My project, A New Take on the Old Self Portrait, has come to an end after 52 adventure-filled weeks.

One year ago today, I challenged myself to take a new and unique self portrait each week of 2010. The challenge was set forth for a few reasons.

To push myself further as a photographer, learning new styles and experimenting with new techniques.

To push myself as an artist, coming up with 52 different ways to portray the exact same subject.

And also to help myself get comfortable in front of the camera; to better understand what my subject feel like when they come face to face with my camera lens.

I can’t believe it, but here it is, one year later. Some weeks almost didn’t happen. Some weeks I almost gave up. Some weeks were a real challenge to make the deadline. Some weeks I was down to the wire coming up with a new idea, or learning the new technique. But one thing remained a constant,
every single week:

I learned something new.

Really!

I could go through, each image, one at a time, and tell you what I learned that week! I won’t bore you with all the details, but I would like to hit a few of the highlights.

Week 5: Blue Sky
This image was a test of patience. I needed an image this week, not only for my personal challenge, but also for a school project. All week, I had been waiting for the sun to come out. Just once! I had a clear image in my head, and it just would not be the same with grey overcast blah boring sky. Finally, the day before the image was due for school, and the day before the image would be needed for my blog, the sun decided to make a stunning appearance through the clouds! It lasted all of fifteen minutes, but I managed to capture it. This week, I used my small speedlights in combination with sunlight for the first time. I learned that I love dynamic lighting, and took the first step in learning to light.

Week 7: Kickin’ It Old School
This image was a test of making something out of nothing. It was the first image during the year (but not the last) that didn’t show my face in the self portrait, but, still tells a story about who I am. I was running short on ideas this week.. until I came across my favorite oldest most ripped up pair of converse. To make it interesting, and show off the multiple textures playing throughout the image, I used an HDR technique. HDR is a pretty controversial topic when it comes to some photographers. In my opinion, it is a tool, like many photographic tools, that is best used in moderation, and at just the right times. This was one of those times. I learned to hold very still, while hitting the shutter nine times. I’ve sold two prints of this image.

Week 10: Down the Rabbit Hole
This image came to me in a dream. Weird, I know. I had seen Tim Burton’s new Alice in Wonderland movie the night before, and dreamed up this silly little image. That morning, I literally sprung out of bed and spent the whole morning and afternoon crafting the image. I don’t think I stopped once until I was complete. One of my top favorites of the whole year, this image inspired my “As Yet Untitled” Wonderland series, which can be seen here. I learned to follow an idea, no matter where the inspiration came from. And that composites are amazing, especially when composited less than the viewer might think! I’ve sold one large print of this image.

Week 14: Shadow of a Doubt
This image was a test of speed! While attending a Salem Strobist meetup, some of the guys said they recognized me from the self portraits I’d been posting. Towards the end of the day, Jeff them suggested I do my weekly image right then. I thought about it and said… okay! I composed my image, zipped up my hoodie, and got to work. Heather helped me by holding the flash low towards the puddle, creating that awesome shadow. I learned that spontaneity is a great tool.

Week 28: Christmas in July
This image was a test in balance. I learned, on one hand, the simplest of things can make a very interesting photograph. The reflections in the eye are made from a strand of Christmas lights. The lights creating the bokeh in the background are from the same strand of Christmas lights. On the other hand, I learned that adding texture to images can take it from good to great. The minute I layered texture over this image, I was hooked!

Week 34: Remembering Rosie
This image taught me that posing is hard! I don’t want to remember how many shots it took to contort myself into this pose, but let me tell you, it’s much harder than it looks! Of the handful of homages I completed over the year, this was the only one that needed to be spot-on. And my arms just aren’t as long as Rosie’s, haha! Fortunately, I also learned that the “liquify” tool is an amazing secret weapon. With great power comes great responsibility. I used it to distort my face to be more like Rosie’s, with full lips and expressive eyebrows.

Week 39: I don’t Wanna Grow Up
This image was a test of will. With a very specific image in mind, Abe and I lugged all of my equipment down to the creek, only to realize the sun wasn’t shining through the trees anymore. Once I got set up, it took forever just to get the duckie to stand up in the water. He wanted to float upside down! It was a frustrating week getting everything how I wanted it to look. I ended up doing a lot of post-process practice this week, and learned new ways to edit my photos. I learned to never give up. I also learned that rubber boots don’t have traction on mossy river rocks!

Was all the work worth it?

Definitely.

I wouldn’t trade this experience for anything. It is exactly that: experience. I took ideas and concepts that I had only read about in books, and figured out how to create them. To me, hands-on experience is priceless. I have given myself tools and knowledge that I will be able to use in my future photography endeavors.

Will I ever do a 52-week challenge again?

Probably not, haha.

Not because of the work involved, but because of the deadlines. There were a few times over the course of the year that my project interfered with my time needed for other things. I work 32 hours a week at a graphic design studio, and run my photography business, and (somewhat) have a life outside of that. I will, of course, continue to create lots and lots of personal projects! But I won’t set weekly deadlines for myself.

If you’d like to stay up-to-date with my work, here are a few places you can find me:
Facebook
Flickr
Model Mayhem
My brand new website!

For the last time this year: thank you for looking. Here’s to wrapping up an amazing year, throwing on a scarf and gloves, and heading face forward into the next adventure. 2011 awaits!

dani

Oh, and just for fun, WordPress sent my some stats on my blog over the course of 2010:

The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads “Wow”.

The Numbers

A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 6,600 times in 2010. That’s about 16 full 747s.

In 2010, there were 49 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 50 posts. There were 117 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 293mb. That’s about 2 pictures per week.

The busiest day of the year was September 6th with 175 views. The most popular post that day was Week 36: From Above.

My inspiration for this week’s picture has been a long time in the works, but, like many weeks prior, was changed at the last minute.

For a few months now, I’ve been thinking about how to end the year. How on earth do I come up with an idea to top them all? Simple. I do the opposite. Stay with me here: how about I take my final week.. the culmination of the whole year’s project.. and take a “MySpace” style cell phone picture in the mirror? Haha! That’ll show ‘em.

