Photography is fun! {portraits, fashion, available light photography}

I have really wanted to try out a few locations I've driven by several times as I take the kids places. I've also been seeing really cool but edgy editing techniques that I want to try but never have the right image for. I also have wanted to try a few different poses that I can't really try out on a bride in a white dress! So I found a couple GORGEOUS girls to agree to let me have the lovely Kristy Harris do their make up and let me test out all this stuff on them! I really love the art of photography and just love to try things even if I fail just so I can learn how to improve. I always stay in the box (because everyone loves the box) but I also LOVE to step out and be creative. I think its the mix of the two that produces a collection of images that people really cherish. But it's the stepping out of the box part that can be frightening at times. When I am shooting a client I don't want to step too far off because they are expecting a certain result. So it's nice to be able to go off for a few hours and just shoot and try new ideas with out the pressure of that result. Then I learn what works and what doesn't and how I can improve upon what didn't work. Which will all help me in my adventures to come! Here are several of my favorites from my shoot with the beautiful Nicole and Brigitte. You will see a few that are the same but with different editing techniques or even the same pose just composed differently and that was mainly what I was working on in addition to trying out these new locations. Enjoy!

Class of 2011-Jill Scannell !!!

Jill is my best friend Laura's cousin. She is so sweet and so adorable. We had a great time just driving around Petaluma with no set place in mind, we just stopped as we saw fun places. Some worked, and some well....not so much! We plan to take a few more once she gets her cap, gown, and tassel but we took all the fashion-style portraits early in the year. Here are a few of my favorites!

The beautiful Lauren...

I don't think it was possible to get a bad shot. Lauren is absolutely beautiful. I had a great time shooting her in downtown covina along the ally. Here are just a handfull of the many amazing photos.

Chelsea

This is another portrait session with Chelsea in an aly behind downtown Covina.

Sara- Available Light vs Studio Light

I'm taking this great class on Saturday afternoons at the Tri-Community Photography School in Covina. The class is focused on available light portraits. We get 1-2 models each week and take them to various locations (usually downtown Covina) and shoot them using available light. Well yesterday was interesting we decided to put up a huge 6ft umbrella with a small studio light to cancel out the extra bright sun. We each only get 1 min. to take photos of the model so most of us hang around like voltures when it isn't our turn trying to get candit shots. When you use studio lights, only the person with the wireless trigger can pop the light so the rest of us had to drastically adjust our camera settings and use avaialbe light to get the candit shots while we were not so patiently waiting our turn. I found it very interesting to see the drastic difference between the shots I got with available light and the ones I got with the studio light. Check them out....
These photos are available light:

these photos are with the studio light:


I barely touched these photos up. They didn't really need any edits or touch ups what so ever. Well, I'm sure all those photoshop gurus and crazy creative kids in my class would disagree but I like them the way they came out of the camera so I didn't touch them much at all. In fact the ones with the studio light were not edited at all. The available light ones I just touched up the contrast a tiny bit.

Emilio Venegas Senior Portraits

I was so fortunate to have met such a fun couple as John and Colleen Venegas. They asked me to photograph their wedding last September. I have had such a fun time with these two from shooting their engagement photos to helping them pick all their photos out, they are always making me laugh! Most recently they asked me to come to their home and do a senior portrait session with John's oldest son, Emilio who is graduating from Apple Valley High School.

Casey

Here are some portraits taken of the beautiful Casey. This was simply using available light, outdoors, on a Saturday afternoon at around 1pm with a grey backdrop.