Life Happens

I walk into the living room dragging my blanket behind me like my daughter does every morning. I plop myself down on the couch to wake up a little more and watch my daughter run to me like Christmas morning. Craig asked how I was feeling as he gets up to make my breakfast.  I am still not feeling myself but I am feeling much better than the day before.  As I listen to the Sprout Channel declare today is July 31, 2011, I turn towards Craig and tell him happy four years. He says, “four years of what”? Yeah that is something a man would say lol. He then realized four years of us dating three years of marriage. Since I had to quit my job from the pregnancy over a year and a half ago we stopped celebrating pretty much everything for each other. Now don’t get me wrong, we sit and talk about what we would have bought for each other and where we would have gone. However, in reality we are flat broke with a capital “B”. We spend all of our extra money on our daughter and giving her everything she needs or just wants. We were hoping by now we would be much further along on catching up on bills, but as the old saying goes, “Life happens”.  

My daughter has a test coming up on Thursday called a PH probe. This is where they spray her throat with medicine that numbs it and they insert a tube from her nose down into her tummy. A monitor is placed inside a back pack to tell us how many times she refluxes in an hour. Then they place some binds on her arms so she doesn’t pull out the tube. She is on adult strength reflux meds but her spasms have stopped. I haven’t seen one in over two months. My daughter has a rare syndrome called Sandifer’s Syndrome. This is basically where her reflux is so painful her body  will spasm from it. At first, we thought she was having seizures. I am thankful that is reflux and not seizures. This test is to see if her reflux is still as bad and if we can pull back from the meds at all.  So if you read this and you are a believer in the power of prayer, please say a little prayer for her. Say one for me too, I will need some patience because this tube will do nothing but piss her off for 24 hours! We will have to take shifts to sleep as well. We need to make sure she doesn’t get tangled in the cords. 

Anyways, (sidebar: I remember reading a blog that said they hate the word anyways and that anyways isn’t a word so this anyways is for you lol. Sorry but I do use it all of the time).  Other than having my hubby wait on me hand and foot all weekend, I did actually get some work done.  Tomorrow is back to reality. Have a great week everyone.  

Please excuse the phone pics. The last thing on my mind when heading to the ER was the camera.

Dreaming the Big Dream!

Craig turns to me and says, “One thing I have learned from living here is that I put my dishes in the dishwasher”! I think I literally heard Angels singing lol. We live in my mom’s garage that has been converted into a 400 square foot room. My hubby, my daughter and myself all stay in there. We are renting out our first house trying to catch up on medical bills and bills in general from the complicated pregnancy and my daughter’s illness.

I am thankful it is Saturday for many reasons. One being that my hubby is home to help me out with the baby. The second is that I am sick and my hubby is here to help out with the baby! I have spent today downloading pictures onto CD’s and watching movies…Legally Blonde 1 and 2 (I remember when everyone use to refer to me as a walking Barbie Doll. That was before 6 months of bedrest and an almost 9 lb baby girl). Don’t get me wrong, every pound and every second in bed was worth making sure my daughter arrived her safe and sound and full term). Anyways, I also watched My Sister’s Keeper (which reminded me of one of my best friend that died of cancer at the age of 14), Big Brother After Dark (I needed a dose of a reality show thrown in there) and Mamma Mia.  I sat back and was in deep thought about how everyone around me would react if I just jumped up into a dance and song number about how sick I was feeling. I could see them rolling me into a white padded room shortly after my song and dance number was over. 

I then read up on some of my favorite photographer’s blogs to gain some inspiration. It is nice to see that even the Big Dogs of Photography had to struggle and find their way too. I guess we all forget that they had to start from somewhere. But of course then reality sets in that they are now earning enough to live off of and we are just starting our battle. I decided I want to make a dream board.  Like a lot of photographers, I am a list maker and I need a visual of what I have accomplished.  I will feel good pulling stuff off the dream board but of course they will be replaced with more. But isn’t that what we are supposed to do, keep dreaming the big dream?

I got a REPLY!