You see, when I first started this project 52 weeks ago, I got a lot of funny looks. “So… you’re going to take a picture of yourself every week? Oh, cool.” Now, I know my project wasn’t the greatest project ever in the world, but I do know it was a lot more creative than most people thought it would be. And I had a whole lot of fun along the way!

At the last minute I decided, like so many other week’s concepts, it just needed some fine-tuning.

I set up my camera on a tripod in the shower. I went with all natural bathroom lighting on this one, to keep it true to its initial concept roots. I took about thirty different shots of different poses around the room, with a vague idea of how I’d like the image composed. Took it into Lightroom and Photoshop for the post-processing and layering of the images.

As a note, my white balance was set to compensate for the yellow light in my bathroom. It’s the only room in the house without the blue light of compact flourescent bulbs. Hence the crazy blue light in the bedroom. But I thought it worked well to create depth, contrasting colors, and balance with the blue screen of my iPhone.

So.. that’s a wrap!

Next week, at the usual time, I’ll be creating my final post. A gallery of the whole project, along with my thoughts about what I’ve learned during my 52-week challenge.

*Edit* Can you believe I wrote the sign, shot the photos, edited, uploaded… and THEN it was pointed out to me that I had omitted two letters in the word “portrait”. Of course. I managed to correct it in the larger photo above, but couldn’t do a convincing job on the smaller photo. See the spelling error in all it’s glory. Great way to end the year, with the lesson learned, you can’t spell check sharpie

Thanks for looking,
dani

I love trying new techniques.

And I may have suffered some head trauma.

There’s an explanation I promise..

This weekend I made time to attend the Portland Lightist group meetup. This is an awesome group of photographers who take time out of their busy schedules to set up shoots and get together. There is a large range of styles and abilities in the people who attend, but they all have two things in common: a passion for photography and a friendly attitude. Click here to see their group page on Flickr.

I brought along my friend Amanda, who happens to be a beautiful model, makeup artist, and also a photographer. Is there anything she doesn’t do? I don’t know. But she seemed to have a great time, and hopefully, made some connections with the awesome photographers in the group.

The meetup was great; we explored different lighting styles in the Film Noir style, and had some awesome models to shoot with. Two of my favorite shots from the day can be seen here and here.

Anyways, there is a reason I’m telling you this. The shoot was in a studio filled to the bursting point with studio strobes, D-SLR cameras, Pocket Wizards, and light modifiers galore. Yet, throughout the day, nearly everyone pulled out their iPhone. And getting some really great shots. I couldn’t believe it.

That evening, while putting away some socks into the dresser, I bumped the drawer, which bumped the TV, which bumped the large candle perched precariously on top. The very large, very heavy, Christmas tree-shaped, silver and sparkly candle, teetered off and hit me square in the head. I fell to my knees and actually saw stars. Oh, pretty!

While kneeling on the floor, Abe rushed over to make sure I was alright. When I pulled my hands away from my head, they were covered in sparkles and blood. It was quite possibly the most festive head wound ever.

(As I write this, I am hoping at least one or two of you readers get my sense of humor)

I casually said to Abe, ‘If I was really creative, I’d find a way to make this part of my photo of the week.’

And here you have it. I used my iPhone

I layered eight shots together, using various blending modes, until I got this look. I wanted to portray the confusion of being suddenly struck in the head, and not knowing where it came from, or what it was… then seeing sparkles.

Thanks for looking,
dani

Wow. Two weeks to go! I decided to try two new techniques this week. It’s getting down to crunch time in this year’s challenge, so why not take on two challenges this week, right?

First, I’ve been very fascinated with Miss Anelia’s “multiplicity” series on Flickr. Click here to view her album. She is an incredibly talented photographer, and I’ve really enjoyed looking through her stream since I discovered it last week. Her creativity, color tones, and compositions are all to be admired. This week is my (humble) homage to her multiplicity.

Second, I decided to try my hand at a slow shutter speed, and rear-sync flash. I’ve heard a lot about the benefits of rear-sync flash; since the flash fires at the end of the exposure, rather than the beginning, it freezes an image on top of the motion blur, rather than the other way around. This is something I’ve wanted to try for a while, but for the life of me, I just couldn’t figure out how to set it on my camera. The manual was no help, and I couldn’t find it in the camera’s menu settings. Come to find out, it’s as simple as pushing a button. Quite literally.

Rummaging through my closet, I found some flowing skirts that would lend themselves nicely to slow shutter speeds and motion blur. I set my camera on a tripod, framing the Christmas tree. It was interesting, playing around with the differences between a two-second exposure, one-second, and half a second. I found the amount of blur I liked right about one-second; it gave me a chance to move a bit, throw my skirt around, before the flash fired. Starting with a rough composition in my head, I took about thirty shots in various locations around the room, then layered them together.

I was in a bit of a rush to get this done, as I’ve been spending most of my free time wrapping up my new website. (Details to come soon!) I only left myself about forty-five minutes to shoot this afternoon. Had I been able to spend more time, there are lots of little details I would’ve fixed. However, this is a weekly challenge, and this is what I produced this week. Without seeing flaws in my own work, I don’t think I would grow as a photographer. Does that make sense?

As a note, we got a living tree this year, so we can plant it next spring. It’s going to have some great stories to tell about the year it was a Christmas tree. All the other trees will be jealous

Thanks for looking,
dani

First, I’d like to dedicate this week’s post to my Great-Uncle Bill. He passed away this morning in Wigan, England after a long fight with cancer, and will be dearly missed. He lived a very long and full life, always keeping a very strong spirit. I don’t do a lot of profile shots, but I found it fitting to do one this week, as my British family heritage shows through in the bridge of my nose

I was inspired by an image in Joe McNally‘s book “The Hot Shoe Diaries: Big Light from Small Flashes“. If you are in to lighting with speedlights, and haven’t read this book, I highly recommend it. Actually, a lot of the techniques would apply to any studio flash lighting. The variety of light setups and styles he achieves is nothing short of inspiring!

