Baby

My friend Audrey had a cute little baby girl.  Her name is June, I think that's such a precious name.  Her sister Chloe is my favorite little person.  She once called my light switch a witch, and told me to "flip the witch", repeatedly.  I loved it!

This is just a preview of the girls.  This may seem unprofessional, but I'm going to own this learning process by sharing the good and the bad.  So, here it goes.  I lost a roll of film.  All 36 frames....nothing.  I've never loaded a roll of film wrong in the past, but I did this time and everything I took that I thought was so amazing didn't even make it onto the film.  This makes me very sad, but hey, one more thing to always check and make sure I take care of before I go on a shoot with all film.  :)

My Favorite Photos on Film

I've been out of the habit of blogging for a while, but I'm getting my act together this year!  I've shot a lot of film lately, and I'd like to share it on this blog.  This is an exciting chapter in my life as I've always loved photography, but something about shooting film lights a fire inside my soul.  I don't know what it is, but I do love the art and skill involved.

These are some shots of my Son and other family members shot on Kodak Tri-X and Kodak Portra 400/160.  I'm not sure if the exposing is great because I metered in camera for the black and white photos, but at least you can see what I was taking a photo of!  I love this learning process!  I love film!  Oh, and there is this really amazing lab in Seattle, Panda Lab, and they are doing all of my editing.  In fact, Asher and I just swung by there this afternoon and had a great talk with one of the technicians and I look forward to working and learning more from them!  I love the film community!

Family: The Longs

My sister-in-law and her family let me take their photos again and I think we did a great job this year!  I'm always so happy to take photos of my family.  They bless me so much, and I love to capture the love they share in a moment.

In love with Senior shoots!

I feel like the comeback kid.  I disappear for a while from the blog, but never really stop taking photos.  In fact, I've been busy this fall with some family sessions and a few return customers!  What a huge compliment to have someone hire me again!  Here are some of my favorites from Nicholas' shoot back in September.

Developing Talents. Finding my Way.

It's no secret that I love photography.  Always have.  I grew up helping my Dad pack up his gear on weekends to shoot weddings and mounting prints in my Grandpa's studio.  I loved the smell of film developing in college and I still get super giddy when I open a new roll of film to load into my camera.

The art of taking a photograph, in my opinion, has left the camera and moved to the computer where you can manipulate a simple shot to look "artsy" and adjust the levels to perfection.  I believe that perfection lies in film and the skill of the photographer with their gear.  I am no where near perfect and I have so many questions and much to learn; however, one has to start somewhere and these photos are my beginning.

In my perfect world I drop $2,500 to go to a FIND workshop and then drop another three grand or so on a Contax 645  with 80mm 1.2 Zeiss lens, or a Rolleiflex twin lens reflex, but the reality is that I need to save up for a while before that can become a reality.  So, here I am with my Canon EOS 3 and trusty lenses learning as much as I can from books, websites, and experience.  Enjoy!

   
 I used Kodak Portra 400 which has warm tones.  I feel like the color is off, but then again I did get these processed at Fred Meyer!  It was my test roll to make sure my camera worked (and boy, does it work!  I love it!).  In the future I need to use a light meter (which I'm buying shortly) and process at an professional lab.

Asher and I love to hike, so he willingly obliged to my lens in his face for 40 minutes.  He also loves to play "Puppy", hence the ball in his mouth.  He is my life.  

My Son

While I'm in the process of bringing this blog back to life with my recent shoots, updating pricing, and offering prints (yes!), I thought I'd actually take some real photos of my son!  It has been way too long since I picked up my camera to take pictures of him and since the sun was out I went for it!  We also took some photos on film until my shutter release got stuck.  Ugh...1/2 a roll down the drain.

My son loves his toys!  Thomas "B", and Batman.  This is normal play for us, except for the undocumented tackle mom part.  That happens all the time too!  Haha!

P.S. Don't mind the skid marks on his face.  He fell on the cement outside while running away from Shem two nights ago.