Again, I won't say who it is from because I don't want all of the 4 people that read this blog to email him/her. All they said is that they were too busy to read or write all of the emails but that he/she was glad they could help me out. I was grateful and surprised I got an reply. Again, it just shows how super awesome this person is. 

Tropical Storm Don has hit south of us and we are getting a few of his rain bands. We need to rain badly so it was nice to see the few showers we did get. 

We didn't have too much of an exciting day today. We went grocery shopping, went to Best Buy and bought more CDs, Cases and a large case to hold all of our DVD's in. The CDs and Cases were for the major amount of burning pictures I need to do this weekend. I have a newborn shoot to send out, 2 weddings to send out, a family shoot to send out and a CD full of one year of photos of my Diva of a Daughter to her grandma in New Orleans. I am glad it is a easy weekend because I got a touch of the stomach flu from my daughter. I woke up sweating and the stomach cramps began. My husband will be sanitizing the cases and touching the CDs. I am terrified of sending the virus through the mail to end up at my client's doorsteps. That would be very bad!

While at Best Buy my husband wanted to check out the Canon 7D. I guess he finally decided he will be a back up photographer after all. He has gone to most of my shoots and he goes to all of the classes, so it makes sense for him to get a camera and snap along side me. Maybe one day we can do this as our main source of income.

K.I.R. (Keeping It Real)

Have you ever written a letter to someone you admire and hit  the send  button and thought, "Hmmm should I have sent that"? I did this very thing tonight. I don’t want to say who I wrote a letter to because I am not sure they will even have time to read it or even respond.  However, I will say this person has a wealth of knowledge and talent. If I could pick that brain for a full week in a workshop I would! 

Anyways, the letter was basically asking a few questions about a certain style of photography. I called it, “A very crisp, clean, modern yet classic style”.  I have found a select few with this style and most of them are very successful photographers. I know for sure this is the style I want to get into.  

I sounded a little desperate when telling them how bad I want to succeed at photography, “If you can give any advice or the name of that style, I will do the research and the work. I have to make this work”. I went on to close with, “On that note, thanks in advance for any information you can give and the time you took to read this. Sincerely, a crazy, unprofessional fan/photographer”.  I cannot believe I even wrote them all of this plus a little more that I am too embarrassed to say. Hopefully, they can understand where I am coming from and maybe pass on the name of the style.  In a way I am glad it is out there and that I took a chance. I definitely K.I.R. in that letter!

 I truly believe this person is genuine and may actually respond with advice. I just don’t want to get my hopes up. 

I am reminded of the quote, “The only person standing in your way is YOU”! I think I am very critical of my work and I am striving to get every picture exactly how I see it in my mind. It is a good thing in a way; at least I am pushing myself and improving with each shoot. However, being too critical can sabotage your whole mission. I have got to find the middle ground!

The Shadows are just as Important as the Light

I am feeling a little bit delusional. We are on day 4 of my daughter’s tummy bug . I think we have only slept maybe 10 hours the past several days. She finally seems like she is getting over it and ate about 2 oz. bananas today for breakfast. She is still pale and weak but I am hoping today is a turning point.

I have been thinking a lot about what my style is and how I want to put my images out there. There are so many different types of photography styles and editing styles. There are some I ADORE, Crave Photography, but her style isn’t exactly my style. I think she is way more creative than I am. I think once we get comfortable with our cameras and start to figure out what style we like while shooting and post processing, we figure out our style. It takes time and we have to develop it over our entire careers. I think I played around with tons of actions, looked at tons of photographers, and finally on my own I discovered my own style. I am not sure what you call it but I love lifestyle photography along with post editing keeping the shadows and the light in a good balance. I am not saying I have this all figured out, but at least I know what I like now. I have been experimenting with this for some time. I sat down to watch Jane Eyre the other night; I am a HUGE history buff. History is where we come from and I feel a sense of connection to the past and my family history when I read about it. I love English history, especially The Tudor Era. I was once told I was Queen Elizabeth in a past life. Either way, I still love everything about history, but I digress. Anyways, in the movie she is teaching a girl that she governs how to draw. She told her, “The shadows are just as important as the light”. That hit home with me. It was like fate finally told me what I had been trying to figure out. Is it okay to show shadows in my pictures? I see a lot of styles that put even light through out their pictures. I do like the way it looks, but I think I prefer to see the shadows in the face. I think it gives the face some dimension and texture to the picture.  Now everywhere I go I pay attention to the light and the shadows. I am finally seeing things in a different way that I believe will improve my technique. I am excited to try this out in more pictures and develop my style. 

