Fine Art Collection | Roses

Last week my Mom stopped by the house and dropped off some roses… for no reason at all. Clearly, she knows me too well. lol  As with every bouquet of flowers, I was enchanted by their increasing beauty each day as the rose blooms opened more and more. I couldn’t help myself and I think I ended up photographing these roses at least three times throughout the week. What can I say? I love fresh flowers. Thanks Mom!

Personal Collection | One Year Blog Anniversary

In the spirit of celebrating life’s little accomplishments, this post will be a quick one in honor of my One Year Blogiversary. Yes, it has already been one year since I started this blog!!! Well, technically, one year and two days, but who’s counting!?! lol

I am delighted to be pursuing my photography and to be part of the photo blogging community in the process. Although my blog page design remains the same for now (wink, wink), I am charmed to see my post-processing of digital images improving. Along with learning tips and tricks from professional photographers online such as Bambi Cantrell, Jasmine Star, Jerry Ghionis, Sandy Puc and more, I must also give major credit to my continued studies of digital photography at the Herron School of Art and Design at IUPUI.

I want to send out a massive thank you to all of my readers as I treasure all of your support. I hope you continue to share my blog with your friends and family as I document portraits and events in the Indianapolis area along the way. Of course I will continue to share some of my personal projects as well! So let’s pop the bubbly and celebrate! Here’s to one year of blogging and more to come! Thanks all!

Wedding Collection | 60th Wedding Anniversary Celebration: Part I

I want to begin this post with sharing some of the things I think about when shooting my photography sessions… stay with me here and we’ll get to the extra-special part relating this to the 60^th Wedding Anniversary Celebration.

So, back to the stream of consciousness when I’m shooting:

Lighting. Good lighting will always trump a good location. Where is the light coming from? How is the light hitting my client? How can I change my location or perspective or angle to better capture the light on my client? What settings need to be adjusted on my camera? What is my ISO setting? What is my white balance setting? What is my aperture setting? What is my shutter speed? How do the lighting and location and intended look for my image affect the camera settings I choose? Location. Make it work where the lighting is best. Are there locations with the same lighting which offer better opportunities for posing or capturing expression? Are there better ways of capturing the location to help tell the story? Are there other ways of capturing the location to complete an album spread? Are there any restrictions or guidelines imposed by the location and its authorities? Are there any special circumstances to be respected such as in a place of worship? Posing. Give direction and help my clients feel comfortable. Does my client look comfortable? Consider my clients’ favorite features about themselves as well as insecurities to help either accentuate or de-emphasize when posing and shooting. Should my client be look at me or away from me? Is my client looking a certain direction with his/her eyes or entire body? If my client is looking away from me, is the direction of his/her eyes and or face helping tell the story? Composition. If something is not adding to the image, it is probably taking away from the image. So, how can I clean up and de-clutter the scene? Yes, that means everything in the foreground and background needs to be considered. How much post-processing can I avoid by how I setup the scene and capture the image in-camera? How much negative space do I want to include? How will the composition lead the viewer’s eyes throughout the image? How tight should I crop in-camera? Do I pull back and leave some extra space to crop in tighter later? Do I need alternate images of the scene to tell a story? Do I need alternate images of the scene to complete an album spread? Expression. What emotions can I emphasize or evoke to elicit a genuine expression? What can I do to capture genuinely amazing expressions as they are happening in the moment? What is going on around us? What are people talking about? Is someone getting ready to laugh, cry, smile, pout, etc.?

Of course all of these elements can break down into more specific thoughts and ideas depending on the moment and the client, but for the sake of getting back to my point we’ll leave it at that. Yes, that is a SUMMARY of the things I’m thinking about when photographing you and your loved ones! That doesn’t include last-minute checks beforehand for batteries, memory cards, clean camera, clean lenses, etc. Now, let’s add to the mix, those extra-special-once-in-a-lifetime-no-mulligan-no-redo-no-do-over-types-of-events like baptisms, weddings, anniversaries and more. You can imagine my worry and excitement involved with feeling so honored to share in such special and wonderful moments and wanting to capture everything and everyone at their best.

In this case, I was hired to capture a special anniversary party for a 60^th Wedding Anniversary Celebration. Where do I begin to explain the honor and excitement I felt from such a request? The fact that I am a hopeless romantic and I am completely in love with love should help you understand how special I consider these celebrations to be. I mean how often do we get to witness 50^th wedding anniversaries anymore? I can only think of two 50^th wedding anniversary celebrations I have ever attended.

Anyways, I was overjoyed at the request to shoot a 60th wedding anniversary celebration and I had a wonderful time capturing such an extraordinary event. It was a wonderful evening! I plan on sharing some of the images as well as images of the album we created in an upcoming post. Stay tuned!

Boudoir Collection | Mademoiselle A.