Sunday, September 21, 2014

Apple cobbler adventures

Last Thursday I went to apple picking with all of my siblings, my best friend, and two little girls my sister nannies.  It was fun! We came home with some apples, of course.  I was so sad that I couldn't take any orchard photos! (My poor camera has been sent away to be cleaned, and fixed.)
A new dream of mine is to do a photoshoot in an orchard! (Also, to pick cherries. I found out that one of the local orchards ALSO has cherry picking in July!)
Today I decided to make an apple cobbler type dish. Just to eat. Just for fun.  I made up the recipe as I went along; it turned out delicious.  I really wanted to do a food photoshoot with some apples as props.  Emily was kind enough to let me borrow her camera.
I great enjoyed setting up this shoot outside on the tabletop of my mom's grill. It gave me some beautiful lighting! I was in the shade of the house, but the late afternoon sun was shining on the greenery behind me.

Thursday, September 18, 2014

Today I learned how to do a 'double exposure' with editing.  Its not a true double exposure I guess, since its not on camera..but since we don't use film, is that even a double exposure?  Who knows...
But in any case, this was great fun! I use GIMP, so I just googled how to do it on gimp, and tried it out!  Fiddled with settings till I got what I want.
The hardest part was choosing two photos that went well together.  That took me a number of tries. Do the two photos relate in any way?
Do the pieces fit without blocking important things from each other? Does the combination look to busy or hard on the eyes?  Hmmm, what is a perfect pair?!

I chose the ocean scene for a few reasons: I love the ocean and sky, the ocean and sky are close to the same color, it is a fairly 'blank' photo, and it is beautiful.  As I was looking through random photos I saw Lauren's hands on the piano, and knew that would be a good match. I turned the hands photo black and white so the colors would only be that of the ocean scene. Think of the sounds of piano combined with the rushing ocean waves.  Think of the beauty of music, and the beauty of the ocean and sky.

What would I name this photo?
I have no idea...





Saturday, August 9, 2014

Addalyn

I have had a good summer at camp. Its been busy, happy, and its soon coming to a close. This summer, besides doing a newborn shoot, I also did a wedding reception, a wedding as a second, and my first ever senior guy shoot.
So keep looking for several more posts on my summer shoots.  Soon I will be doing another senior session of sweet Lisa.  Its a challenge fitting in these sessions between working at camp but I'm glad I can do a few.
This morning I enjoyed taking some photos of scenery here in central WI. What a beautiful sight.  God's creation is amazing, and breath taking.

Babies are for sure a part of that amazing creation!  I have wanted for quite awhile to do a newborn photoshoot.  It just wasn't working out, and I was waiting for the day it would happen.  Well a friend of mine had a baby early this summer.  She brought her up to camp when she was just a few weeks old, and we did a newborn session.  Addalyn was very alert, and awake, so sleepy shots were a challenge!  But she was adorable at just over 5 pounds, and 18 inches long.  I am so glad I could do this first ever newborn shoot.




Wednesday, June 11, 2014

30 days 30 photos

Flowers
So Lauren and I completed our challenge.  The last few days didn't go so well....we missed a lot of photos.  But we made them up in the later days.  I am only missing one photo-after dark. I kept procrastinating that because of atrocious mosquitoes.  I have never seen mosquitoes as bad as this year.  Not sure how they all survived this super duper cold winter...so much for having less bugs!
Something old
I am glad we did the challenge.  Because of it, I have many beautiful photos I would not have taken otherwise!
Anyway, I am off to camp today, and do not have time to post all the photos.  But here are a few from the challenge I liked.
Faceless self portrait
What I ate



Sunset

Tuesday, May 13, 2014

May 2014

So my best friend found a photo challenge she liked; we decided to do it together....
Some days we fail. Some days we excel.  But what is important is the fact its making us stop what we are doing and TAKE PHOTOS.  So I think its a win. ;)
I think I will blog about the challenge at the end, and let you see them all at once.
For now, here are a few photos that I never would have taken if I hadn't started this challenge.



Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Food photography

My sister, Paige, is planning on making a recipe book for a 4-H project. She asked me if I would photograph many of our family's favorite recipes as she made them.  I said yes.  So, slowly but surely, we are working on this project.  Today I photographed peanut butter cookies.
A few weeks ago I did chocolate chip.  Also, hush puppies.  [I'm not sure hush puppies fit in this project to well, but she made them and wanted a photo, so I did it!]
Food photography really is probably my favorite type of photography...I enjoy it quite a lot.
I start out by making a 'setup' scene in my head-imagining what dishes, props, I need, and how I want to place the food, what angle to come from etc.
Then I set my camera up, and do a test shot to check lighting.
I then will look through the viewfinder with composition in mind, checking the placement, angle, and overall feel of a photo.
Then! Start shooting!
The most recent way I have been doing food photos is a pretty cool setup.  I will put the camera on the tripod, capturing just what I need in the lens, get all the settings correct, and use a remote to snap photos while I hold my 13" reflector to give better lighting.  Its an AMAZING setup, and allows me to move around  freely while photographing!