In tribute to Joe’s style of using the built-in Nikon CLS Creative Lighting System, I also decided to challenge myself to put my Pocket Wizards… away… in my camera bag. You heard me correctly. I want to be just as comfortable with my Pocket Wizards as I am with other wireless triggering systems. You never know when something is going to come at you from left field, so I had better not forget about the Nikon’s built-in triggering system, just in case.

Speaking of something coming from left field…
I had a camera error this week that nearly halted everything. I realized just how paralyzing it would be if I was without a camera. I was covering the Dallas Winterfest event for the local newspaper, about to take my final shots of the town’s Christmas tree, and my camera stopped working, only to say “ERR”. Come to find out, this is the general error code for… any number of things.

Fortunately, it was a sticking shutter that decided to fix itself the next morning after I took it in to Focal Point Photography. Fortunately, it’s still working fine today. And fortunately, my Dad is kind enough to loan me his camera to use as a back-up for the time being. Unfortunately, it is an inconsistent and recurring problem that will probably only get worse.. and of course probably happen at the most inopportune times. Needless to say, I’m seriously thinking about an upgrade. I’ve got my eye on the D700… thoughts?

Enough about that. On to the photo!

I let my friend Amanda borrow my tripod for the weekend, so I balanced my camera on top of a Converse shoe box on top of a table. Who knew, it worked! I set myself up against a black fabric background in my studio. I used a single speedlight, behind me at an angle, head level, shoot-thru umbrella to create a soft light. If I had a different light modifier, it could have been a bit more directional, but I like the wrap it created to hit the curls in front before fading to black.

Abe was kind enough to hit the shutter for me. We took a few snaps from the first direction, quickly got a shot I liked, then reversed the lights. Since I was using a single speedlight, this was really simple to reverse. Then we took a few more shots. Combined in post in about one minute. Done and done.

Thanks for looking!

dani

As with most of my ideas, this concept evolved before, during and after the shoot.

Initially intending to do a silly “attacked by scarves” theme for a few weeks now, I had it pretty well planned out in my head. I would probably use my 50mm lens at a good head shot distance, my ring flash, a brightly colored background, and compose myself completely engulfed in scarves with the exception of my eyes. Vibrant and silly and fun.

But something changed this morning. I noticed the early morning light coming through our cris-crossed sliding glass door. Knowing that light would be gone as soon as the sun raised higher in the sky, I thought it might by fun to reproduce those bars across the wall. Suddenly, my scarves became much more ominous and the bars became a prison.

To recreate the bars across the wall, I set my flash about thirty feet outside the sliding glass door, just past my deck. I set it to full power and shot bare. After a few shots, I got the angle just the way I wanted. My camera is on a tripod inside my living room. One additional flash was placed camera left, very high and angled down, shot bare, about 1/16th power. I wanted it to just skin my face, and keep as much spill off the wall as I could.

Then came the fun part… convincing Abe to help pin me to the wall with scarves! He has got to think I’m absolutely crazy, haha. But, he was willing to help, and did a great job helping me figure out the composition and angles needed.

Abe was also nice enough to press the shutter for me. In the end, we only took a handful of shots before we had the look I wanted, both with the scarves, and without. It’s fortunate too, because the rain started coming down in buckets! I ran outside in my socks to save my flash from a certain soggy demise.

In post, I played around with a number of techniques overlaying two images, adding a few textures, and shifting the colors to the cool end of the spectrum. I hope you enjoy the end result, even though it’ much different that my original concept! Perhaps, with one of the few remaining weeks in this challenge, I’ll pull off the silly happy scarf concept.

Thanks for looking!
dani

Everything will be all right.
You are in my hands.
I am here to protect you.
You have nowhere to go.
You have nowhere to go…
[THX 1138]

I’ve shot on a white background before, but I’ve never taken the time to make sure it’s lit correctly and do things “right”. All the previous times, I’ve spent way too much time in post-processing cutting out the subject from the background.

I recently (nearly) completed my white background setup. I now have the white seamless paper roll, the background stand, and some really awesome reflective white tileboard for the floor.

Last night I set everything up in my living room and did some test shots for this week’s photo. I got an image I liked, edited it, got it ready for upload, broke down the whole lighting setup and backdrop, put my living room back to normal…… and realized I missed an opportunity to do a THX-1138 reference.
Why didn’t I think of that earlier!

So this morning, I put it all back together.

I guess it’s a learning experience on two parts.

First, it was a good reminder to really think through my images. Is this really the best it can be? If I put just a little more thought into the concept, could one little change make it a LOT better?

Second, it gave me another opportunity to practice my new setup. Haha, I’ll be able to set this up and break it down in record time!

On to the lighting: The background is lit with two speedlights, one on either side, power setting pretty high. Both of these speedlights are flagged, to keep their light from bouncing back too much to the camera. The subject is lit with a third speedlight, above the camera, shoot-thru umbrella, taped to the back of a rocking chair. Ran out of light stands

What I learned about shooting on a white background. Doing it “right” so you don’t have to edit it later… difficult but absolutely necessary.

I still need to work at this. And acquire some more equipment, of course! I need some large flags for the lights to keep the light from bouncing back and affecting the subject. My small flags didn’t really affect a speedlight on full power. And, perhaps most importantly, I now need a FOURTH speedlight. I have enough fire power to light the background correctly, but, that only leave my weakest Vivitar speedlight to light the subject with… weak.

Thanks for looking!

dani

I guess I couldn’t go a whole year without at least one Monty Python reference

Just so you know.. curly hair is crazy. Especially mine. Today, for example, the left side decided to curl less than the right side. Hence the longer length. You’d be amazed just how long it actually is when you pull the curls straight. That curl takes off multiple inches of length!

Forced indoors this week due to the dreary weather, I decided to try my hand at a few new things.

