Eleven Friends :: Copperas Cove, TX Photographer

You graduate high school. Some of your friends head off to college. Others head for the military. A few return home to sort it all out. No one's path is the same after the final verse of your alma mater is sung on graduation day. The shared journey of the past four years finally diverges and you may have to say goodbye when that is the last thing you want to do. But friendships can endure the test of time, of distance, of long silences. I wish the best to these eleven friends as they part ways and travel off on their own roads.

Greetings, Autumn!

Vivid Memory #12: my mom's "Color Me Beautiful" book from the early 1980s. According to the author, every woman has a "season" of colors that best compliments her skin tone and hair color. If you figure out your season, you will be set for the rest of your days, looking gorgeous in every article of clothing you don. From my 6 year old view point, I simply went by the colors I liked best. I declared myself a Winter Dresser. Pinks, pastels, cool colors. Yep, that was me! No one wanted to be Autumn with those drab browns and dark greens. Definitely not me. Not the girl with dark hair and greenish eyes and freckles. Oh, no. That was NOT my color group. I was committed to Winter. And I have a host of tragic school pictures to prove it.

Then one day in high school I borrowed my best friend's hunter green, long sleeved t-shirt from the Gap (obviously, this is Vivid Memory #13). And my eye color popped. My skin looked better. I felt great. I got compliments. I shook my head and muttered, "I am an Autumn Dresser."

Autumn is my season. In color, in temperament, in changeability. When I think of autumn, I think of the northeast. I feel the crisp air with an early morning bite of cool in it. I hear the rustle of wind scattered leaves, chasing a fast moving car down a neighborhood street. I yearn for apple orchards, apple cider, hot chocolate and the smell of cinnamon. I solemnly leaf through the pages of an LL Bean catalogue, noting the cable knit sweaters (in russet, of course) that just seem so perfect for a brisk romp outside with the kids.

I love you, Autumn, and though you appear differently in Texas, you still bring pumpkins and shades of orange and the sense of change and newness. Hello, my friend, hello.

(above picture courtesy of my brave friend who did not shy away from my "big" camera and gave my husband a beautiful gift of a picture with me in it)

My Beam of Light :: Harker Heights, TX Baby Photographer

She is my beam of light. My ray of sunshine. My source of much happiness. And she is almost one. Almost. Not quite. Still a baby. My baby.

A Drop of Rain and a Dash of Color :: Harker Heights, TX Family Photographer

When I pulled out of my garage, heading to this evening family session, the drops started to fall on my windshield. The Weather Channel said no rain until 7 pm, which was 2 hours away. The Weather Channel lied. Again. I called the mother to see what we should do and she said they were a bit further up the road and there was no rain. So we chance it. And it was so worth the gamble!

The sun played hide and seek with the clouds, the rain drops fell intermittently, but the smiles never stopped, the happiness never faded and this family has never shined so brightly. It was my pleasure to spend the evening strolling about with you all, candy bribes and all, and I cannot wait for you to see all the gorgeousness we captured!

Rowdy Love :: Belton, TX Family Photographer

It helps to have a great backyard. It also helps to have beautiful children. But what really makes a great family session is a willingness to free your children to be rowdy, quiet, creative, belligerent and purely themselves. I spent a fun hour with this family of five, encouraging the kids to swing, to play ring around the rosy, to love on their parents and to race around the backyard. I confess, I broke a sweat, but that is the only way to capture kids being kids. These images are memories made tangible and I was honored to be trusted with that responsibility!

Because You Asked #3 :: Camera, Lenses, Classes, Oh My!

(I have a list of all the questions folks asked me in the comments section of my October 8th post and I am working my way through to provide answers. If you are reading this and want to have YOUR question answered, just add it to the comments on this post.)

Rachel Spin asked, "What equipment do you use? Lots of lenses, or just a couple? Have you taken any classes on photography or processing? Tripod or no tripod for most of your shots? I love the natural light in all your photos, do you ever take photos at night?"

I began with a Canon Rebel as my first DSLR, graduated to a Canon 40D (this is a cropped sensor for your Nikon folks) when I started my business and then moved to the full frame Canon 5D Mark II after my business turned a profit. Obviously I like Canon, but have never used Nikon, so I cannot compare the two. I have so much invested in Canon lenses, batteries and flashes that I simply do not intend to make any switch for financial reasons. From a totally unscientific standpoint, I don't think you can go wrong with either a Canon or a Nikon. However, once you make the initial investment, know that you really have set the course for which "camp" you will belong to.

