Light Walk

Last night we had a great sky, so I ventured down to the Capitol with my lovely wife and we photographed from several directions. Here is one of my early favorites. If you haven’t been, it’s a very interesting place to visit and it is a great spot for family, wedding or corporate portraiture. This image was captured as 9 consecutive photographs, all combined to create a single image.

The North Side of the Texas Captiol

In Austin there are several groups I belong to as a professional photographer that are very helpful and encouraging and help me to build my skills and keep them current and fresh. Last night I attended the monthly meeting of the Professional Photographers of Austin, or APPA, where we heard from an awesome photographer – Shelby Lane. She is based in Victoria and specializes in babies and children and she talked about her business journey of the past 8-9 years. I love hearing how other photographers approach the business; it’s something that I can never learn enough about it seems. From my perspective she is a very down to earth teacher, giving what amounts to simple clues that can help anyone willing to listen to hard-learned lessons. I learned a lot! This talk was particularly good for me since I have always loved children and creating portraits to celebrate their lives is something that I have a passion for.

Shelby covered the obligatory “here’s the way I work with kids and here’s the equipment I use” stuff but what was most useful was her experience trying different approaches to build life-long relationships with her clients. I love photography precisely because I can have meaningful friendships and connections with real people and can make something with them that they cherish. A couple of things I walked away with in my pocket:

• A lot happens in a child’s first year of life, so an overall plan to capture key milestones during that year is an awesome way remember those changes and provide a wonderful set of memories to the family.
• Very early on in a child’s life (<1 month) is really the best time to successfully photograph them sleeping.
• Expressions are everything with a baby; when he or she is learning them (around 3-4 months old is when it tends to start) is the most fun time to create portraits focused on expression because this is what everyone in the family has been longing for!
• Older babies (12 months) are great for movement and more actual posing since the child can sit and stand and walk and move about.

I plan to bring some of these things into my business practices over the coming months.

I’m back from an intensive week-long course up at UT Arlington called “The Power of the Classics”. This was an awesome group of dedicated professional photographers learning more about “the art of portraiture as it has been practiced since the renaissance era to the present”. Gabriel Alonso is a Master Photographer and Photographic Craftsman in the Professional Photographers of America (PPA). I found the course to be very helpful and inspiring. My brain is full and looking for ways to infuse my everyday photography work with these ideas, although I’ll likely apply most of it to in-studio work with children. Check out Gabriel’s web site for an example of this kind of work.

I can’t post images from the photography, but is a shot I took while on break:

Wary Squirrel Watches Me

One of the main sponsors for the school sent the whole group (1038 students!) to Six Flags for an evening. While I didn’t actually ride anything, it was great food and I grabbed this shot of some classmates:

Wood is Strong?