First, I’m still learning the ins and outs of my new 70-200 f/2.8 lens. I’ve used it for a few other shoots, here, and here. But this was my first attempt using it for a self portrait.

Second, I tried moving myself further away from the background. In a few of my previous studio shots, I wasn’t able to get the light on the background just the way I wanted. For this shot, I moved out about five extra feet. That gave me room to put a flash behind the subject, aimed towards the wall, and get a good even fade. It’s one of those little things that kept giving me a little trouble, but I never thought of the simple solution.. just give yourself more room!

So, the setup. This is lit with three flashes. The light on the background is a single bare speedlight, just behind my head at eye level, pointed directly at the wall. I used a low power setting. The key light is another speedlight from camera right, up above my head, about eight feet off the ground, shoot-thru umbrella, full power. The fill light is the third speedlight from camera left, about eye level, shoot-thru umbrella, about half power.

Thanks for looking!
dani

www.danimouser.com
www.danimouser.wordpress.com
www.flickr.com/danitello
www.facebook.com/daniphotography
www.modelmayhem.com/1624265

These past few weeks have been a struggle with headaches.. seems like I’ve had a headache every day. Not quite migraine intensity, but similarly sensitive to sound and light. So.. I’ll do my best to not sound grumpy

I’ve had the (loose) concept for this week’s shot in my head for a while now. It’s just been a matter of time. When I say loose concept, what I mean is.. I know it will have to do with my eyes and a scarf. That’s about how much I like to plan these weekly self portraits..

The theme lent itself well to the technical concept I wanted to try. I love the Ring Flash, and I love the look it can give. It’s intended to be mounted onto a speedlight, which is then mounted to your camera. It brings the light down, away from the top of the camera and disperses it evenly around the outside of the lens into a ring of light, creating a signature style of a nearly shadow-less face.

Here is my previous Ring Flash portrait, here.

So… what happens if you put the Ring Flash onto a speedlight… but don’t put the speedlight on the camera? I set out to find out.

I got out my favorite, softest, biggest, longest (and oldest) scarf I own. A present I received about seven years ago, and still remains my favorite scarf to wrap around me three times before venturing outside on brisk mornings. It’s shades of blue. Perfect for a warm / cool color combination.

I set my camera on a tripod and figured out how I would be positioned. My black fabric backdrop is hanging behind me. The only light in the photo is from the Ring Flash, eye level, camera right, nearly at a 45-degree angle. Fired with Pocket Wizards.

So the Ring Flash test? I love it. It still created the signature “ring” in the eyes. But it lit the subject very well, creating soft wraparound shadows.

Thanks for looking,
dani

www.danimouser.com
www.danimouser.wordpress.com
www.flickr.com/danitello
www.facebook.com/daniphotography
www.modelmayhem.com/1624265

Q: Did you hear about the vegan zombies?
A: They eat GRAINS!!

Okay, so it’s not funny. It didn’t stop me from telling it to numerous people, and always getting the same response: GROAN.

The second annual Zombie Ball is a dance for high school kids, put on by the Dallas Area Chamber of Commerce and Visual Media Center (the design studio I work for). I got to chaperon!

Last year was the trial run, and while we didn’t get a big crowd, the word must have spread.. this year we had at least twice as many kids, and many more came dressed as zombies. We upped the ante by creating a story behind the dance.. a fictional company called BioGue had a chemical leak. Mixed in among the 7-foot tall carved tombstones were glowing, cracked bio-hazard canisters spewing fog. The HazMat clean up crew were all around, many turning more zombie-fied throughout the night. It was awesome.

Also, I learned how to do zombie makeup! Last year I helped with the bruising and shading.. this year I made my own face wound from scratch. I started with a child’s pirate eye patch from the Dollar Tree, applied a few layers of latex and toilet paper and created the wrinkly infected look. I applied it over my eye using more latex and toilet paper. Then.. the fun part. Color. I applied some skin color to the white toilet paper with regular foundation. I created the bruised look with reds and blues, finishing off the infected look with greens and reds. Then added some gel blood for the finishing touch.

The best part of the night was spending time with my sister Ashley and her boyfriend Johnny. Ash learned a thing or two about zombie makeup too. And, I can’t count how many times I heard, “I love your face.” That’s a first

So, who can pass up the opportunity to shoot zombie photos in your old high school hallway!

I started by lighting the hallway with two strobes. The one in the back of the hallway is sitting on the floor, shot bare, with one blue gel. The one towards the middle of the hallway is sitting on a table, shot bare, with two green gels. The subject is lit with a third flash, no gel, shot bare, on a light stand, aimed up from camera left to create the eery light. All fired with Pocket Wizards.

Thanks to Ash and Johnny for being my test subjects, hitting the shutter a few times, and putting up with my perfectionism.

Below you’ll see my three favorite shots..

Thanks for looking,

dani

www.danimouser.com
www.wordpress.danimouser.com
www.facebook.com/daniphotography
www.flickr.com/danitello
www.modelmayhem.com/1624265

I had an awesome shoot this afternoon with my sister Ashley. Such an awesome shoot, in fact, that it inspired me to shoot a “behind the scenes” look for my 43rd installment of this photo challenge.

The “As Yet Untitled” series is loosely inspired by both Tim Burton and Alice in Wonderland characters. This shoot you’re viewing will (eventually) be the third installment, based on the Red Queen character. The previous two photos in the series can be viewed by clicking on their titles: Down the Rabbit Hole and One Lump or Two.

I have to admit, this is, and will probably remain, the most “real life” photo in the entire challenge. This is almost straight out of camera, with only a touch of adjustments to color and clarity. I had indeed put makeup on earlier that morning, but after running through Salem for props in the rain, it was near non-existent. Hair thrown up in a messy ponytail. Jeans, t-shirt and socks. This is me at a photo shoot.

On to the lighting: as you can see, this scene was lit with two flashes, one from either side. The key light is from the left, shoot-thru umbrella, about 1/2 Power. The fill light is from the right, also shoot-thru umbrella, about 1/16 power. I shoot against a white wall, so I can retain the shadow detail for overlaying onto my digital backgrounds. The wrinkly white tablecloth have been a constant for the series, as well as some sort of teacup and accessories.

