Day 307; Abby on the Pond

I am pleased to announce that I will be spending the summer working as a camp counselor. We started our training period this week, and it's been so fun and I'm so excited for campers to get here. My camp nickname is Grapes, and my roommate's nickname is Jelly. Jelly made awesome flower crowns for myself and Abby, who is the subject of today's photo. I won't have a lot of time for photos and editing while I'm here, but when I do take photos they turn out really well because the camp is beautiful. Here, Abby is pictured looking out over our pond. I liked the angle of her head because it draws your eye across the frame. I also loved the reflection of the trees onto the water and the textures of the leaves, water, and her hair.

Day 306; The Wall

One of the most enjoyable and most uniquely "camp" experiences at the Iowa 4-H Camp is the climbing wall. I've attempted it a couple times, but I enjoy climbing the wall much less than I enjoy watching others do so. This weekend, armed with a camera, I sat with other chaperones under a tree and watched several campers reach varying heights on the wall. I wanted to get a more interesting action shot, but this particular group was very cautious, and I can't really blame them. Even though it wasn't exactly the composition I wanted, I really liked the lighting and colors of this image. The colors in the camper's outfit pull out the blue of the sky and the hand holds, in addition to making her pop from the brown of the wall.

Day 305; Madeleine

Last weekend I spent at the Iowa State 4-H Camping Center for the first of two Culturally-based Youth Leadership Accelerator retreats Iowa 4-H is putting on this year. It was an awesome experience. My friend Madeleine and I spent the whole weekend photographing and videotaping the delegates' experiences and then putting together a video which we played at the closing ceremony. I've never really done any video editing before, but it was a lot of fun and I'm looking forward to doing it again next weekend!
This photo of Madeleine was taken while we were waiting to load the buses at the end of camp. I really liked the hipster-esque look she had going on, so as the other counselors and I sat there laughing at the end of a very long weekend, I snapped a couple of candid shots of her. I love how the sun is hitting her shoulder and hair. If I could change anything, I would have moved the backpack which is behind her, but all in all, I'm really pleased with this shot. Editing was minimal, mostly to decrease noise on the side of the cabin and keep the focus on her face.

Day 276; Time Flies

It's been a very long time since my last post and I am incredibly sorry. A lot of things have been going on and I simply have not gotten around to it. I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season, because I know I sure did. This weekend it's been relatively warm, which has been great. It's made me wish summer were back though, so I dug out this old photo from the summer of 2012. My little brother Noah is holding a baby rabbit and was pretty happy about it. I didn't do too much editing to this back then, except for a scratch on his right eyebrow which I had decided to airbrush out. Now, it looks clumsy and kind of obvious, but back then I didn't know any better. I do love the natural lighting going on here.

Day 268; Elijah's Eyes

This photo is fairly simple. It's a portrait of my brother Elijah. It turned out pretty interesting, as it focused on his nose and left his eyes out of focus. I liked the black and white to draw the attention to the lighting pattern and smaller details.

Day 267; Californian at Convention

This was a great weekend spent at the Iowa State Rabbit Breeders Assoc. State Convention. I didn't have many chances to take photos for my blog, but I did get some photos of my sister's Californian rabbit. This rabbit won Best In Show for youth three times over the course of the weekend and will be going to Texas for the national convention. This cool little photo backdrop was set up by some friends of ours, and was used a lot over the weekend. I liked the fall colors of the setup and complimented those with a dusk effect. While this isn't the type of photo I usually post, it is nice to take photos which are important for the subjects and not as much the artistic merit.

Day 258; Looking Lens

My brother Elijah agreed to pose for me today. Granted, it took a little bribery. Either way, I got some really neat portraits but this was my favorite. I liked how the eyes were really the focus of the image and how he used his hands to frame his face, adding interest. I thought a black and white effect was best for the simplicity of the photo as it drew more attention to the various details of his face.

Day 249; Noah in the Dark - Funny Face Edition

My brother Noah is a little ham. He likes to make funny faces, and was not in the mood to cooperate, even though I'm leaving tomorrow morning for state conference. I won't be able to post for the next three days, and possibly not on Friday either. For this shot I used a small light to illuminate his face but leave the background in the dark. I wanted a sweet smile, but he was not in the mood tonight. I still think he's adorable though.

Day 246; Noah and Thalia

I love my brother Noah and my horse Thalia, and especially like watching them together. Today's photo is simply a snapshot taken while Noah was walking Thalia around this afternoon.

Day 241; On the Grass

This photo was actually taken a couple weeks ago. Tomorrow morning I'm leaving for a State 4-H Council retreat and won't be back until late on Friday. I'm going to miss both Elijah and Noah and the rest of my family so I wanted to bring out this cute shot before I left. It was actually Elijah's idea to make it look like he was giving Noah a monkey-back ride, but getting Noah to cooperate was difficult. I did love how it turned out though, especially with the texture of the grass in the background.

