Soooo much better

Well, I'm happy to say that with in a few hours of the last post, things have taken a turn for the better. I don't know how long this will last, but I'll take it! Amazing what a little time a way from life to do something you love can change your spirits dramatically. Not that being at home isn't great, but you know what I mean. Tonight I got to attend a seminar for photography that was awesome! It's totally re-energized me and given me some amazing tools to help me develop my business. So for those of you who have experienced my work, get ready for some awesome new things to come your way, and if you haven't yet let me photograph you... well, you're in for a real treat.


Because I am on such a photo high right now, and I can't sleep I want to write about, guess what.... photography. Although I realize if I get all technical with lighting and shutter speed and all that really neat stuff, I'd bore 1/2 of you and just plain loose the other 1/2 who would read on just to be kind. So instead, I wanted to quickly tell my story of how I became a photographer.


It all started with my dad. He is an award winning photographer, mainly photographing still life and landscapes. Basically anything that wouldn't move and change on him like a person would. Since I could remember I too had a camera in my hands, following along behind my dad. While I loved the camera and I loved nature... I couldn't figure out how to capture that together. I took a few classes, in hopes that learning some techniques would improve my abilities to capture images like my father. No luck. I just didn't have an eye for it at all. I didn't give up completely. I always had a camera with me. I loved taking candids of friends and events I was in, but still has a huge desire to capture nature in a beautiful setting. In college I explore completely different avenues like floral design. I loved that for a while, but finding that the wedding business would take me away from my family every weekend, I moved to a new venture. I had the opportunity to open a dance and fitness studio with a partner, again indulging another love of mine. I helped run a children's performance group and was a certified Pilates instructor teaching at my gym and at a local privet school. Just after Tyler was born, I left the studio to stay home full time with Ty.


As many new moms, I couldn't stop taking pictures of my baby. I loved finding props around the house and making my own home made studio shots, and loved it. The photograph spark was reborn. I talked to Eric about his thoughts on me pursuing a new avenue. Portrait photography was something I had never considered. Like I said earlier, my mentor was a landscape photographer, and portraits weren't ever a subject that I had explored. Now I look back and I'm like duh, but I know I couldn't experience all those other ventures otherwise. I started looking online at other local photographers sites, and I was shocked. The prices they charged for the images they produced, well, lets just say I was less than impressed. I knew I could do much better than that. I wasn't trying to be snooty, but the photos I had taken with my little 4 mega pixel Olympus camera validated my feelings.


Just a few weeks later, my good friend Alexis was getting married and I was at her house looking at her engagement photos. They were beautiful and I knew that was the type of photographer I wanted to be. At her wedding weeks later I made a point to meet her photographer and ask her if she ever needed an assistant and could possibly train me. She said yes, and I could start the next week. I bought my first SLR camera that night and started practicing. I assisted her on many shoots, for about a year, and using my own friends when ever they'd let me. After feeling very confident I asked my sister's good friend if I could take some senior portraits for her. She said yes, and my that was my first official shoot. It was amazing. A month later I asked a gal I met at a home party if I could take photos of her family. Her daughter was the cutest thing ever, and I wanted to try a family and children. Again good success. And the rest is history.
I'm glad I found the portrait side of photography and didn't get stuck in the landscape side that I still can not do. My dad and I joke that he doesn't like things that move, and I have to have something that moves, and then we're both happy.




I've loved my journey and the people and places my photography has taken me, and I can't wait to see where it will take me.