Big thanks to Ashley, Fievel and Splinter for being my delightful models!

Thanks for looking,
dani

Second: I love the new lens that Focal Point let me borrow for the weekend! I’m sold on it and will be adding it to my bag of tricks next week. It’s a 70 – 200mm f/2 lens. Having *never* shot with a telephoto lens, it was a whole new experience. Finally, I can get compressed images with beautiful bokeh. It’s similar to what I can get with my current favorite lens (the 50mm f/1.8) but different enough for me to be very excited about the possibilities!

Note: This wasn’t shot with either lens referred to above.. but with my wide angle. Hence the distortion. The portraits linked to below, however, were shot with it. I love the bokeh!

Third: My plan for this week’s shot totally failed.. I envisioned a super hero pose, autumn colors, dramatic lighting, complete with scarf flapping proudly in the wind. Instead it looked more like it actually was: a scarf propped on a lightstand. Before my challenge ends, I will try again..

This afternoon was spent on a fun shoot with my sister Ashley and her friend Johnny. Ash has an interest in photography too, but somehow we never end up finding the time to shoot together. She brought her camera, we swapped lenses, had fun, and I did my best to explain some of the basics like f/stops and depth of field. Can’t wait to do it again!

You can see some of their portraits from today here, here and here.

In the end, I was a bit rushed for this week’s shot, and decided to go with a composition including my converse, my scarf, colorful sweater tights, the pebbles and fallen leaves. It couldn’t get much more autumn than that. I did use one flash, camera left, low to the ground. Fired with Pocket Wizards.

In post-processing, I went for a look that I like, but rarely use. Basically, it’s a lowered contrast. The effect seems pretty popular in certain circles on Flickr, but always seems a bit overdone in my opinion. I thought it might work better if it was a bit subdued, and kept to the edges. That way the star of the show (the converse) could keep their blacks black.

Thanks for looking,
dani

I’ve been having a hard time sleeping lately.. when I do, I dream a lot, and wake up quite a bit throughout the night. It’s not a huge deal, but it is starting to catch up with me a little. This image came out quite a bit more creepy than intended this week. It’s not really my style, but I liked the result, and decided to go with it.

My intention this week was to play around with overlaying imagery to give the feeling of tossing and turning all night. I got out my wide-angle lens, put it up high on the tripod, and composed the very centered image. Usually, I crop my images just a bit to get the composition right, but this week came straight out of the camera.

I also wanted to play around with a monochromatic image, per the suggestion of my friend Jami. Since my bedsheets and my bedroom walls are nearly the same color, this was the perfect opportunity! And no, I didn’t intentionally match them.. bought the sheets before I bought the house

Once again, I got to try something I hadn’t tried before: bouncing the light off the ceiling. To light my cave-like bedroom, I turned off all the lights in the room, and brought in one flash. I’ve read about using a wall or ceiling as a giant bounce reflector, and love the idea, but haven’t really had the opportunity to test it out. I put my flash high on its lightstand and pointed it, bare, at the ceiling behind the camera. Loved the result. It nearly duplicated the light that would come from a ceiling light, but softer and more natural.

I only took about ten shots of various blanket and pillow compositions, then one shot of myself. Bringing the images into Photoshop, I layered them together at different opacities, and masked in the parts I wanted from each image. To complete the look, and make it feel more continuous, I added a layer of texture and vignetting on top.

Usually, I reserve Sunday mornings for my photo of the week adventures, but this Sunday my sister is getting married! I’m really looking forward to being her photographer on her special day.. I love the idea of capturing those memories, that for her, will be gone in a blur of excitement. Years from now, she;ll be able to look back at my pictures and bring the memories back in an instant.. congratulations Melissa & Brenton! Now, just wish for clear skies

Thanks for looking,
dani

Back in high school, I was in one of the first Film as Literature classes offered. We watched some really great movies that I probably would never have been exposed to. Das Boot and October Sky come to mind. But I was most influenced by the classic silent film Metropolis. (Thanks, Mr. Fawcett!)

Filmed in 1927, Metropolis speaks of love and the division between classes. It is a very artistic movie, with great visuals and great design. It was made during a time of revolution in typography and design, and it shows. The style of the architecture, machinery and typography are all very art deco and very beautiful.

Anyways, while scrolling through Netflix, we came across Metropolis and decided to give it another watch. It’s still just as good as it was in my memory. Perhaps inspired by the very cool overlaid film effects, or the constantly wavering heavy vignetting, I was compelled enough to create a Metropolis-themed photo this week.

I started out by researching photos of Maria, the main female in the movie. She is portrayed as a warm, friendly figure, and always has soft light and a glow on her face. In the film, her character is kidnapped and her likeness used to skin the human robot. There are some really great dissolve scenes as she makes the transition from robot face to human face. Below, you’ll see the photos from which I drew my inspiration.

I set up my lights as best as I could to recreate that glowing light. One flash, high camera-left, shoot-thru umbrella. I made my own “flag” to keep the light off the backdrop as much as possible. Second flash, very low light, from the ceiling, softened, to light the top of my hair. Third flash, very low light, from directly behind me, softened, to create the rim light and separate me from the background. All three flashes fired with Pocket Wizards. The backdrop itself is my intentionally wrinkled fabric, which I hung to look like an old theater curtain.

Now.. hair and makeup! The hair style was actually a little tricky, but a pack of bobby pins seemed to do the trick. Makeup was very fun.. Realizing that makeup looks very different in a black and white or sepia image, it didn’t really matter what colors I used, as long as they were the right shades. I used a dark brown eyeliner, a dark brown eyeshadow on my eyelids, and a medium brown eyeshadow all the way to my eyebrows. My lips are much more full than the actress I was trying to portray, so I used my brown eyeliner and created smaller lips for myself.