I still have only had a few paying clients and sometimes I feel like there is no hope for my photography. But in the end, this is what I love to do. So, if I have to take pictures of rocks and my daughter to develop my style that is what I will do! I hope one day I can attract someone’s eye to me and give me a chance.  It would be nice to move out of my mom’s garage and back into our home that we are renting out. Living in a 400 square foot area with your husband and you 13 month old daughter can be tough at times. But we get a lot of help and she loves seeing her Nana and Uncles every day. God has this all worked out for me, I just have to have faith in his plans for us. 

Newborns and Cropping in the Can

This past week has been really hectic but so much fun. We received a free night stay at a hotel and we decided to head to Moody Gardens and check it out. Since we got a night alone, Evie stayed with Nana and went shopping. 

I wanted to pack light (camera wise) so I packed up my camera with my 50mm lens. There are 3 pyramids at Moody Gardens and each one represents a different environment, Rainforest, Ocean and Discover (full of bones and a life size operation game). I could have kicked myself for not bringing my macro lens because the flowers and butterflies were just gorgeous. I did get some really nice pics of all of the ineradicable things there, so I am not too bummed about it. I really need to buy my shootsac to help carry around my lenses and camera more easily. Here are some images I captured.

After the relaxing night out I headed home a little early to get ready for my newborn shoot. This was my first newborn shoot since my daughter so I was very excited. I think the biggest problem I had when shooting my daughter when she was a newborn was being super tired and also editing. I kid you not when I say I use to spend HOURS editing ONE PICTURE. I know you are laughing and hopefully saying you did this too. I was just snapping away and not trying my best to edit in the can. I would come home upload the pics, then crop them down, then try to remove background stuff, and then change exposures before I even got to the real editing. I was SO CRAZY! I have cut down on my editing from hours (mortified to even say that) to minutes. I take the time to make sure my exposure is right, I double check the background to make sure I am not getting any eye sores and I crop my picture in the can. Once I see the image in my head I crop the picture to not only save time by not having to crop later but also saves the integrity of my image. Cropping your image can make you lose resolution of your images. Most parents want a blown up picture of their pride and joy to hang up on the wall. If you take away the resolution you may not get the quality you would have if you would have cropped in camera. If you are not careful, you may not be able to blow up that image to the size you want to (I know from doing this myself to my favorite picture of my daughter. I put it below). 

So I am happy to say coming home and being able to edit the pics in one night is such a HUGE time saver and a lot less of a hassle! Here are a few of the pics I took. I posted a SOOC and an after too so you can see how I didn't have to crop at all!

Editing, Actions and Education

 So while I am sitting here editing some wedding pictures I thought I would write about a few ways that I edit. I edit weddings different than I edit my portraits. Due to the high amount of photos I give the clients for a wedding session, I generally spend about 2-3 mins on each photo. Portraits I will spend about 5 mins on each photo since there are fewer of them and are mostly close up shots. I do however take around 5 pictures from portrait sessions and 10 from wedding sessions that I like to get a bit creative and take extra time with. These are what I call my Lasting Impression Prints. I do use a few actions but there is only ONE action I ever run at 100% and that is the Florabella sharpen and defog. I usually only run one other action at a very low percentage after the sharpen and defog. That action depends on the pictures itself. I will tell you that I have spent a lot of money on actions and so far my favorites that I use come from Florabella, coffeshop (which is free by the way) and Totally Rad. Another great freebie I used on my daughter's cake smash session was MCP's Mini Fusion set. That is really an awesome action for a slight vintage look with a pop of color. If you are ever looking for a great mentoring session on how to edit photos go see Crave Photography. Andee is worth every penny and I adore her pictures. 

