And then I realized something about my photography. About how much joy and gratitude play a role in it. About how, if you cannot find joys in the simplicity of life, you cannot capture them with your camera.

You see, I am a joy junkie. In my shoots, I want to find that joy. I want to get that moment when you let down your guard and let me in and share with me. I crave that.

And I believe that for you to do well with photography {or your other ventures}, you will also need to seek out that joy. You will need to appreciate the small gifts and be patient enough to wait for the big ones. Once you are able to do that, you can relax and let yourself feel those moments. It is hard to describe this feeling, but try it sometime. Try to feel the joys in the task in front of you and I think that your work will change. And so might your life {big statement to throw in at the end of a paragraph, I know}.

I know that you may want some technical advice by now in these shop talks. You know, talk about lenses and light and Photoshop and printing, but that will have to wait for now. Because while these things are incredibly important, learning how to not worry about them is important too.

And just to share two of my joys with you, here are Bella and Abe. Can you feel their joy?

How I got this shot? This is called “panning” and is all about your shutter speed {and patience}. I first determined the correct shutter speed for how much background movement I wanted. Too fast a shutter speed, and the background would not show enough blur. Too slow, and the elements would not have been recognizable. So, play with the shutter speed and check the viewfinder on the back of your camera to determine your personal preference. I was at 1/60 here.

Then you want to be sure that all of your subject is in focus, and that your aperture is not too wide. I was at a 9.5 here. I am never at a 9.5 {I like a very narrow depth of field – i.e. very blurry backgrounds}. However, in this case, I knew that the motion would give me the blur that I needed so I didn’t worry about that. Plus, the swing was moving around so much that I needed to have a very large focal plane so I could catch the kids in focus no matter where the swing took them.

Once you have all of that determined, you then need to move with the subject. Yes, you need to pan! I planted my feet and body so that I would face their resting position directly from the side {Does that make any sense?}. Then when Luke swung them, I kept my feet planted and moved my camera with the kids at their speed.

Finally, you need to take lots of shots. I took over 50 of them swinging to get this one good one. This was especially tricky because you have two kids to look good and have their eyes open and you have a swing that spins, so sometimes I would get a shot of their backs. Remember that whole patience bit?:)

Good luck…

And there was this shot. The lighting was perfect. The story was perfect. The background was perfect. The colors were perfect. And I still had my camera on in my hands. Without a word to the mother and grandmother – I dashed away from our conversation to capture this shot.

This has become one of my favorite shots, and each time I see it, I think about how happy I was that I stayed ready  - even when the shoot was officially over.

Part of why I wanted to start with this “lesson,” is because it perfectly introduces you to my all-time favorite photography book. It is not your traditional photography book. It is not a technical journal. It is not a coffe table book. But it has given me more practical advice than any other photography book I have read. It has given me easy-to-remember nuggets to carry with me in my photography journey, and to me, the book is worth its weight in gold.

The book is “The Moment It Clicks” by Joe McNally. It is a joy to read and is written in a way that really speaks to me. I carry his words with me always, and it will not be the last time you hear about Joe’s advice in one of my shop talks!

On pages 14-15, his nugget is “Don’t pack up till you leave.” Was I ever glad that I followed his advice! And I hope that you do too. Whether your love is photography or rock collecting – always be ready until you leave. You just never know when you will find a treasure…

I read so many books and blogs and websites and sometimes all the information was too much to process. I was so overwhelmed with conflicting opinions and people telling me something because they had their own motivations.

The more I dug, the better I wanted to become. I didn’t want to be the type of photographer who does cheap work and doesn’t care. I wanted to get better. I still want to get better.

I know that some of you are like me.

Yesterday my family and I were out enjoying the beautiful snow-melting weather when a woman approached us saying that she reads my blog. {I was beyond flattered!} After some chatting I learned that she herself loves photography and strives to improve her skills. As I love tech talk and helping people, we decided to set up a time to have a play date with our kids and talk shop.

And I decided to do something on my blog that I have thought of for a long time. I decided that I want to start talking shop with you too. Not because I am better than any of you. Not because I have all the right answers. Not because I am so wise that the world would be missing something if I did not post these blogs.

Just because it might help someone out there. Just because I enjoy sharing what I have learned.