Finally, it was time to put it all together. I made some adjustments to the image in Lightroom, then brought it in to Photoshop for the texturing, grain, vignetting and overlays.

thanks for looking!
dani

P.S. Here are my inspiration photos:

My goal this week was to create something nostalgic.

I’ve been feeling pretty sentimental lately. Earlier this week, I shook the dust off my old shoe boxes full of memories and dug in.. I spent a whole afternoon going through old pictures, ticket stubs, notes, and other oddities special enough to keep in a shoe box, mostly from the high school years. It was a lot of fun to look through all the paraphernalia. I scanned a few of the pictures and posted them on my Facebook (here) for my friends to see. It must have been a lot of fun for them too, they got a lot of comments back right away.

So, while this week’s image doesn’t have to do with high school memories, I set out to create an image that is reminiscent of old times.

My first challenge was to convince Abe to help me carry my equipment down to the creek.. no small feat! Once we got down there, I found many more challenges. The most obvious being just how slippery the rocks are when walking in rubber boots! The creek was deeper than I imagined. The camera needed to be low to the water, so I kept dunking the bottom of my skirt in the water when looking through the viewfinder. The rubber duck wanted to float on his side or upside down. Oh, and we got there later than intended, so all the light had vanished behind the trees. But! I stuck with it and kept a positive attitude.

Using my 50mm lens, I set the camera on a tripod out in the creek. Yes, that was a little frightening. Originally intending to shoot with natural light this week, I took a couple test shots to see how the lighting was, and quickly realized I would need a fill flash. I set up my SB-900 flash on the bank, with shoot-thru umbrella, aiming for some side lighting. Fired with Pocket Wizards.

Oh, and Mike (from Focal Point) would be proud of me. I actually bumped my ISO up to 500 : P

Because of the slippery rocks, I physically could not fire the camera, even on the timer, then get back in to position on time. So I composed the scene just the way I wanted it, locked it into place, then Abe was nice enough to step into the creek and hit the shutter a few times. Only took about ten shots before everything was positioned the way I wanted.

Back in Lightroom and Photoshop, I made some adjustments to make it feel more old fashioned.. like a memory that’s starting to get a little fuzzy.

Thanks for looking,
dani

P.S. Thanks to Mom for the rubber duckie!

P.P.S. Thanks to Tom Waits (here) and the Ramones (here) for both versions of the song “I Don’t Wanna Grow Up”.

I’ve been feeling a little down all week. I’m not sure why, probably lots of little reasons adding together, but I just haven’t felt like my usual upbeat self. Which is exactly why I decided to use my awesome Ring Flash for this week’s photo!

I’ve had the Ring Flash for a few months now, and have used it for some shoots, but have been waiting for just the right time to use it in my weekly challenge. Now is the time.

I set up my backdrop using my awesomely wrinkled white fabric. The same used for one of my favorite shots of my nephew Evan, you can see here.

I put my Ring flash on my camera and tested out some different light settings to see what I liked. It was doing some great things to the face, creating those cool wraparound soft shadows and the telltale reflection in the eye.

But the background was going a little too dark for my liking. And I wanted to add some color. In comes a second flash, set to light the background, and gelled with a color. Love it.

After taking the shot, I’m in a little better mood. I got to play dress up. Now I’m off to look at bridesmaids dresses with one of my best friends from high school. I get to be one of her bridesmaids and her photographer next summer!

Thanks for looking,
dani

This is the week that “A New Take on the Old Self Portrait” almost didn’t happen.

Every week of 2010 has proven to be a bit of a challenge, just in finding the time to shoot and edit a self portrait, then write and post a blog about my setup, and post the images to my Facebook, MySpace and Flickr. This week in particular, I simply overbooked my weekend.

During the work week, I spend my time at Visual Media Center, doing photography and graphic design.

Saturday I spent nearly the whole day shooting product photography for Sam’s Crochet. I absolutely adore her awesome crochet accessories. Each time I shoot her items, I end up buying one. This time it was a cell phone cover for my new iPhone. So cute!

Sunday I spent the whole morning prepping for a vintage 50′s pinup shoot, which lasted the whole afternoon. We shot a scene for each of the four seasons. It was a fantastic shoot; the model was a total doll. But by the time the shoot was over, I was wiped out.

I went to bed without taking my photo of the week, and without writing my blog post. I felt pretty bummed, but, what can you do.

Fortunately, I woke up this morning feeling refreshed and ready to shoot a silly morning photo. I wanted to create something funny while I had this backdrop set up. What’s funnier than posing in a bathrobe next to a Starbucks cup on a pedestal? I hope at least one person besides me finds this funny as well. If you’ve ever wondered how I spend my mornings, this is it, haha.

On to the photo: I used the same lighting setup and backdrop as the pinup shoot the night before. The backdrop is a white seamless paper roll. One flash to light the backdrop, one flash on each side of the backdrop to light the subject, at different power settings.

I quickly got the shot I wanted, then gave Abe his robe back

Thanks for looking,
dani

I set out to take a whole new direction with my lighting this week. Literally! I realized I had never lit a subject with light from the top.

Inspired by a recent post on www.strobist.com, the blogger detailed how he used a lightweight reflector stand as a mini-boom stand for his flash. For those of you who may not know, a boom stand has an arm designed to hold a light out over a subject, while staying safely out of the shot. While I fully intend to add one to my arsenal as soon as I can, this week’s shoot required some special rigging.

I put my SB-900 flash on a lightstand and raised it all the way to my ceiling, then pointed it down towards the ground. Since my umbrellas wouldn’t work to diffuse the light at that angle, I shot through a large white bounce diffuser. The bounce was balanced precariously, parallel to the ground, on an adjustment knob of the flash’s lightstand, and a second lightstand I used to hold it in place. If you can picture that, it created a cute little fort to crawl under!

I set the camera up on a tripod low to the ground, and kneeled in front of it. Once I got it dialed in, the lighting from above was really nice, but the shadows were pretty dark under my chin and eyes.