The Rebel is a fabulous camera to learn on, affordable for most budgets and produces a good product for the technology it contains. In my opinion it is not a camera with which to start a business, though. As a professional photographer, you should have professional grade equipment. We all know the camera does not create a beautifully composed, exposed and conceived image. It does, however, allow you to offer the very best to your clients, which is what they deserve when they invest in you and your photography.

I only use three lenses: a Canon 24-70mm/2.8L, a Canon 50mm/1.4 and a Canon 85mm/1.8. I am sure there are others I would fall in love with if I used them or did too much research, so I don't window shop! For my purposes as a family and child photographer, these lenses have served me well and never leave me wishing for something more. The times I do get a bit irritated with my lens options are when I am trying to take personal shots of my stepson playing soccer. At those moments I would love a great low light zoom, but since I am not making money on those images I will make do with what I already have.

Here are examples of how I use each lens:

24-70mm/2.8L at 24mm, ISO 640, f/3.5, 1/500

50mm ISO 400, f/2.5, 1/1250

85mm ISO 400, f/5.6, 1/200 (sometimes I use my prime for group shots because I love the clarity and I don't want to take time to switch lenses)

85mm ISO 500, f/2.8, 1/1600

I find it is very easy to look at all the things I do not have and wish for them. But an advantage I have is that I am extremely frugal. (I can hear my husband yelling the word "Cheap!" from the desert...) I can talk myself out of purchases far faster than I can convince myself to hit the "Buy Now" button. But I tell people who are starting out that they should invest in one or two quality lenses, then master them. Get great with them. Love the images you are capturing. Figure out when each lens is at its best. Learn its limitations and, when funds become available, you will know what you need to buy to fill in the gaps of your focal length or aperture range.

I do not use a tripod because I do not own one. I refer you to the previous paragraph and my frugality... Other than the random self portrait of my family, I don't ever think I would use it. I cannot fathom how hard it would be to chase a child around a field with a tripod affixed to my camera. That thing is heavy enough with the 24-70 mounted! Even my posed family shots are not static scenes, for I have yet to meet the three year old that will settle down from a run to smile perfectly with Mom and Dad. I need to be free to move quickly and easily and a tripod just doesn't fit into my style of photography.

Other than a class in high school (back in the film days), I have not had any formal instruction. Just years and years of taking pictures and learning cameras. I started in the 35mm days with a fully manual Pentax K1000. I had to know exposure and aperture. There was no room for error when I had to pay for film and developing. But since entering the digital age, I find it is so much easier to increase that learning curve. Pay attention to your metadata. Learn what your ISO, shutter speed and aperture look like when you see a shot that makes your heart sing. Take tons of images and critique yourself.

Along the same lines, the bulk of my Photoshop education has been trial and error. I did attend Cheryl Muhr's The Secret Workshop which opened my eyes to all sorts of new things within Photoshop. I would really love to take an advanced PS class, but there are none offered in my area. So, I turn to Scott Kelby and his fabulous books on the topic and keep playing around to get a feel for what suits my eye.

To answer the final question and close this rambling dissertation, I do not shoot at night. I own a flash but 1) am not proficient with it and 2) most of my family clients don't want to be outside at night with small children. So the need has not presented. And I am a morning person with little energy by the time the sun sets! However, I do love the look of Off Camera Flash at twilight when a photographer nails it. It really does add a dramatic effect to images.

Thanks, Rachel, for all the questions!

Countdown :: Killeen, TX Baby Photographer

He is in his fifth week of life. He is the fourth child. He is the third son. His ability to nurse is second to none. You can't help but notice the eyes first.

