UK COMPUTERS CONTAINING VALUABLE PHOTOS STOLEN FROM PHOTOGRAPHER al.com: Living

Can you help him find his stolen photos?

Sunday, October 28, 2007

Trust me. You wouldn't want to stand in Wes Frazer's loafers right now.

It's not that he doesn't live an exciting and admirable life. As a professional photographer, Frazer has shot rock stars and exotic locales. His photos have appeared in advertisements and in The New York Times.

Go to his Web site, www.wesfrazer.com, and prepare to be enthralled. Frazer brings a painter's eye to the miraculous and the mundane, whether he's focusing on birds in flight or students inspecting an exhibit of Einstein's writings at the McWane Center.

He's a cool guy, for sure. But at the moment, he's knee-deep in hot water.

Did I mention he's also a wedding photographer? Well, he is, though not of the line-'em-up-and-shoot-'em variety. Rather, Frazer does candid wedding photo story books, works of art that typically cost a pair of newlyweds from $2,000 to $5,000.

You would not want to be in Frazer's shoes because of a phenomenon known as bridezilla, which is so common it has its own reality TV show (8 p.m. Sundays on cable's WE channel). It is a condition that strikes new brides (and sometimes grooms) who, at the drop of a hat or in this case a bomb, can pitch hissy fits of Mount Vesuvius proportions.

What happened is, one night when Frazer was out with friends, burglars kicked in his back door and absconded with close to $40,000 in cameras, lenses, computers and hard drives loaded with several unfinished wedding stories.

The 29-year-old photographer was devastated and, frankly, terrified at the thought of telling his wedding clients. He enlisted Oneonta lawyer Bill Ellis to file a lawsuit against his landlord, who, Frazer says, had failed to fix his rotting back door. Ellis also agreed to call Frazer's clients.

"As an attorney, I've had to notify people of a death in the family, but I've never had to do anything as hard as calling these brides to tell them their pictures were gone forever," Ellis says.

Not all of the brides have been told of the loss, but those who have didn't take things out on Frazer. "They were sad and upset. But they all wanted to know how he was doing," Ellis says.

Frazer could be better. To make things right, he's refunding money to the affected couples and offering to shoot, later, births and anniversaries. He's lost his livelihood because he can't afford to replace his equipment. He worries about losing clients and, frankly, his home, if he doesn't have income to pay the rent.

Frazer can't imagine life in another profession. As a child, he took all the pictures when his family went on vacation. By the time he entered Pinson Valley High School, he had his calling and went on to earn a photography degree from Birmingham-Southern College.

Frazer is offering a no-questions-asked, $5,000 reward for the return of his equipment, or $2,500 for just his F.A. Porsche-designed LaCie 250-GB external hard drive, which contains the wedding photos. Call him at 586-6702.

"I just want to make things right for my clients," Frazer says, like the stand-up guy he is.

E-mail: kkemp@bhamnews.com.