Anyways, I think with portraits I don't mind if they look like they might have been touched up. I don't do much I dodge and burn, add contrast, add vibrance and touch up the eyes and skin. For wedding photos I don't touch up a photo that much because I want the Bride to remember exactly how she looked that day. Most of the time the Bride looks stunning anyways and she doesn't  need any editing on her skin. Some Brides do ask for it and if they do I will certainly do it for them. However, I will never suggest that a Bride needs any touch ups done. When I got married I had some red scaring from acne when I was younger and my make-up artist was able to cover it all by using her airbrushing skills. You got love the power of airbrushing make-up! So on weddings I will run the sharpen and defog action, bump up the blacks a bit, check to make sure their skin tone is pretty and do dodging and burning if necessary. I try to keep the wedding pictures simple and just as they were on that day. That is such a special day I don't want to touch it. I will add some haze to soften the picture for spring and summer weddings, not every picture but a few. I will also add more contrast and vibrance to winter and fall weddings that have rich colors.

I read a post recently that said something to the effect that we should not waste our time explaining why custom photography cost more money. Their reasoning is because if you have to educate the customer then they are probably not in your target market. I have to disagree with this. I worked in sells for a long time and the first thing I learned is not to judge a customer by the way they look, act or what they of questions they ask. The second thing I learned was educating the customer is a HUGE step in gaining their trust and letting them know you know what you are talking about. Educating the client on our abilities to understand our own products is key to my business. If a client was to ask me why is custom photography so special than going to a big retail store or a mall picture place, I would tell them this: A custom photography session is an experience. I take the time to sit down with you and find out what your style is. If you need assistance in picking out a color pallet and/or clothes, I do this to make this process fun and enjoyable. I get to know my clients and they become my friends. So, it is like going into your girlfriends closet and playing dress-up. Another great thing about custom photography is you don't have to wait in lines nor do you have to figure out what poses you want to purchase. Also, my poses aren't the same with every client. I feel out your personality and create the poses right then and there. Most of the time it is the little moments when you think the camera isn't clicking that the best poses happen. Another great thing about custom photography is FREEDOM to do what you want to do. You can change clothes, take a break, take pictures almost anywhere and you are not on a time schedule. I give each of my clients up to 2 hours and most of the time we are done in an hour, but that extra time gives us the option to change locations or just feel no pressure from the time clock. So basically, custom photography gives you a personal experience, freedom and custom edited pictures. Why is it so pricey? Well like in all things, you pay for what you get. I own all professional equipment, I am a legit business, I travel to you, and I spend a great deal of time perfecting the pics not only on location but in the editing process. This makes for great pictures to show off. 

So I think when using actions to edit your pictures, use the actions to give your photos a nudge not a make-over. Also, education on your business and your products is important for you as well as any clients that may come your way.

Here is an example of the mini fusion set I used on my daughter's cake smash session. If you want the template it is free right now on Florabella's Face Book page. 

I am going to be an Aunt.....well sort of

So I have some exciting news...I am going to be an Aunt...sort of lol. 

