Serving the Central Savannah River Area Since 1953
Our Location
309 Park Avenue SE Aiken, SC 29801 (803) 649-4321 (800) 886-1264
Lista's Studio of Photography is located within a 3,000 square foot building - equipped with a large shooting studio; office space; storage for equipment, props, and backdrops; a comfortable reception area; and a beautifully landscaped courtyard. Our courtyard, along with the parkways, historic buildings, streetscapes, and parks in beautiful downtown Aiken that are in easy walking distance provide lush outdoor backgrounds.
Our History
Joe Lista
Old Aiken Post Office
Joe Lista opened Lista's Studio of Photography on Laurens Street in 1953, at the time Aiken was being transformed by the advent of the Savannah River Site. Although the business was started to provide photo services to the new federal nuclear site, Lista's Studio quickly expanded to serve the private individuals and other businesses in the area.
Over the next few decades, Lista's Studio moved several times, always to other downtown Aiken locations. In 1978, Todd Lista joined the business with his father. After another decade of serving the photographic needs of the people of Aiken, Joe Lista retired in 1988.
Todd Lista took over the business after his father retired, and it continued to thrive. In 1995 the Old Aiken Post Office, a magnificent landmark building that stood empty and unused, came up for sale. In a bold move, Todd Lista bought the beautiful building and converted it for commercial use.
Lista's Studio of Photography used the Old Post Office building for 16 years. Unused space in the basement was made into elegant and spacious offices for other small businesses in Aiken. For a period of time, Senator Strom Thurmond's Aiken office was located there.
Todd Lista
Todd Lista is a second generation Aiken photographer. He has benefitted from both formal training and two decades of experience working with his father Joe Lista, who established Lista's Studio here in 1953. The family experience spans 60 years of photography.
Mr. Lista is widely recognized by his peers for his ability to use light in his photographic composition to make his work distinctive. He has studied and worked abroad and throughout the United States. He regularly teaches and attends seminars in the latest advancements in the science and art of photography.
Todd Lista uses lighting, background, expression, posture, and myriad other visual details to capture just the right image with camera and lens, just as a painter uses paint colors, surface texture and brush strokes to create a feeling and an image that communicates the essence of the subject.
Special Equipment
Lista's Studio of Photography has adopted the latest in modern digital photographic technology. All photographs are made with high-end digital cameras, then processed and stored digitally on modern Apple computers and PC graphic workstations. Our staff is conversant with the latest graphics art technology which allows them to produce visually stunning prints, artistically composed albums, and a wide variety of other superlative products.
In addition, we can also provide several state-of-the-art items of equipment that can enhance the success of your event.
Large Flat Panel Displays
We can provide a slide show displayed on one or more large flat panel displays for your event. You can enhance the event with your Powerpoint or graphic slide show, or we can display photos of the participants in near real-time. Use our equipment and services to jazz up your event; bring in your box of childhood pictures and have them on display for bridal showers, wedding receptions, family reunions, bar mitzvahs. Enhance corporate meetings, new product anoouncements, press conferences.
Immediate Proofs and Prints
How would you like to have the photographs we take at your event available immediately as fine quality prints? Lista's Studio has the equipment and expertise to produce quality prints at your event as the photos are taken, in real time. We can provide a print so soon after it is taken that, if we are not careful, it will show you five minutes BEFORE it is taken.
Deuglification
Through the magic of digital technology, Lista's Studio of Photography can take even the ugliest dog of a person and make them look better than Brad or Angelina. Through unspecified non-nefarious means, Lista's Studio has gained possession of one of Dr. Emmett Brown's cromulators. CAUTION: Our cromulator must be used sparingly, so the subject does not contract DGS (Dorian Gray Syndrome).
Activate this video to see the Cromulator in action
