Guess we’re back with another entry into the Photo Shyster category with another person trying to be an industry leader but instead takes money and doesn’t always deliver. SIGH.
Today we’re here to talk about Michael Thomas Ireland who ran “SEOtographer” but now is focusing on his new business Tanooki Marketing.
The summary is SEOtographer has taken a lot of money from people and not always delivered the goods.
This post is an attempt to reach more possible clients who are also waiting for work that hasn’t been completed.
Update 7/14/2023 @ 9AM EST:
Michael sent me his rebuttal, you can read and judge for yourself here. The clients all maintain their stories are true as posted.
Added Client #6
Added supporting evidence that Michael may be behind Tanooki
I don’t even know where to start with this post about Sallee Photography other than knowing NOT to name any child of mine Brinkley.
I’ve been in the industry for about 16 years and for all of them Sallee Photography has always been humming along in the background. JB and DeEtte run Sallee Photography out of Texas and often seem to be running workshops with a few weddings and portrait sessions mingled in.
Sallee Photography is a well-decorated member of the PPA, WPPI and probably a million other organizations that I don’t know. JB especially is (or was) the darling of the Texas PPA which is how I actually found out about him after somehow stumbling into their party at my first WPPI.
JB Sallee, who is the main man running Salle Photography, is also a ProFoto Legend of Light.
DeEtte, tends to run the backend of the business and is generally not at the forefront of a lot of the drama but she *is* still a part of the business and is at many of the workshops.
Past Business Names: Whitney Elizabeth Photography, Whitney Jones Photography, Whitney Smith Photography, Irish Twins Photography, Don’t Blink Photography, The Wandering Orchid
Other Locations: California, Utah, Arizona, South Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina, Lancaster, Pennsylvania, Boston, Massachusetts/New England
Whitney has been submitted to me a few various times over the years but generally when I’ve had her dumped into my lap I’ve been too busy with the job that actually pays me to invest time into unraveling the mess that is Whitney Slusser / Whitney Slusser-Smith / Whitney Elizabeth / Whitney Elizabeth Knott / Whitney Elizabeth Knøtt.
There is some photo stealing here, she does like her some inspiration pics! However, the bigger picture here is the problematic history that Whitney has as a professional photographer.
I prefer things to be told chronologically so I’m going to attempt to tell this story in a timeline format so the sourcing format for stolen images will be a bit differet.
While I tried to mostly stick to things related to photography there are some other parts of this story that play into the photography parts so I’ve included it.
Grab your popcorn. It’s a (long) ride below the cut but I promise that it’s a story that needs telling.
Summary: In the past ~8 years of being in business that I can find online, Whitney Elizabeth Knøtt / Whitney Elizabeth / Whitney Slusser Photography (aka Don’t Blink Photography and Irish Twins Photography) has cancelled or no showed to many weddings and sessions. If she does show there has been problems getting photos and/or prints. Refunds are few and far between. She has also at times used images that were not her own to represent her business.
Update 11/9/2023: Ugh. I wish I could say that I’m surprised to hear that Whitney is up to her shit again this fall but I’m not. I’m mostly sorry for the clients she’s burned, yet again.
• Added four more weddings for 2023. One from July with photos and a refund that weren’t delivered until this week after the client posted online, three for October that she cancelled last minute on (as per usual, two were for the same date).
• Here’s hoping that maybe she’ll be prosecuted like CP Family Photography who has a similar history to Whitney (but with less clients affected).
Update 7/14/2023: • Added another client who Whitney sent in a last minute replacement for on 10/22/2022
• Added a post of Whitney needing last minute second photographer coverage for a wedding 5/27/2023
• More proof Whitney is still pursuing photography despite her claiming to be stepping back
Update 5/10/2023: Whitney is back to replying to ISO’s and posting ads for her photography business.
Update 2/20/2023 @ 10AM: even more receipts including a rebuttal from Whitney via email and Facebook (spoiler alert: she doesn’t refute anything with the sessions, only asserts the medical history is factual). Also included a chat message from Whitney telling her friends that she’s stepping back from photography in 2023.
Update 9/10/2025: I’ve put off updating this post for a while but this summer I’ve had a lot of messages about Whitney so I figured I’d finally update her post. She’s had some issues canceling last minute for birth photography. She’s also changed her business name to Wandering Orchid Photo.