My Best Friend, Jenn, is almost 16 weeks pregnant with a baby girl. She is the God Mother of my 13 month old daughter and I am thrilled for her to be pregnant for many reasons. Jenn and I met on a baby forum a little over a year ago. I was 17 weeks pregnant when my water broke. This is called pPROM (Preterm Premature Rupture of Membranes). After being in the hospital and feeling rather lost I went and joined a bed rest group. I could not find anyone with a story like mine and was feeling very alone. Then two special women came into my life that just had the same thing happen to them. One of those women was Jenn. Her water ruptured at 13 weeks and we relied on each other for comfort and support. This is the hardest fight either of us had ever been through. We both remained hopeful and prayed harder than we ever had. For whatever reason, I was able to reseal and carry my daughter to 37 weeks and 2 days on top of all of the mounting complications. However, my best friend, who feels more like my sister, lost her baby girl at 26 weeks. We all felt like we got kicked in the gut. We couldn't understand why her daughter couldn't be saved and through it all Jenn and I were able to keep our connection growing. I flew out to NJ to attend and shoot her wedding. I brought my husband, mom and most importantly...I brought my daughter. They instantly took to each other and to this day Evie loves to talk to her Aunt Jenn. I think it is important to mention that Jenn and I had only talked through texting, emails, phone calls and mainly the forum. The first time we met was in NJ for her wedding and we felt like we had known each other for years. Being able to see the incredible woman who got me through my battle and stayed by my side when I won and she was defeated was.....there are no words to describe how special she is to me. There are many times we reflected on how things should have been and why they are they way they are. We never quite understood God's plan until now. My best friend is currently pregnant with a healthy baby girl with lots of fluid surrounding her. While other doctors told her there is no way she would ever carry another child, this baby is so strong and was just meant to be here. I truly believe it wasn't time for Sarah to be here yet. Even though we grieve for her often, I feel in a sense a piece of Sarah is coming back and she is watching over her Mommy and her baby sister. Sometimes God puts us through things to remind us we need to turn to him when we are in need instead of running from him. We may not always understand his plan and it may seem so cruel at that moment; but in the end, God always sheds his love and light on us. 

Congrats to my best friend Jenn and her family and Sarah please know we think of you often and we miss you so much.

The Wiggles and The Wedding

So this week has been super crazy since I was getting ready for my second wedding to shoot (that I have done by myself) and getting my daughter ready to see The Wiggles Live. The wedding and The Wiggles were on the same day so my husband and my mom took her to the show and sent me videos throughout the night. She had such a good time and it wore her out. Now she is in bed asleep FINALLY. She is cutting two back teeth at once (her teeth always seem to come in two at a time) and she broke out in some funky rash on her face. She is not running a fever and after some antibiotic cream on her face, the rash is gone.

On a good note, I had two friends of mine stop by and say hello. She is a fellow photographer that I have known for nine years.......Has it really be nine years!!! Time flies by. Anyways, she finally got to meet my daughter and we had about an hour to catch up on things. Then, to add to my photography mingling for the night, I spoke to another photography friend, she is really more like a big sister to me, and we chit chatted about my wedding shoot. I love getting advice and from them and just having some adult time. The great thing about these gal photog friends (yes I am from Texas and I say gals lol) is that we all help each other out. If we need advice, criticism or support we all are there to give it. For example, one of the gals thinks I charge too much for a new wedding photographer. I know she is probably right, but my work takes so much time away from my family that if I had to put a number on it to be worth my time, that was it. It takes so much time to get ready for a shoot, shoot the event, edit all of the 800 - 1,000 images, set up the meetings, driving time and so on. I am not complaining, but I have to be honest with myself. If I have to spend all of those hours away from my daughter and husband (and miss stuff like her first concert with The Wiggles) then I want it to be worth it in the sense that it will help my family in the long run. Anyways, back to my point. I find it hard to make photog friends that will KIR (keep it real) with you. There are so many great photographers in my area and we could all learn so much from each other, but I find most photographers are very secretive about their business, equipment and price list. I am very open about all of that and so are these gals. I get random emails every now and then asking me questions and I am very forth coming about it all. The last one I received was asking how I got my own business started. This particular photographer is only 20 mins from me but our styles are so different. Her style is the cool, funky urban thing and I am not sure what you call my style lol. But we are different; even if we were similar I would still help her. We all have to start somewhere and why not help each other out. In my area we have over four million people here and there are plenty of clients to go around. I know I am rambling, but I just feel like all photographers should help each other out. I am not saying we should hand out all of our knowledge that we had to research and study but point the people asking in the right direction. It's all about good karma people and paying it forward.

