my SHOOTSAC is here!

And it's just what I thought it would be. Can't wait to break into it! I'll be sure to take a few pictures of it in action ;) For now, here is the pretty box it came in:

Here is the shootsac with the normal black cover:

And now with the Baroque! To be honest, my intention was not to buy this cover, because I had my eye on another one, but now that I have it, I love it! The best part is that it matches my brand colors: Black, White, and Red :)

The 3 little dots...

I also had another great treat come in. I signed up to be a WHCC customer and one of the perks of signing up is that you get 5 free 8x10's. They do this in order to see if your monitor is calibrated. Here is one of the five that I picked:

It's from Anaya's baby session I did a few months ago. It's one of my favorite pictures EVER and the parents love it as well so this free print will be a nice gift to them.

Brief story of my beginnings

When I first wanted to start photography, I had just a film camera. I bought it off ebay along with a lens and decided I would start off doing free shoots, you know, to build up a portfolio. This was all just last year, around October. Before that, I had never, ever, picked up a SLR camera. For the longest time, I took my little point and shoot everywhere I went, snapping pictures of nature,trips, parties, dinner's, new friends, etc. My film camera was the only SLR I ever used, and to be honest with you, I had no clue what the heck I was doing. All I did was PRAY the rolls of film I invested in weren't a waste of money. I was afraid my pictures would come out black or blurry or funky looking.


Meet Tatiana:

She was one of my "guinea pigs", that would tell me whether I really sucked at this and don't ever pick up a camera again, or if I should follow my heart and keep going. She was the first person who I pointed my film camera and shot, shot away and prayed the film wasn't a waste of money. I held my breath the whole time as I went to picked up the photos. Anxious and nervous at the same time. I wanted to cry as soon as I saw them, both happy and sad tears. Alot of them had come out dark, but when I saw the decent one's, my little heart jumped with joy! I could not believe I actually had some good one's! I must have been doing something right, but I had no clue what I was doing during the shoot. I was just posing, shooting, and praying.

After Tatiana, I decided to keep going. I shot about two couples that were friends of mine and asked them if they could dress up in their wedding attire. Meet Kyle and Chivonne:

My rolls of film were really taking a toll with my wallet at this point. I still didn't know what I was doing with my film camera, but just like with the other session, we had tons of fun. I felt so happy shooting and it was really what kept me going. From this session, I booked my first wedding. I made it clear to the bride that I had never shot a wedding and that I had never shot in digital, but that I would be buying a digital SLR camera in a few weeks and that I would not be shooting her wedding in film. It's as if she didn't hear what I was telling her because she booked me to shoot her wedding. I read every photography forum on the internet and read thousands of blogs and read all the technical things there is to know. I FINALLY purchased my first DSLR in January, a Canon 40d, about one month before the wedding!! My husband could not believe what I was getting myself into, and neither could I, but I felt like this bride had faith in me, in my ability to succeed, and that only motivated me more to not let her down, and not let myself down.

The real reason for this post was because I sat down today and starting looking through my folders of photos and Chivonne's and Kyle's session stuck out to me again. It made me think of the things I know now that I had no clue about then. You can never know everything about photography. If you want to be in a creative industry, you have to keep on taking new things and growing. I started editing a few of the shots from their shoot and I really want to share them! They are in film but I just love them!

This one is a little different processing style to my usual taste but I still like it :)

Posing & Inspirations

Some people look at books, art, and magazines to get the creative juices flowing and this is all very fabulous but you don't always have the time to drive to the book store and the money to pay for magazine subscriptions. When I want to fuel my brain with creativity, I often turn to the internet for inspiration. The internet has tons and tons of inspirational ideas.

One thing that I often find myself looking at is wedding gown websites. Often times, this is where I get alot of ideas on how to pose a bride. I pay close attention in which direction her head is turned or where her hands are placed and her posture. I also imagine a groom in the picture and think of ways his poses would compliment hers.

One of my favorite websites is Eve of Milady. Besides the obvious fact that their gowns are breathtaking, I love how their models are always posed. Always.

In this one, I can imagine the groom behind the chair kneeled down looking at her and having her looking at him while her right hand gently touching his face. Just an example to show you what goes on in my head as I look at these posing ideas. Please don't think I'm weired!! :)

In case no one knew, I love fashion photography. Not the weired kind. I love making girls feel beautiful and sexy and confident, all while having fun! Photography for High School Senior girls is something that I've been thinking about alot. I'd like to cater to them as well in the near future. Here are a few ideas for posing senior girls that I picked up on the internet. The poses you do on an actual shoot don't have to be exactly this way, these are just ideas to give you some inspiration...to tweak a bit to your liking and to develope your own style.

Photo Credit: http://www.bryanjamesbrophy.com/

Photo Credit: www.adrianacurcio.com.

I look to photography blogs and websites for alot of inspiration as well. One of my favorite photographers in the wedding industry is Jasmine Star. I love her work because it is so natural and sharp! I could look through her pictures all day.

Her Website: http://jasmine-star.com/

One more photographer who I really admire for her style and business is Jessica Claire. Her work has this look to it that if you were to spot it somewhere else, you'd definilty know it was hers. She has really defined her style and stuck with it, and I think that is something alot of people struggle with, which isn't such a bad thing because there are so many great things out there that it's hard to just pick one of something! ;)

Her Website: http://www.jessicaclaire.net/

TRA photoshop actions - Before & After

I've decided to do another installment of Before and After photos using my favorite photoshop actions from the TRA sets. I simply adore these actions and use them on all my photos during post processing. So check it out, here is just one example of an engagement session I shot a couple of months ago. Mari & David are our friends so I decided to use them as an example just one more time :) To see their engagement pictures, click HERE

Before & After

What I used from the TRA sets:

Big blue on sky
Green with envy on ocean and sand

Greetings from paradise
select -o-pop on couple
Punch out 25%
Burn out 74%

I also added some sky to the picture. You can see there is some blue on the original picture that is straight out of the camera, but I wanted to define it just a bit more. When I learned how to create and enhance skies, I've been having so much fun with it!! On a next blog post, I will post this process step by step.

And there you have it! You can see that will a little tweaking here and there and lightly using some of these actions, you can achieve beautiful results.

Happy Tuesday!

Elizabeth and Rob Wedding: Part 3

Wow! Third and final post to Elizabeth and Rob's fabulous wedding. Brief detail: Mid-way through the ceremony, I headed to the reception to capture all the details and decor untouched, before the guests got there. This is always one of my favorite parts to capture. The bride works hard for months to ensure her vision comes together beautifuly at that day so it is really important to capture such details.

While Caroline finished capturing the ceremony and the family portraits, I captured the little details. Here are a few of my favorites from the reception:

Elizabeth and Rob's Wedding: Part 2

Elizabeth's and Rob's reception was nothing short of amazing. It was the most easy going, everything couldn't have flowed any more perfect type of reception.

The reception had so many beautiful details and I can't wait to share. It was held at the Cocoa Beach Civic Center. There is too many favorite details so that is why I will leave that one for Part 3 of this wedding. For now, here are a few of my favorites of the couple together:

The venue has gorgeous scenary surrounding it, so of course, we took advantage of that. It is why you will see many different backdrops.

My favorite! I love long wide angles

Here Elizabeth and Rob were practicing their first dance. They did a great job!

Part 3 coming soon! :)