So I remembered a technique I saw in a Joe McNally video. On the ground in front of me, I laid out the gold material cover to the bounce. I set a second flash on the floor, aimed at the gold material, to bounce some warm light up into the shadows. The light was really strong, because it was only about a foot away, and the gold material is very powerful at reflecting light, so it was set to the lowest power setting.

Considering this was the first time I have attempted either light option (lighting from above, or bouncing light off gold material) I am really happy with the outcome. I love studio techniques and would love the opportunity to try them out more often. Any takers?

Thanks for looking,
dani

It’s no secret that I’ve been struggling with exercise for four years. During college, I worked, went to school, and did homework, all day, every day. When faced with the decision as to what could be cut out of each day, it was the process of elimination:
I can’t cut out work.
I can’t cut out school or homework.
I can’t cut out basic housework.
I can’t cut out paying bills.
etc..
etc..

What could I cut out? Exercise.
It was always last on my list.

So, now that I’m graduated, my business is doing well, and I’m transitioning into this awesome place in life, I’m trying to find the time to fit exercise back into my everyday routine.

Three weeks ago, I finally started riding my bike to work every day, and riding extra on the weekends, for a total of 24 miles a week. Biking is great, but it’s on concrete. Ever since we bought our home in town, I’ve missed our walks through the woods.

The solution? I found a great little trail that goes up the creek by my house. My Mom and I have been walking the trail for two weeks now, and I love it! It’s serene, with the creek on one side, and an orchard on the other. It’s relaxing, and this time of year, the golden sunset light is absolutely stunning during the time we take our walk.

On to this week’s shot: During a walk with Abe, I stopped by my favorite spot on the trail. The light was doing that awesome thing it does, shining right through these puffy white weeds. I wanted this image to feel like capturing a moment in time, spontaneous. Which is exactly what it was.

No flashes this week.. all natural light from the sun. Enhanced with some overlaid map textures.

I’ve found my direction.

Thanks for looking,
dani

I’ve been looking forward to this shoot for two weeks! “Rosie the Riveter”, the classic American WWII propaganda poster. For a fresh reminder of the original illustration, please see the side by side comparison below. I’ve always loved the colors, pose and lighting. So why not give it a shot!

Props were the first thing on my list. The bandanna was made from an old tank top. I happened to have the work shirt, although it isn’t navy blue, I decided it was close enough. Moving on to hair and makeup, I looked to the illustration for inspiration. It was really fun actually, and I wish I could get away with it more often

I set up my lights to recreate the poster lighting.
The key light is a flash, at1/4 power, shoot thru umbrella, camera left, at about a 45-degree angle. The fill light is a bare flash, at 1/16 power, camera right, aimed at the shadow side of my face. In the end, I think the lighting came out really close!

Then the best part.. trying to find the right pose. Abe was a wonderful help with this, and kept telling me to lean back more, lean back more, chin down, elbow up.. He doesn’t even realize how much of a help he is. Thanks Abe. We got it after about 30 shots. That pose is hard! And totally unnatural.

We shot against the white wall of my studio, so from there on out, the post-production was done in Lightroom and Photoshop. The fine-tuning included masking, blending modes, textures, skin softening and some (subtle) transformation of the facial features to look more like “Rosie”. I took some artistic license with the textures and colors. But, like any homage, it is my interpretation of the classic.

This shoot was, among a select few others, the most fun of the series. I’m finding my favorites are, by far, the ones that involve the most photo manipulation, the most lighting challenges, and detailed post-processing. I love it.

Please see the original illustration, and my homage, side by side for comparison.

Thanks for looking!
dani

Summer is here.

And it’s hot.

Between shooting wedding portraits in the middle of a hot August wheat field, and shooting event photography for the newspaper at the Polk County Fair, I’ve spent enough time sweating outside with my camera for one week!

But I still wanted to portray a hot August summer.

So I headed to the studio, pulled out some old fabric, threw on some shades, and turned my off-camera flash into the sun. Okay, not really. But close enough! I set the flash to 1/4 power, above my head to approximate the angle of sunshine. I did use a shoot-thru umbrella for some diffusion, and to allow the shadows to wrap a little bit. But I kept it far enough away so the shadows kept an edge, like they would in sunlight.

Then comes the fun part! I decided to try something else new, and play around with some actions to create a faded vintage hot summer look.

I had never used someone else’s actions before, but I found some great ones by Night Fate. I played around with them quite a bit, finally creating this look by combining two different actions, and blending them with the transparencies of the layers. The textures were added using masks and overlays.

Once again, I tried something new this week, and had a blast. What a fun weekly challenge this has been!

Thanks for looking!

dani

It’s good to be back! After two weeks off for Comic Con and Summerfest (which felt like two months) I am fully recharged and ready to go. Bring on the final twenty weeks of A New Take on the Old Self Portrait!

There is, as usual, a story behind this one. Last Friday was the Coffeehouse Cafe reception for the month of August. A handful of my prints were hanging in the front room, among other local talented photographers, while the Emerge Oregon Art Series was bustling in the back room.

Long story short, my friend Dan had some of his work in the Emerge show. While talking to him about some of the pieces on display, it came up in conversation that, while I love the soft glow of old photographs, and I love the flowing lines of motion blur, I have a hard time letting go of crisp focus in order to make those effects possible.

This morning, while talking with Abe about this week’s theme, he gave me a very clever challenge. He wants to see something soft and dreamy. Of course!

I went to work immediately in my studio. Something soft and dreamy. I decided that a soft shoulder and flowing curls may be my best bet at getting something soft and dreamy. I worked up a color palette around the water tattoos on my shoulder, put some textured fabric on the back wall for interest, and went to work.

I really wanted the light to fall off around the edges, to create a sort of ethereal atmosphere, like you are looking through a dream or a distant memory. Who is this person, and why are they looking away from you? You can’t remember.

I blocked the light from coming in the window, which allows me to build up the lighting from scratch. I put a single flash, camera-right, about head level, right outside the frame. I put on a shoot-thru umbrella to soften the light, then turned it so I was being lit by just the corner. Big, soft, close light. No fills were needed, because I wanted the edges to remain dark and mysterious.