So, the wedding went well and I am very pleased with the pictures. I feel they are 10 times better than my last wedding (I can say that since my BFF is the wedding I shot and she still loves her pictures). This is part due to a different lighting situation and part because of experience and research. One thing about me is I will NEVER stop doing the research and taking classes. Technology moves way too fast, so I feel I need to stay on top of it. This wedding had it's challenging lighting situations. The room where the girls were getting dressed was a school room. There was a chalk board, flags, metal chairs, tables and green curtains. The green curtains played to my advantage to diffuse the harsh light coming in through the windows and actually gave me pretty decent light. I moved some of the tables and chairs to put the girls in better light and to get the eye sores out of my way. Other than that I just made sure to try to double check the background before taking pictures. There is one picture where the bride is getting her jewelry on and she is in front of a chalk board. Instead of ruining the moment and asking her to move, I just shot it the way it was and worked it into the scene. After all, this is where she is getting dressed and it is a part of her day. Luckily, the church allowed me to use my flash and get very close to the bride and groom. I opened my lens all the way up, cranked up the ISO, and bounced my flash off of where the priest stands. It was all white marble. There will still be a little noise in the pictures but not enough to draw attention to it. I did take it into light room and added a tad bit of warmth and reduced the noise just a bit. One piece of advice Jasmine Star said was to shoot the difficult weddings like the easy weddings. Not all brides have the funds to spend thousands upon thousands of dollars on her wedding. Not to mention EVERY wedding has their fair share of challenges. However, I can still take pictures that make the wedding look like it should be in a magazine. After all, every bride deserves that.

Here are a few pictures that I took. They have only been put into light room and I pulled some of the warmth out of the pictures due to the very yellow light I was getting. I haven't pulled them into PS yet.

And so it begins.....

So I guess I am finally jumping onto the blogging train. I am not a huge fan of writing, or  reading at that, but I thought I need a space to write my thoughts. Hey maybe if I am lucky I will actually have some pretty cool people follow me too. If not, well at least my mom will think I am cool! 

I actually got this great idea by watching Jasmine Star's first Creative Live Class online. If you ever need a plethora of useful information, that class is perfect for it.  In this class she has teamed up with the very hunky, Chase Jarvis to shoot and document a wedding live. It is a very different way of learning about weddings. It gives you more of a hands on experience. The best part of all is you get the feel that Jasmine is teaching you one on one. I gotta say Jasmine is one of my photographer crushes (that would be defined as someone I secretly stalk online and fall in love with her pictures). Anyways, after listening to her reasoning behind starting a blog I decided I will give it a go. Maybe there will be someone that can learn something from this and if not, I am sure I am all sorts of fun to laugh at. 

I decided to use the blog name Kim It instead of Emotional Accord. I feel Emotional Accord is too professional and I wanted to be a bit more laid back on here. The name Kim It came from my husband because if someone asks me a question I don't know, I always say....yep you got it...."Google It". So after saying this a few thousand times, he now says, "Hey Kim It". You can still see my business name at the top where my email address is and I will refer to it often www.emotionalaccord.com . 

So what is going on in my life today. I had lunch at Black Eyed Peas (not our first choice, but our first choice was smashed due to them not paying their taxes and the government seizing the building). Our second choice was actually Road House, but they don't open until 4pm! So off we went to eat at Black Eyed Peas with my mom, husband, my adorable diva, Evie, and my grandparents. In just a bit I am going to check out a Church that I am shooting a wedding at tomorrow. I want to get a feel for the lighting and where the bride and groom will be getting dressed. I am also going to stop by and check out the reception hall. I will make a few notes as to the layout of the two places and mark a few places that would be good for taking formals at. I am going at the time of the wedding to judge where to good light is and I will make a note of my readings. They may change a bit tomorrow but since we are in a drought and we are being compared to the Sahara Desert, I think it will be pretty close. Funny and true story, I went to go look up the church on Google to see where about it was and I clicked on the first one that popped up with the correct information. It was a review site and noted below was one review. I read it, and I promise I am not lying, it said, "I WOULD NOT EVEN GIVE THIS ONE STAR". Now not only is that person going straight to hell, but what could be so wrong about a Catholic Church? I mean, I don't totally agree with everything Catholicism says, but come on it is a house of God.....right? So, for back up I am taking the husband. speaking of, I better go get ready.

Kimberlee Peterson

www.emotionalaccord.com