Birth Announcement

Welcoming the newest addition to our family! :) 

Little Leifer was born November 10, 2011. 

Fall Session

As an artist, I like to dream up ideas to photograph. As a photographer I like to explore different genres in the field, and as a mother it's always the challenge to execute the idea when it pertains to my toddler. I find the challenge excruciatingly painful at times, however each experience or failure lends its own lessons to be learned. Sometimes those failures become successes played out in contrast to my perceived vision, offering new experiences and skills learned.

This was definitely one of those shoots. Everything went wrong, but yet the end result was everything we needed. :)

My husband helped me do a mini-session, of my Daughter at a year and a half, which ended up lasting till sunset. What a wonderful opportunity and experience. It's sad to say, I don't often get to enjoy a sunset outdoors, let alone have the opportunity to photograph during one. With young children one learns to try to advance ones skills with expediency. Especially as they grow and no longer are content playing while you snap away.

Changing of Seasons

A change of seasons is an appropriate label for this point in my life... another semester is in full swing and my baby boy is due in just mere weeks!
Unfortunately I do not have a photography class this semester. So I am trying to take advantage of the opportunities to photograph non-school related projects. I must say this is a little more difficult than planned (as it usually is) being my life as a stay at home mother and student with a toddler on my hands is always busy.

My older brother came back to Minnesota for a visit and it provided the excuse to procrastinate on studies a little and enjoy some family time. Daniella really took to him, considering this was her first time meeting him, and I had a fun little opportunity to photograph Uncle and Niece together. Good memories.

Summer Thoughts

My mind shifts into a completely different gear during summer, especially now that I am no longer just a student on break, I'm a mommy who shifts into full throttle when school goes on the back burner. I always end my semester's with lists and promises of goals I'll accomplish... and summer usually comes and goes without me having the chance to give it a second thought. 

Often times I find myself feeling bad that I haven't spent more time being creative or honing my skills. 

My focus usually becomes more about every day life, and therefore that's usually what I photograph. It's like I go into warp speed trying to catch up on all of the photo ops of my daughter that I usually miss during the school year. I've also shifted into high gear with my crochet. So.. I guess I am learning to see the creative in the every day, when my life may not be goal oriented in the art department. 

I was going through editing some of these photos I took over the 4th, and was a bit disappointed at the grainy quality of them due to the high ISO setting. I also tend to stray away from the softer focus, however I was reminded of my instructor's comments that there's not always cause for sharp focus, and I think that the more grainy and soft focus of these images are effective for the theme I decided to shoot for. 

So I thought I'd share a couple of my favorites. 

Heart of Amber

My husband and I took our 15 month old out for a mini family vacation the weekend before last, and while we were out and about my husband bought me this beautiful necklace. I hadn't started looking at the necklace with the intent of guilting him into buying it, I was just admiring it... 

I felt it was too beautiful not to photograph. While photographing it, the amber color made me think a little bit of the phrase 'heart of gold'. Over the (almost) five years that we have been married, I have seen many sides to my husband. I think one of his strongest traits is his willing heart to learn and grow. Over the years I've seen grow into an involved and loving father, and better husband. The more we go through in life the more our character is built, shaping us to be more compassionate, and loving people. Therefore making a person more attractive. Just like the little fractures in the amber prove the substance to have been under stress. However this does not take away from the beauty of the necklace, the fractures sparkle in the light and add a special beauty to the piece. In a way this necklace reminds me of my marriage :) 

May the Force be with you!

I thought I'd share, being my little brother was very proud for being a part of this shoot. I am also very proud of his persistence during this long and challenging shoot.

A couple comments made by him were, 'Standing still for this I bet is harder than being in a movie!' and then a day later after he'd seen the results, 'It was hard work but it was worth it'. The thoughts of a 10 year old. lol.

Desserts, desserts, desserts!!!

I'm pleased to announce that the choice to continue the 'food photography' experience paid off! After a very pleasing grade and critique from my instructor I thought I'd share :) 

Fairy Princess

I had the fun opportunity to photograph my youngest sister this week for school. It's been a while since she's allowed me to really take pictures of her. She used to tell me how many more pictures I could take. Lol. But today I was very impressed with her patience. :)

After all of her hard work we went out for ice cream cones. It was a rewarding day.

Photography and Flowers.

I had the opportunity to expound upon my 'picture within a picture' photography that I enjoyed playing around with so much last semester. My new camera twin lens reflex film camera also made another debut in this shoot. 

Food Photography

After shooting this assignment for class this week, I'm considering pursuing food photography for this Semester's Final Assignment.

Photographing Glass

Here's another class assignment that I find myself pretty satisfied with. We focused on photographing glass this week... this image though not so much my typical style as it is full of color, reminded me of spring. :) 

Camera!

I have had my eye on one of these for a while. :) I was telling one of my friends about it, and she bought it for me. I'm looking forward to getting some film and playing around.

Mood

For my Mid Term assignment I had to create 3 different moods using lighting. These are the three that I captured.

It was a fun shoot. A friend of mine drove out and modeled for me. She is a photographer herself, so it was fun having her on the other side of the lens.

Window Light

Another School assignment using window light.

Winter Photoshoot With My Cousin Brit

My cousin helped me out by modeling for a school assignment, and we made a mini photoshoot out of the deal :) It was a lot of fun, and I'm very pleased with the results.

I'm posting my favorites of the bunch!

1 Year Old!

My daughter turned 1 a week ago Monday Feb 21st. It's hard to believe how quickly one year has gone by. Every day is a new adventure, and I love watching her learn and grow.

It's funny how entering into motherhood while still in college introduced one of the most challenging times of my life, however during this challenging period, I would have to say that I have had more inspiration than ever before.

So here's to my beautiful little girl.

Crochet

Over the last month or so I have fallen in love with the art of crochet. It's a perfect end to my day... I have also found it to be extremely stress relieving. So I thought I'd share a photo that was crochet-driven/inspired.

 

It can also be found at my Crochet Blog. 

Portrait

Thought I'd share what I thought was a nice portrait of my husband. This week we were working with lighting placement, and this was my favorite of the set-ups that we had.

Roses are NOT always Red

In light of the recent holiday of love... I thought I'd post a photograph that I took for my 'Lighting' class. The set up is done purely in artificial light.

I didn't specifically shoot roses because of Valentines day being just around the corner, rather I have had this desire to shoot white/Ivory roses in order to gently capture all of the contours and delicate shadows that fall upon the beautiful leaves. There is something about the deep red of the red rose, but so much detail is lost in the depth of the color. The white rose reveals the delicate beauty of the curved petals that are intricately woven together. 

Picture within a Picture

I thought I'd submit a couple photos from my final assignment that I completed for my photography class I took last semester. I have been holding on to these, because my intentions are to further the series, but just have not had the time as of yet.

My instructor was pretty amazing, she really helped direct me through the idea process as I was brainstorming. I realized that I began to really see the concept of the final series during my mid term, where I shot the various photos within photos that each told a different story about me. From there I kind of became engulfed with the picture, within a picture idea and spent most of the rest of my semester playing around with different versions of it. Two of the images below were submitted into the Academy's Spring show via my Instructor :) I was one of three selected in the class for such an honor.

Though I have stepped back this semester from this concept, I plan to further explore this. Hopefully I will find the time in the not too distant future.

Christmas Vacation

Robert's Mom visited over Christmas Vacation and I did a little photoshoot of Daniella and Grandma Zuni. This was the ONLY photography project that I managed to complete over break.