Photo of the Month - August 2010

I was so busy with the Pinups for Pitbulls 2011 calendar submissions during the month of August, that I totally forgot to post my Photo of the Month, which happens to be a Pinups for Pitbulls image.  So here is my Photo of the Month for August.  Hey it's August 31st, but it's still August.  Lol.  I submitted four different sets of photos for their 2010 calendar last year.  I was so excited to find out that two of my images were finalists.  And then super excited to find out that one of them made it into their calendar!  Yeaaa!!!  This is the image that they used for their August 2010 image.  The model is my friend LaQuaisha and the dog is Rusty, owned by my friends Jessica and Justin.  They were both great to work with.  LaQuaisha had never "modeled" before, and look how cute she looks.  So anyone can be a model for Pinups for Pitbulls.  And Rusty was just happy that he got to eat so much ice cream that day.  Lol.  We went through a few cones by the time the session was over.  If you would like to check out the rest of the calendar or purchase one, or to learn more about the Pinups for Pitbulls charity, please visit www.pinupsforpitbulls.com.  They are a great charity that tries to educate people that pitbulls are not these evil dogs that some people think, plus help out injured pits and shelters.  This year I submitted seven different sets of images for their 2011 calendar.  I can't wait to see the images they choose.

Photo of the Month - July 2010

I decide to use one of my favorite Model Session images for this month's Photo of the Month.  This photo has got to be from one of the most fun Portrait Sessions I've done.  Plus most dangerous!  Haha.  I saw some portrait somewhere online with fire, and thought "Hmmmm, that would be fun to try!"  I wanted to glam it up a bit with a fashion model look.  The fire is real!  No editing it in later.  We took some rope made a circle around the model, then drenched it with lighter fluid, finally added the fire with matches.  It didn't stay too long, so my husband had to keep lighting the rope, until it burned away.  Pretty cool!  By the way, don't try this at home.  Haha.  We were in a large open concrete floored abandoned parking lot. 

The Bui Brothers Photography Workshop

Last week I attended a very cool and informative photography workshop by the Bui Brothers.  It's always a good idea no matter what your profession to keep up with the latest techniques and skills.  So from time to time I love to attend professional photography seminars and workshops to help inspire me and to be able to learn from other people's point of views and experiences.  Plus I always meet other friendly photographers with experiences of their own, who make great friends to bounce ideas off of.  The Bui Brothers workshop was on lighting, natural and studio.  We learned some in the classroom first, about some great equipment and some super cool lighting techniques that they use.  Then we went outside to photograph what we just learned on some models.  With the natural light we learned the best spots for the model to stand and for the photographer to stand and how to really make the light work for you, plus some little tricks and tips.  When all you have is the sun to work with, you really have to know how to use it to your best advantage.  Being in Florida, one minute is can be super bright hot sun, then the next a cloudy dark sky, so I need to know what works best in all situations to really make my clients look amazing.  After we used just the natural light we had a couple different studio strobe lighting setups outside.  It's amazing at how many different looks and creative feels you can get from introducing different lights and different power of lighting into your scene.  I personally love using studio lights rather than just natural lighting.  So it was great to experiment with different setups and see the styles I really like best.  After that we ended the day by going back into the classroom to learn some editing techniques.  It was a great day and I enjoyed expanding my knowledge and meeting some great new friends. 

Here are a few photos of me that some of the other photographers who attended took.  I'll post some of the images I got from the day very soon.

Photo of the Month - December 2009

This photo of the month is a tad late. Oops! December has been a CRAZY busy month for me. Everyone craving new family portraits before the year is over. I've been so involved in them that it totally slipped my mind for December's Photo of the Month. Anyway, I came across this cool photo I took of my hubby and decided to use it. He's a hardcore mountain biker and was bugging me about getting some images of him jumping. So one day I went with him to the park, waited by one of the jumps, and snapped a few shots. This one was my favorite. The park has trees and foliage everywhere, but this spot had some cool sunlight coming in. Plus he's making his 'bike' face, we call it, when he's concentrating on his jump. Haha.

Photo of the Month - September 2009

For this month's "Photo of the Month", I chose an older image from a model session I photographed. I really love this image because of the vibrant colors that really catch your attention (and aqua happens to be my favorite color). Plus they really bring out her dramatic eyes. It's fun to bring props into images that help bring it to LIFE (such as the peacock feathers)! I hope you enjoy this image as much as I do! :)

Photo of the Month - August 2009

For this "Photo of the Month" I decide to use this cool photo I took of my hubby, Nick, a few months ago in June. We are Disney World Freaks. We love the place! Everything is just so awesome; the atmosphere, the cool architecture, the food, the beautiful hotels, the fun, the whole 'magicalness' of it, we love it all. And being not too far away, we visit often. So when I had family coming in town from Kansas wanting to go to Disney, we of course said we'd tag along with them. Sneaking away for some 'us' time, we visited the Disney Coronado Springs Hotel for dinner and just to relax and walk around. The hotel has a Mexican theme and has some very cool and beautiful architecture around. Of course I had my camera with me, so we walked around and photographed some interesting shots of the place. I love this one because of the repeating arches and the cool lighting. Since I didn't have a tripod with me, I laid down on the ground and stayed VERY still to capture this image. I think it turned out pretty cool. I hope you think so too. And look at my hubby, all posing for me! What a good 'model'. :)

Photo of the Month - July 2009

Since blogging is a fairly new concept (very new to me since I just got into it), I was not able to post tons of cool images while I was creating them. So in the beginning of each month, I'm going to pick one of my favorite images I've photographed in the past and blog about it. It's only July 2nd, so I'm not far behind. Let's hope I can keep up with this!

This image was done back a few years while I was in college (probably in 2004?). Being a photography major, we always had to be shooting something. The 'model' here is actually one of my best friends, Simone, in her bridesmaid dress for MY wedding. We had recently picked up the dresses and I decided I would dress her up in it, put a ton of makeup on her, and do some dramatic black&white images. Yes, this was back in the film days (gasp!) so I was using black&white film (later put onto a CD). I used one main hot lamp for my light source, and afterwards over developed the film during the process (we had to develop the film ourselves) to give it that very high contrast, dramatic look. The images turned out very cool and she looks super hot in them. We both loved them (and so did the professor)!