HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!

Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving, and make a joyful noise unto him with psalms. -Psalms 95:2

Digital Photography Master Class – Assignment Pet Portrait

I’ve talked about Tom Ang’s book before and posted the results for a couple of the assignments that I have tried working on. If you don’t remember feel free to take a look back at earlier posts on this book, it has been a while since I wrote something about it.

– Digital Photography Master Class –  DPMC-Assignment Urban Nature –  DPMC-Assignment Basic Image Enhancement –

Yesterday D said that the company he works for was needing pictures of employees and their pets to put on the company website. One of the gals that works there set up a studio to take the pictures. Well, our Bella dog is not the most cooperative beast when it comes to portraits. Believe me I’ve tried many many times and she usually runs straight up to the camera and sniffs at the lens!

Bella’s lack of cooperation and hyper personality meant that she would never sit still in an unfamiliar environment with a stranger trying to take her picture. D’s employee/pet portrait was going to have to be taken at home. We all know my living room is the worst place for taking pictures of any kind but we gave it a shot.

Oh, what does all this have to do with Tom Ang’s book? –Pet Portraits

There is a chapter on perfecting your timing and developing your skills, the assignment for that chapter is Pet Portraits. The brief for this assignment is to “obtain a telling portrait of a pet animal to convey its character, charm, or features… work with an animal that is lively and has an expressive face..”

Bella Dog is very lively and really does show many expressions on her face. You can almost hear what she’s trying to say just by the look in her eyes. One of my favorite times with Bella was the night she discovered she could move her eye brows!

Last night I set up an old blanket for a back drop, didn’t matter what color I knew I’d have to remove it later. D sat down in front of the blanket and we tried and tried and tried to get Bella Dog to pose. Oh she did pose nicely a couple of times, about 4 feet away from where D was sitting. Crazy dog. Finally L grabbed some treats and gave Bella a little help getting closer to D. With the promise of a tasty treat, and a snug hug from D, Bella managed to resist the urge to sniff the camera for just a moment and I managed to get one shot.

I think, even though it’s not a portrait of just Bella, that it really does convey her character and brings out her funny personality. And you can tell how much energy she has by the fact that she is getting that snug hug to help keep her still.

Hope it’s good enough for the company site!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!

Happy Halloween Everyone!!

Hope you all have a great time and stay safe.

Enjoy a few shots of our Halloween fun.

Free Samples

Have you ever made an unplanned purchase because you were given a free sample? Sure you have. Everyone does!

I used to sell cosmetics for a well know door to door cosmetics company, DING-DONG, and I know I made many a sale because of those free mini lipsticks!

And, as a Mom I have bought grocery items that were not on my list because K and L tasted a free sample and found something new they just couldn’t get through the week without.

Even big office supply companies give free samples of paper and labels. Less face it we all love to get something for free, no matter how small, and more often than not -after we sample, we buy. 

Recently I have been discussing the idea of free samples with other photographers at Dreamstime. The DT agency offers free images to their clients, just as that well know super store offers free samples of freshly baked cake or crisp crackers with a new cheese spread.

All the photographers I have visited with about donating images as free samples seem to agree on one thing. Any view into your portfolio is better than no views into your portfolio. So I have ventured into the realm of free samples once again. This time instead of giving away mini lipsticks to encourage women to purchase a new shade, I am giving away free RF stock photos.

I started two weeks ago by donating three of my oldest images, a volleyball net, a swing set, and a school bus, and so far it seems to be going well. Because of those images my DT portfolio has had more views recently and those three images have been downloaded over 100 times in total. That means I have over 100 potential new clients, and that’s just in the first 14 days!

I plan to donate a few more images in the next few days or weeks, I think my stock photo sales will increase because of the additional exposure to my portfolio.

So whether you sell delicious cakes, colorful lipsticks, or those ever-present stock photos think about passing along a free sample or two. You just might be pleasantly surprised at the results.

Have a great day everyone.

An Unexpected Trip To The Museum

So they tell me I should take my camera with me everywhere I go.

Sorry to say that I usually do not and I have missed many a great photo-op.

However last weekend we took an unexpected side trip to a little museum and I actually had the camera with me!!!

OK, so I had it with me because I was taking pictures at a volleyball game earlier that day.

I wish I’d had my nifty fifty with me at the museum. All I had was my longest lens that was far to long for the close quarters of the museum, and my 17-40 wide-angle.

I don’t have a flash yet, just the little pop-up. But I attached the wide-angle and popped up the flash and hoped for the best.

I must have taken 50 shots of the animals (taxidermy polar bears, lions, moose, skunks…) only a couple of those came out at all. I also took another 100+ shots of other things in the museum including giant animatronic dinosaurs. (Watch for at least one of those to show up on Zazzle products in the future!)

Now this is kind of a low-budget museum run by a local college so it’s a smaller building with not the best light in the world.

I figured I’d never get anything that Dreamstime would accept so I was happy to find, when I got home, that I had 10 shots that just might work.

I gave it a  try and submitted those 10. Turns out that only 4 of them were actually good enough.

But hey! That’s 4 more photos in my portfolio that I would not have if I hadn’t had my camera with me for that unexpected trip to the museum!!

So be sure to take your camera with you every chance you get. You never know when something unexpected just might net you a couple of fun shots.

Have a great weekend everyone!!!