Update 2/13/2026: Whitney has rebranded yet again to Light & Leaf and appears to be operating out of the New England area. She’s already canceled last minute on events and sessions there.
It appears she’s also dipping her toe into styled sessions and is hosting one in June in Newport.
I laughed when I saw that she was recommending herself in comments like a client not the owner.
This photography group appears to operate in just about every state they can get their hands into.
There’s so many stolen images in the galleries I gave up sourcing. It’s ridiculous. Most are stock but not all. Most of the top gallery on their wedding page is stolen/stock, most of the real estate photos are stock and many of the corporate images are stock.
PS: Their pricing is bananas.
Update 9/9/2025:
This update is going on top so it doesn’t get lost.
Since my last update there have been a few incidents with Billy Griffin / Natural Images Photo Video. Some are issues with clients, some is just him being the swell human he is /sarcasm.
First, lets go to March 2025.
If you look at Billy’s social media you’ll see he’s constantly on the go traveling all over the country and is often in a different state each weekend day. If you’ve ever flown you know that this is dicey planning due to travel delays and I’ve been waiting to see if this bites Billy in the butt and it seems to have done so in March.
Britni hired Natural Images Photo Video for their wedding and paid $2500. Their package was supposed to include two days of service including a photo booth and dancing-on-a-cloud effects.
Billy was a no show for the day before the wedding and was an hour late the day of. He offered a refund of $1000 but said it had to be paid in increments due to being a family business. They ended up sending $200 but not the rest.
Now, there’s ANOTHER client from March with a similar issue.
Melani also had Billy no show for their first of two day coverage after they booked the $3500 two day package. I am not clear when their wedding was but she posted this review in March. At the time she posted Billy had not refunded or delivered anything. I believe their wedding was in Tampa.
Now lets move forward to July.
Billy posts one of his ads in a wedding group on Facebook and a photographer replies with his listing here.
Of course Billy blocked Mindy and sent her a kind message you’d expect from a man who claims to be a Christian.
Billy then went on a rant on his Facebook about her and me.
On August 16th Billy Griffin of Natural Images Photo was booked for a wedding in Sturgis, South Dakota. The client booked Billy for $2250 for a two day package to cover the rehearsal and wedding day. This package was supposed to include a boudoir session, drone coverage, photography and videography.
Yet again, Billy completely no showed the day before the wedding and then was late the day of the wedding making the clients push back their ceremony by almost an hour.
Billy claimed he ‘forgot’ to book a flight until it was too late/the prices were too high to arrive the day before the wedding and then blamed the airline for why he didn’t get to Sturgis until 6:30PM.
There’s one problem – Billy was live streaming a wedding in Alabama when he was supposed to be in South Dakota. The client said Billy claimed he booked this wedding after he found out he couldn’t afford get to South Dakota on Friday but I have my doubts.
Screenshot from Billy’s Facebook
Billy offered the client a refund of $1500 but told the client it would take 6 MONTHS to pay them back.
Some of the clients who have had issues with Billy have been trying to raise awareness on Facebook in various groups that Billy has frequented or where they found Billy but a lot of the posts have been taken down.
On one post a photographer commented that has been an associate photographer for Billy. The clients had reached out to them since Billy never delivered the photos!
Some of the clients who have had issues with Billy have been trying to raise awareness on Facebook in various groups that Billy has frequented or where they found Billy but a lot of the posts have been taken down.
On one post a photographer commented that has been an associate photographer for Billy. The clients had reached out to them since Billy never delivered the photos!
Once again, I’m asking you to check your own local wedding pages that you frequent and if Billy Griffin and/or Natural Images Photo Video is in your group message the admins with a link to his listing here and ask that he be removed.
Oh, and he’s still using an ad with images he didn’t create. OF COURSE.
Also, if your wedding is 10/4 I don’t think Billy is coming.
Here’s a thought – if you feel the need to go onto photographers’ instagram pages and bash other photographers work, make sure you don’t have stolen images on your own page.
It sounds like he’s recently rebranded after getting a slew of bad reviews for his prior company named Casanova Images. There’s a lot of clients that seemed to never receive their images.
As I was making this post the stolen images (confirmed and suspected) disappeared from their instagram.
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.