Seriously. His eyes are amazing: deep blue, huge, attentive and while I was there, seldom shut. Again I worked my magic on this baby and made him stay awake for nearly two hours, followed by over two hours of sleeping as soon as I left the house. Nevertheless, he is precious, beautiful and certainly well loved. And he will never again be this small and this new and it was a joy to spend my day with him and his mother.

iheartfaces week 42, Orchard :: Killeen, TX Children's Photographer

I've missed a few weeks of the I Heart Faces weekly photo challenges, so I was not going to let this most Fall of categories slip me by. I had to delve into my 2008 files, back when I traveled up to Northern Virginia to see what fall truly looks like. This picture was taken almost exactly two years ago to the day when I spent a week with my dear college friend and her family. In that time, we have both added another child to our families and we are long overdue a visit. I can't even imagine what these two look like now!

Head over to I Heart Faces and share your Orchard picture with the rest of us.

Sunny Smiles :: Killeen, TX Family Photographer

Fall shows up a bit differently in Texas. Mornings are 50 degrees, afternoons are in the 80s. The leaves don't really change from green to majestic orange, yellow and russet. They just kind of turn brown. But the air is so clear. The sky is so blue. And the sweat seems to have stopped rolling down my brow every time I leave the house.

It is nearly impossible not to want to fling your arms out and laugh on such beautiful days. And this sweet, loving, laughing family found that to be just the case. A field of grass in which to run, a stream with rocks to throw and a lovely line of trees under which to enjoy some shade provided the perfect backdrop to a fun hour of chasing, chuckling and some shutter snapping.

I hope you guys enjoyed it as much as I did!

Because You Asked #2 :: Resizing and Cropping

Christina of Studio 23 Photography asks, "the one thing I can't figure out is sizing. When we dump our pictures off of the camera it comes off as a certain size (inches and pixels). Usually I edit the image and maybe change the number of pixels. I run into the problem when I want to print the photo whether it be myself or by Mpix. So my question is what size do you edit your images to so that when you go to print you don't have to re-edit or the photo doesn't get cut off?"

This question seems to deal with two things: resizing and cropping. Christina

is absolutely right, the camera has a predetermined ratio at which it takes pictures. For most DSLRs, it is a 2:3 ratio, which translates into your "normal" 4x6 print. However, the image does not come out as a 4x6. On this example of a shot I took of my baby, the image straight out of camera (SOOC) is 78"x52" and 72 ppi:

Think back to math class...I know, it's Friday and I am asking you to compute things! But this is the key to understanding resizing and cropping. Everything relates to that 2:3 ratio. If we multiply 2:3 by 2, we get 4:6. Look familiar? Something like a 4x6 print? If we multiply 3:2 by 26, we get 78:52. Hmmm, is that our SOOC image size? Is 78"x52" equal to 6x4? You bet it is! So I set my crop tool, for a horizontal image, to a width of 6 in and a height of 4 in. I choose to use a resolution of 600 ppi because I was as much resolution as possible. All the printing places say 300 ppi but I haven't had a problem yet using 600. (If someone knows better, please weigh in!) Anyway, having set my crop tool to a 6x4, I just "crop" the whole image. Losing nothing. Just reducing the inches and raising the resolution:

I then edit the picture as a 6x4 (or 4x6 if it were a vertical shot) and save this edited 6x4:

I do this for an entire session. I make a folder of fully edited 4x6s, resolution 600 ppi. Then I duplicate all the 4x6 images and put them in a new folder to be cropped as 5x7s with a resolution of 600 ppi, because I like the 5x7 ratio on my blog and in my client galleries.

Let's pull out some more math. The other thing you can do with a ratio is write it as a fraction, 4/6, and divide 6 into 4, resulting in 0.6667. If we did the same thing with 5x7 and converted it to 5/7, we would have 0.714. These are obviously not the same value, and they will not result in the same crop of an image. The 4x6 crop ratio has the most "space," if you will. Any other standard crop size will reduce the "space" of the picture.

Below, you can see a 5x7 crop box over the 4x6 image. They are obviously not the same size and I will "lose" some of the image:

And here is an 8x10:

and an 11x14:

If you offer various sized prints to your clients, you will have to crop your images. There is no way to preserve the entire view of a 4x6 image when the client requests it as an 8x10. They simply are not the same size. The key is getting a good feel for crop ratios by taking the same image and placing different crop boxes over it to see what you lose of the image. Then, when you are shooting, you can keep these crop ratios in mind and allow yourself enough perimeter in your image to successfully create a beautiful 4x6 and a beautiful 8x10 without cutting off arms or heads.

