New Additions

For Christmas I am asking for a drawing tablet. I have had one before but 1. It was a knockoff, and 2. It was mainly for drawing. Now I am getting one to include my illustrations into my designs for school and also to edit my pictures with more precision. I want the Intuos Pen and Touch by Wacom because it's a perfect for my needs. It has supreme pressure sensitivity so that when I'm using a tool on photoshop I don't have to adjust the settings on it every time I wanted a different size or opacity. When swiping with the pen that comes with the tablet, it automatically changes the opacity by how much pressure you apply. I seriously think this is the best thing since sliced bread. This setting cuts my drawing/designing time in half. Another example of the greatness of pressure sensitivity would be the fact that I would never have to use the zoom tool in photoshop ever again! All I'd have to do with the tablet is pinch my fingers together to zoom out and pull apart my fingers to zoom in, just like you would do on an iPhone. These perks are very minor but all together it saves me from doing things manually which take a lot of time. It also has a keyring in the center that you can set your favorite software shortcuts to. So press one button and photoshop is open, it's that fast! My favorite thing about the entire tablet is the pen. You are actually writing, drawing, and swiping with the maximum amount of precision. Whereas with a mouse, you can only do limited robot-like movements. Imagine trying to draw a perfect circle with a mouse, that is what I mean by robot-like movements. When you are actually drawing with a pen, I can edit someones eyes or anything that's round a thousand times faster and sharper!

This tablet will be a great addition to my cute little collection of photography gear. What I really want is a new camera, but that will have to wait for now. I don't exactly have a thousand dollars laying around that I can spend on a new camera. Especially since I haven't even started taking photography classes yet!

Update

It's the time of year again where the leaves shrivel up and the trees become bare, the sky is a bleak shade of grey, and a mixture of rain and snow slicks the ground. The transition between fall and winter is the most uninspiring time of the season. Much the same as any transition between seasons, besides fall in general. Fall is my absolute favorite. Lately, I have been lacking creativity and it's killing me. I have no want to look good in appearance, general laziness, and an overall negative change in mood. Waiting for actual winter weather to come is painful and boring. I have so many ideas, but no motivation to do any of them. Bay City isn't the prettiest place in the world though, and I've lived here my whole life and basically discovered everything already, about a thousand and one times. I want to travel around soon, but am nervous to do it on my own.

On a side note, I am looking into selling my camera! Its a Nikon D3200 and I have only had for about a year. I would be selling the body and the 18-55mm lens that it came with. I paid around 500 dollars for it, so my asking price would probably be 350 or so. It's a perfect starter camera for people either wanting a nicer camera or is planning on going into photography from a professional standpoint. I am planning on getting a new camera with the money. I'm going to stick with the brand Nikon, because I think it's nice and it's what I know. The new one is around 1,000 dollars, so not cheap. But I am looking for higher quality photos and this will give me exactly that.

Currently...

I just finished editing a wonderful collection of mommy and daughter pictures. This was my second time taking pictures of kids and I really enjoyed it. Some problems that occurred were freezing weather, lens switching, and lack of good location. So first of all it was about 38 degrees out, and the little girl, Anavaeh who was only two years old, wasn't very comfortable. I got a few smiles out of her, but the poor girl barely moved. The second problem was the fact that we were crunched on time, and I had keep changing my lenses! My prime lens is a 50mm and it has no zoom. So when we were doing picture on the swing set and other places where I may want to adjust the space between my camera and her, I had to change lenses. Even though it's a quick on and off, I wish my 50mm could zoom. Lastly, this time of year is the transition from fall into winter and it's not pretty. All of the leaves are fallen and dead, it's either raining or windy, and the sky is always grey. So finding a location that was remotely picturesque was difficult. We were at two different parks and a bridge (which was the prettiest). 

Here are some of the good ones.  

For my next shoot I plan on doing something editorial and high fashion! Like I said in a previous post, I get high fashion magazines in the mail every month and I am especially inspired by them recently. One of my other talents is makeup and high fashion makeup can be very abstract sometimes. It's fun to pay around with it and find a cool location to capture it in just like editorial photographers do in the magazines. I just need to find someone that is willing to be my model! 

Organization Time!

I have had a wonderful time doing shoots with different people of all ages and being able to build up my portfolio. One thing that I have discovered through the process of working with multiple people at the same time, is that shooting and editing for just one person takes a lot of time. While I was doing multiple people all at once, I wasn't giving 100% of my effort. I am the type of person that doesn't particularly like to say no to people or really anything. So I always end up with more on my plate than I can handle. Well, I've come to a point in my life where my unorganized, creative, and non-stop part of my personality has taken over. I've become so unorganized with doing the simplest tasks, that it's hard to even complete them. While going to college over full time, this is a huge problem.

Today I'm saying enough is enough. I need to get my life together and mainly my photography life. I've decided that I should start my contract. I will have set rules and fees, that way there won't be any more confusion. I was having people that wanted to pay me, but they were unsure how much. I never realized how many decisions there were until I began to research it! Some include setting and location fees, rights released or not released, different packages, and most importantly my name and logo. I have been brain dead for a long time on what to call myself. Designing my logo would be a breeze, but actually finding a name that sets me apart from other popular photographers in town, is next to impossible for me. I feel very pressured to come up with a brilliant yet unique name so spur the moment. Waiting for a good idea to pop into my head when I'm actually inspired sounds more comfortable to me. 