So, my next shop talk blog post will be about never putting your camera away until the very end. Not simply the end – but the VERY end. You will see what I mean…

When I first decided that I wanted to do photography professionally, my plan was to take awesome photos and hand over a disk of images to my clients for them to do what they would like with them. 

A month after I purchased my first digital SLR, I gave a CD of images from Christmas to one of my sister-in-laws. I printed out a few for myself, they looked great. Then one day I was at my mother-in-law’s house and I saw a terrible picture. It looked kind of like one that I had taken but it was orange and dark and blurry. My mother-in-law said that my sister-in-law had printed out a few of my images from Christmas at Costco and had given them out to our family. So there were my images, with my name on them, in the hands of people I love…and they looked terrible!

And I saw so clearly how much I love photography and think of my images as my babies and how I want them to be the best they can be.

I saw what a difference a professional printshop (and Photoshop) made on my images. That neon sign said that I needed creative control from start to finish. I knew that I wanted to be more than a photography chop-shop. I wanted to give my clients full service. I wanted to spend quality time with my clients and not try to squeeze as many sessions in a week as I could. I wanted to make sure that all images bearing my name were as good as they could be. I saw clearly the direction I wanted to go and never looked back.

I can’t show you the print quality until you come to my office, but I thought it might be fun (and a little nerve-wracking on my end) to share some before/after Photoshop images with you! 

Although a good image needs to be well-composed and exposed with great lighting and expressions right out of the camera, every image needs a little tweak before I share them with my clients. Some tweaks are so minor that no one would ever notice but me. And some images just cry to be played with a bit more like two recent images below.

—

I liked this image. Beautiful Dani. The pose. The lighting. The blues. The wind in her hair. But straight out of the camera it deserved a little something. A little special Photoshop effort…

This is now one of my favorite images! So warm and soothing and I cannot take my eyes off of hers.

Again, right out of the camera this had potential. These two were so full of affection and they were having a great moment (on a cute bridge)…

But this Photoshop technique made this image even more special! This is also one of my new favorites!

I hope you enjoyed seeing a little behind-the-scenes and saw how I came to run my business the way I do. It was really guided by the love of photography and commitment to quality (that sounds like such a warm and cozy corporate moral phrase!).

This may be the first time I have publicly shown my straight-out-of-the-camera shots (I hope you still like me!). I am feeling a little naked at the moment but I know I will get over it. Maybe I should have paid attention to the flashing buzzing sign in my window now that says I should keep some things to myself! What fun would that be?

And then when you open your eyes, you will see the reality – it’s a construction project. Holes in the ceiling for track lighting. Ladders. Painting supplies. A broom and shopvac. The incredible smelling soaps still on the backdrop after yesterday’s shoot. You are in a place where you will be taken care of and should leave feeling better than you came, but it is not a super fancy space…yet! 

Everything has a reality.

Like my broken lens. During yesterday’s shoot, I heard a loud bang in the other room and quickly went to check on my kids. But not before setting my camera and favorite lens down too close to the edge of the backdrop. When I heard the thud of my camera hitting the floor and turned to see shattered glass everywhere, I nearly had a breakdown!

Instead of crying, I called my dad. Then I called National Camera. Then I went to National Camera – and found a wonderful reality. I didn’t break my lens. I broke the filter on my lens! Yes, the $22 filter that every camera salesperson recommends you buy to keep on your lens at all times to protect it. National Camera said that my filter took the force of the blow and that my lens and camera body seemed fine. I have yet to use them, but I am optimistic! 

I hate to keep giving out advice, but seriously folks, when the salesperson at the camera store tries to sell you a filter for your new lens – BUY IT! I want your reality to be a good one too.

One more note: When I mentioned walking into my office with your eyes closed, I didn’t really mean that you should close your eyes and walk places. My son tried closing his eyes and running yesterday (ah the mind of an almost two-year-old!) and missed running into a pole by a hair. Yup, keep your eyes open!

It was painful to take this image. The white flecks are bits of glass…

One of my product shoots of the day. It is a living will program and my client said that I can keep the product after the shoot. When I realized that I actually probably do need something like this, I must admit that it made me feel a tad bit old! Wills and life insurance and all that stuff are necessary (especially when you have kids), but actually thinking about it doesn’t fit the girl in her 20s that I still think I am!

My other product shoot of the day – simplyneutral’s new soaps (the fun shoot that made my office smell like a dream)! I love these new soaps! They made me feel more the age I think I am.