Because You Asked #1 :: Selecting Images

I asked for questions, you guys complied and today I start with Rene Fernandez of RenDez Photography's question regarding how I whittle down my images after a session.

Narrowing my images down to a workable number was extremely hard for me when I started in professional photography. Except for the images that were obviously blurry or improperly exposed, I felt that every single shot had merit. This expression was slightly different from that expression. The mom looks spectacular in that shot, but dad looks fabulous in this one. And on and on. And seriously, this part of the process used to take me as long as the session itself!

I had a great family session this past Saturday (shameless plug HERE if you didn't see it already), so I will use that session for our discussion. The dad is getting ready to deploy, their son just turned one year old and they wanted to capture this time in their lives.

Over the course of the hour we spent together, I shot 699 frames. 699. I know, my finger must have palsy and I hit the shutter release too many times. Whatever, I like to have too much. I want to offer greatness to every client. (Small note to my clients: you do NOT want to see all 699. You don't. Many are nearly identical to one another, others are out of focus or someone is blinking...which is why I take so many: to nail the really exceptional amongst the okay.) So, after having a wonderful morning with this family, I get home and download my images to Bridge. And I see this multitude of thumbnails:

Just in scanning this snippet from the whole 699, you can see there is redundancy. I shoot 10 frames of one particular arrangement, 7 of another, et cetera.

When I am ready to select my shots, I work through Bridge and I use a star system. If I feel the image is a keeper, I give it one star (hit command+1 on a Mac). Only if a shot is completely ruined do I delete it. Otherwise, everything stays for the time being. I break the session up into the small groups of similar scenes or settings. I try to star at least one image from each arrangement, but I admit, sometimes a grouping or a position simply wasn't flattering and I skip it completely. In this example, from the 699, I found 106 images that I felt were star worthy. I then filter my view in Bridge so only the Star Pictures are displayed:

But how did I get from 699 to 106? What was it that made me skip one image or star one? I look for sharpness, for I like my images to have spot on focus. I will omit an image if the focus is soft, knowing that if I include it that will be THE picture the family loves and wants to enlarge to a 20x24. And soft focus just gets worse as you enlarge... But what really makes me place a star on a picture is if it grabs me. If the image makes me smile. Everyone does not have to be smiling politely at the camera. They just have to be having fun or sharing an emotion together. I react to pictures that seem to tell a story on their own, as though I was not really there, but just happened to luck into a special moment between people who love each other. So, narrowing from 699 to 106 is based largely on emotion.

I do not show all Star Pictures to my clients. 106 pictures would overwhelm anyone. And all 106 that I initially starred are not truly keepers. They are just the ones I liked best on the first look through. I still have some redundancy of scene or pose, but now I have my three favorite of one scene. I can look at those three together and pick the one that really knocks my socks off.

Also, since I do all of my first look in Bridge, using thumbnails, I sometimes find that a picture I starred is not in focus when I see it enlarged in Photoshop. And if it is not in focus, I skip it. I don't want to get into the situation of "forcing" a slightly blurry shot, no matter how cute everyone is, for the specific fear of that one being the one choice for enlargement.

The final consideration in deciding which images to show a client is asking myself if a particular image lends itself to telling the story of the morning. When the client looks through the entire gallery, will they remember the whole session? Will the complete experience be presented for them? When I look at my folder of edited JPEGs, can I see the various facets of the family, the smiles and the tears, the posed shots and the natural moments that just happened?

If I can answer yes to that last question, I have made good image selections.

One Year :: Killeen, TX Family Photographer

Their sweet boy just turned one. He walks. (Incredibly well!) He loves his Mama. He laughs with his daddy. He hears the joy in his parents' voices as they roll with his moods. He loves blue frosting but is not so keen on wiping faces and being chilly. He has obviously been surrounded with love, easy laughter and comforting arms these first 12 months of his little life.

As many days as he has breathed deeply of his family's love for him, his daddy will miss. In the way of the Army, the soldier a woman decides to love is only present intermittently. Not be choice. Oh no, never by choice. But by duty. And for that devotion to duty, she loves her man. She accepts, sometimes begrudgingly, the job he is called to do, away from her side, away from their child. But before the family is put on hold for a year, we preserved this day of happiness, this moment of togetherness, these precious memories. May they comfort both of you in the many months ahead!