Day 224; Spotted Dress

At Easter this year there were so many adorable little kids in nice clothes, so portraits were inevitable. This little girl was particularly adorable in my opinion, and I managed to snap this photo in the midst of the chaos of the egg hunt. I liked the texture the bushes in the background and the bright, springtime colors.

Day 223; Elijah at Easter

I hope you all had a wonderful Easter. I know my siblings and I did. Today's photos are of Elijah at our family Easter get-together yesterday. He was waiting patiently for the Easter egg hunt to start, and didn't know I was photographing him. Considering how far away I was, I was surprised these photos turned out, but I was glad they did.

Day 221; Joy in the Dark

I think I'm going to try to do a series of all my brothers and sister in the same style in the dark. Here you see the oldest of my younger siblings, Joy. Again, it's not as good as the one of Noah, but I still think it was worth trying. Joy has similar coloring to Noah, so the faded holga effect turned out pretty well. Joy was wearing a dark shirt which covered her neck, so it looks like her head is floating in midair, which I don't really like.

Day 220; Elijah in the Dark

Tonight's photo is a portrait of my brother Elijah. When taking it the goal was to get a photo like the one of Noah I posted a while ago (found here), but it ended up going in a whole other direction. Elijah's darker hair, eyes, and skin made the faded look I used on Noah impossible and I couldn't get the lighting quite right. Plus, he couldn't pull off the serious, stare-into-your-soul look I captured on Noah.   While editing I toyed around with several possibilities, but I settled on this very dramatic black and white look.

Day 215; Noah in the Dark

I love portraits. I love the diversity and the complexity of people, and how we, as photographers, can capture a sliver of a person's personality and it will be there forever. I didn't set out today with the goal of taking a portrait, but when my little brother Noah was willing to participate I couldn't resist. Since it was totally dark outside I had the idea to turn out the overhead light in my room and use a small portable light to illuminate his face. The result was a very dramatic lighting pattern with deep shadows on either side and creeping onto the left side of his face (his left, it's the right side when you're looking at it). Luckily he was wearing a dark shirt so it worked out surprisingly well. Now that I'm looking at the finished product, the serious expression on his face makes him look much older than his three years. To get the really dramatic look I wanted I faded a black and white effect to give the colors in his face a little bit of a washed out look so the bright colors of his eyes and hair didn't stand out too much.

Day 209; Standing on the Haybale

Last Friday I posted a photo of my brother Noah's shadow on the side of a round haybale. Today, to continue the theme, is a picture of my brother Elijah standing on the same bale. I had him try several different positions, some showing the bale and some without. I ended up liking this one since it gave the impression that he was flying or on top of the world. Since the sky behind him was so bright and the sunset only eliminated him so much, most of his body and face are quite dark. To compensate for this and lend an older vintage look, I layered a green cross-process, a dusk effect, and a spotlight effect to get a more unique and unusual photo.

Day 208; Shadow on the Haybale

This afternoon we went to my grandpa's house for dinner. He raises cattle and always has haybales sitting around someplace. Today that place happened to be in front of the barn where the setting sun could light it up. I wanted my brother Noah, who happened to be wearing his farmer shirt, to stand in front for it for some portraits but he wasn't cooperating. While he stood next to me trying to get me to come play soccer, I snapped a couple photos of our shadows. The only editing I did was to highlight the shadows by adding vignetting around the edges.

Day 203; Doll With the Floral Dress

This doll was for the longest time tied for my favorite porcelain doll. I think it was mostly because she was plain enough that I could play with her comfortably without ruining her (although her hair has seen better days). For the past few years she's been sitting in a box with all the other dolls I outgrew. It's sad that I can't even remember her name anymore. For this photo I put her in a box of packing peanuts which you can see in the corner. I did a focal soften so it would fade into softer focus the farther out from her head you got. I also did a faded black and white to give a gentler light to her dress.

Day 194

Sorry I haven't posted in the past couple days, but the whole family has been super sick. I finally seem to have started getting better, or at least I'm well enough to work on photography. I had my brother Elijah with me, and we went outside to get a few portraits. I'm not sure exactly what this pose is all about, but when I'm working with Elijah I usually just let him stand or sit however he wants to. In this case, he opted for a sort of squatting position with his arms folded across his body. Now, I'm not the biggest fan of the color red. But that's what color Elijah was wearing and I actually really liked it against the bright white snow. I added some vignetting around the edges to give a kind of ultra modern look to the portrait.

Day 187

When I was younger my sister and I collected porcelain dolls. We gathered a lot, through birthday and Christmas gifts or by buying at yard sales and swap meets. The one featured in today's portrait was one of my favorites, and one of the first brides we got. When looking around for a subject today, I noticed her sitting in front of my window and thought she would make an interesting portrait. I love portraits taken with the face at an angle, and with all the details in her outfit I got a really life like shot. I loved the black and white, but I also wanted a softer look, so I added a focal soften which softens the edges while leaving the face in focus.