Post comments and she’s full of insults. Since she’s so full of justifications as to why she can steal images and is still posting them I am going to update the post with the new stolen images posted since her original post here.
Note: I do have sympathy for her dealing with a sick child but you can take care of the child and use your own images to advertise your mini sessions and not steal them.
When I start a post with so many AKAs known already you know it’s going to be a long one.
*nmp* is a new one to me for what I am assuming means “not my photos.” Even if it was widely known what nmp meant even spelling it out doesn’t matter – you can’t use photos to advertise your own work without permission from the copyright holder. Full stop.
There’s at least one post in a local group that was found with stolen wedding photos and no disclaimer about these not being her photos and I’m sure there’s more that I haven’t been sent (yet).
One thing I noticed when searching this photographer out is that she posts *everywhere* so check your local Facebook Groups to make sure she’s not in there. She’s based in North Carolina but I found posts in Pennsylvania, New York, Montana, Tulsa, Colorado, Tennessee, Salt Lake City, Pensacola, Chattanooga, Outer Banks, basically everywhere in the United States she’s in a local wedding group.
While the copyright infringement is the main story here, there is also a side story that Courtney allegedly has a history of not delivering photos/is slow to refund and is why she’s changed her business name in mid 2023 after conversations like this popped up in local groups. This story is at the bottom of the page with the update.
Update 1/29/2024:
It turns out the above was just the tip of the iceberg and there’s a lot of people out there who have had issues with Courtney.
In summary – she has allegedly canceled many times on clients at the last minute for boudoir sessions and weddings. She has allegedly sometimes sent in subpar photographers but sometimes she hasn’t sent in anyone at all. This girl allegedly gets covid a LOT. She allegedly rarely delivers albums. She allegedly owes a LOT of refunds.
She also posted this as an excuse before unpublishing her Facebook page.
Update 2/14/2025: Southern Silos Photography by Courtney Smith was not deterred by her post here and unfortunately has continued on.
Today I was notified that Boston’s 25 news has posted an article (and also aired the same) about a couple in Boston who hired Courtney for $1200 which was to include the travel from North Carolina. They mention Photo Stealers in the article! Anyway, the couple hired Courtney who called shortly before the wedding claiming that she ‘accidentally’ booked her flight for the wrong year and she ended up hiring another photographer for $700. Unfortunately she didn’t pay the photographer she sent so those images haven’t been sent to the client. What a mess.
After seeing the article and recognizing the name I looked Courtney / Southern Silos up on Facebook and there’s been a few posts since my original post about her from various clients.
Allegedly she’s rebranded to ‘Bloom Again Photography’ which still, at this time, does have an Instagram link. I’ve also seen “Always Yours Photography” may possibly be hers as well.
One of her brides made a TikTok about this in January when stuff started coming out, yet again, that Courtney Christine Smith of Southern Silos Photography was not fulfilling her contracts. This bride hired Courtney for their 2025 wedding. The night before their engagement session Courtney replied to a message confirming their location (in Philadelphia) stating she was having a “co shooter” do the engagement session because she had the flu and claimed she’d still be editing. The bride goes on to show screen captures of Courtney bailing on a wedding due to “somebody” dying. The comments have other clients who had bad interactions with Courtney as well.
It’s wild seeing how often my post about her was shared in conjunction with the story being spread on Facebook.
Another PSA post from a bride who had a similar story about Courtney canceling the morning of the wedding because her “family was in need of me for a very serious thing” but she assured the client she was in good hands and promised extra product to make up for it.
The bride reached out to the photographer that she worked with the day of after Courtney made it sound like Jill (the fill in photographer) didn’t send over all the photos correctly. In the end she was able to send over some photos that she was able to recover from the cloud from the wedding but Courtney never delivered herself.
On the above post another client appeared in the comments. Courtney no showed at their wedding along with the coordinator (unclear if they were hired through Courtney or not).
There are a LOT of clients who chimed in on that thread all with similar stories of Courtney either ghosting completely or sending in someone at the last minute and not delivering the files.
So yeah, I think I can confidently say that Courtney is still on her bullshit and is likely in the middle of a rebrand. She has seemingly branched out from North Carolina though and people all along the East Coast are reporting issues so keep an eye on local groups and report to the admin if you see her posting (and screencap it for me before you do!).
Apparently he’s been already approached about his use of others copyrighted works and took a few images down but apparently he didn’t care to take down ALL the images that weren’t his.
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.