I kind of feel like I'm not really justified to have a contract seeing that I am a newbie and haven't taken classes for it yet. Developing a contract, was mainly for myself to make sure I looked organized and professional. I really hope people see it that way, rather than think of me as some self centered girl that thinks every photo she takes is amazing, or someone who only cares about the money. What I really care about is if my client is happy. But unfortunately, you can't make everyone like you. 

Wish me luck!

-Annie ♡

A Walk In The Woods

My absolute favorite place to go for anything is Tobico Marsh in Bay City Michigan. I go there to cry, laugh, read, to get away from my thoughts, and for photo inspiration! There are trails, towers, boat launches, and plenty of marshes. It's beautiful at any time of the year, but my favorite time to be there is during the fall season. When you first get on the trail, the trees tower over you and sprinkle down vibrant color leaves. The leaves blanket the ground in a gorgeous picturesque scene. Another thing that you might see there is the wildlife! I've seen snakes, white tailed deer, black and grey squirrels, woodpeckers, turtles, and many birds. And for some reason, they aren't afraid of people. One time when I was far along on the trail, I came within about 20 feet from two white tailed deer, and of course I didn't have my camera with me. They simply stood there and watched me, not moving a muscle. I took a picture with photo memory, and continued to walk. That's when they casually strolled off the trail and back into the woods. I'll never forget that moment.

I get inspired by how certain things in nature can be naturally placed so beautifully. I always think, how did this get here?! Like when one really big tree falls and you can see its pretty roots that were hidden underneath the forest floor, or when little trees fall on top of each other.

These are a couple of leaves that decided to change color before any one else, and resulted in standing out between the pine and green leaves. I adore this photo because the sun is shining through to where you can make out the actual veins of the leaf.  I took this going through the woods by myself, which is what I usually do. 

Usually I walk the woods alone, but when I do bring someone, I never can resist using them as a model. Even though there is a green stalk standing clear in the middle of his face, I still like the way there are shadows on his face and the colors of the background. 

 

I created this conceptual piece to describe the process of being insecure yet trying to branching out of the insecurities. The body language is modest and pulled in, yet her surroundings are flourishing. It was similar to my own process of wanting to branch out, but still being unsure. 

How I Edit // Over-editing

First thing I do before editing, is set my camera to shoot in Raw file format. What this is does is takes uncompressed images. It will plainly record what you set the camera up as. Leaving every tone and setting in its original form. Whereas a .jpg file format will compress the image and limit the brightness and tones available. A raw picture will have over 30 times the tones that a .jpeg has. The main reason for shooting in Raw, is to edit in Raw. You can find camera raw filter in photoshop under filters. But when your camera is in this setting and you go to pull one of your images up, they should be in .dng, .tiff, or in my case .NEF (nikon electronic format) because this is Nikon's version of raw file format.

Most people edit in raw to fix their under/overexposed images or to adjust their white balance. I edit in raw to slightly fix my exposure but mostly to add light in different places. Sometimes this is necessary if your using backlighting with your model.  Or simply if they just need more light on a body part. Once I get a photo into camera raw filter, I fix my exposure, and if I still need more light but in a certain area, I use a tool where basically you draw a line and it will fade out light from wherever you place it. If there is an instance where I only need light in a very specific place, I'll use the paintbrush and specifically put light in that place. This is not the easiest thing to explain. But after I'm finished with camera raw filter, I'll open the photo up in photoshop and fix blemishes, brighten eyes and hair, and make any other modifications I want or my client wants. Then I'm done! 

Now we've reached the dreaded act of over-editing. From photographers to the average person, we all over edit images. When you're looking a picture and you just want it to be perfect, it's not hard to go a little overboard. But it's a terrible mistake and I see it too often. People have imperfections, moles, freckles and more that make them who they are! There is no reason to take them out. A big thing that I see is completely blurring out the skin in an attempt to smooth out the skin. Here is a very good example. 

My First Child Photoshoot!

Yesterday I had my first child photoshoot and let me tell you, it was not ANYTHING like I expected it to be. Usually for photoshoots, I'll plan out where I'm taking the pictures, and I will bring a drawn out book of all of my favorite poses I plan on using that day. So I drove out to State Park a half an hour before the shoot and brought my rake to make cute little piles of leaves in different places. For props I had a sand papered black apple crate and a faded white chair. All of which I bought from the antique store in Bay City. I had one nine year old and one six year old. They both had bleach blonde hair and bright blue eyes. The six year old arrived and the first thing I asked him was,"Are you ready to throw some leaves around?" After that I directed him to sit in the middle of the leaves and all he nodded his head no and said, "nope!"

It was definitely a rough start, but after things began to pick up, that's all the six year old wanted to do was jump around and take pictures. It was the cutest thing! He was even giving me direction. There was many times where he took my chair and moved it where he wanted it, then told me where to stand and take the picture. After that, he'd ask me if that was a good idea or not. The whole time I was with the youngin, I could not stop laughing. There was little bursts of energy throughout the day where he was excited and where he just did not want to cooperate whatsoever. But all in all, he was my favorite little goofball.

After the six year old there was the nine year old! I never would of anticipated the difference of maturity in the ages! The nine year old was SO mature and patient. I loved it! He was a bit toned down compare to the other one that's for sure and it was so much easier to take his pictures.

I realized towards the end that letting these little kids just unleash their energy is better than trying to pose them. It's more natural too!

Six Year Old

Nine Year Old