I did some post-processing work in both Lightroom and Photoshop. The final glow effect on the shoulders and curls was created using layers and blending modes.

It’s good to be back

Thanks for looking,

dani

Oh that’s right: a Simpsons reference.

After much debate, Abe decided that I could indeed invest in a business laptop. And keep my iMac. Now, isn’t that sweet of him? Thanks Abe *cough*

Okay, so that’s not exactly how it happened, but you get the idea.

Really, the decision came down to the ability to take a laptop to my photo shoots and tether my camera. How amazing is it going to be, when I can shoot a photo, have it transfer to the computer, and automatically open in Lightroom on a 13″ monitor. No more zooming in to a tiny 2.5″ LCD screen!

I have been fortunate, that every dollar I earn from my photography, goes into its own account, then straight back into the business in the form of new equipment. Otherwise, I would never have been able to invest in such awesome tools to further my ability to create the photographic scenes I picture in my head.

On to the photo: I lit this shot with 3 speedlights, all shot bare. The first is sitting on the laptop keyboard, gelled blue, and bounced off a white piece of paper on the monitor. The second is to the right, aimed up towards my face, gelled blue, to add to the “glow” and cast the shadow on the wall. The third is to the left, very low power, not gelled, to fill the left side of my face and add interest.

On that note: I’m taking a vacation!

The graphic design studio I work for, Visual Media Center, is closing down for the week to take a road trip to Comic Con.

Really.

So week-30 and week-31 of the 52-week challenge may be postponed due to awesomeness.

Thanks for looking,
dani

Texture? Muted colors? That’s not my style at all. Well.. exactly! Each week’s photo in my 2010 challenge has been a different and new perspective, a new theme or concept. But this week I wanted to try something that is totally not even my style.

A few years ago I stumbled across a photo with christmas lights reflected in the eye, and I’ve always wanted to try that. What better time than July, right? Strange I know. But I always go with my hunches when it comes to these weekly photos. I uncovered the lights from the garage, blew off the dust, and went to work.

I sat on the ground and arranged the two strands of christmas lights around me. The ones reflected in my eye are wrapped around a chair, just to the right of frame, almost next to the camera. The ones making the cool bokeh in the background are draped over two more chairs covered in a silky fabric, a few feet behind me.

I covered up the window to my studio so I could control all of the light. Set up a speedlight, camera left and behind me. Bounced the light off a big white bounce card placed behind the christmas lights. This created a little bit of fill light in the eye coming from camera right.

Abe was nice enough to push the shutter for me. At f1.8 aperture, I had to be sure that the focus was exactly on my eye.

Took about five shots and found the right one. Did a touch of editing in Lightroom to mute the colors. Then brought it in to Photoshop to apply the texture. Pretty fun.. I’ve always enjoyed a textured photo (when it’s done well) but it’s not something I’ve really played around with. As of today.. it’s my new favorite toy

Thanks for looking,

dani

P.S. Here are both versions of this week’s photo. I really could not decide between the two! I even called in Abe to get his opinion, and he told me good luck. What do you think?

Avast, matey! Ya mayhap seen me and me crew sailing the Grungy Galleon through the rough waters of the Monmouth Independence Parade this mornin’. A fine ship indeed. I be the lady on the bow navigatin’ the stars and spreadin’ the word about Summerfest. Set sail for ye olde Dallas Towne!

But even pirates can only pillage so much.. after spending eight hours in my pirate costume, and six hours in the sun, the day after shooting a two-day destination wedding: I’m tired.

Then I still had to shoot my photo of the week. Fortunately, I still had fun, and learned something about lighting. This is the first week I’ve been able to use my *three* strobes operated by pocket wizards. Now I can actually light with one flash to the left and right, as well as one behind. Finally!

My intention for this photo was to focus on light and texture, along with the sense of exhaustion. Note the silly sunburn from the mixture of off-the-shoulder pirate shirt, strappy straps, wench vest, pistol holster strap and large necklace. I set up one strobe to my left at 1/16 power, and one strobe to my right at 1/64 power. Both on lightstands and shoot-thru umbrellas. The third strobe was behind me, pointing bare at the wall at a less-than 45-degree angle, to skim the texture and bring out the detail in the wall.

Thanks for looking,

dani

Week 26: This week marks the halfway point of my 52-week challenge!

For those of you just tuning in, I’ve been creating a different self portrait for each week of 2010. The intent is to try out a new style or technique each week, pushing myself to break boundaries in my photography development. What have I learned? That I have in fact learned something valuable every week. It’s been tough a times, to keep up the challenge during busy school loads, and on days I don’t particularly feel like being creative. But in the end, I’m always happy that I took the time to create each week’s photo.

This week.. another mini-vacation! After returning from the desert last week, then rushing through a busy week at work, we escaped again to a few days at the coast. I had lots of ideas in my head about how I would work the ocean into my weekly photo.. sunset silhouette.. long-exposure on the water.. but like most weeks, I ended up creating something spur of the moment. I loved the view from our little hotel room. I imagined creating a picture that is a “view of the view” during the sunset and came up with this week’s composition.

My challenge was waiting for just the right timing.. This was shot about 9:15 as the sun was setting behind the wall of clouds on the horizon. As you can see from the image, it was lit with two speedlights, one on either side of the subject, on their own light stands, shot bare at half power. I used one Nikon SB-900 and one Vivitar 285, both fired using Pocket Wizards. Shot with my Nikon D80 and my 11-17mm lens to capture the whole scene.

26 weeks down, 26 weeks to go!

Thanks for looking,
dani

All year I look forward to our camping trip down to south-eastern Oregon. Five fantastic days of wild country and wild animals. This year we saw four cottontail bunnies, a big lizard, a red-headed woodpecker who made his home in a juniper next to our tent, a small herd of wild horses, about a dozen rocks covered in petroglyphs, a large group of sandhill cranes, and a snowy white egret who kept his watchful eye on us for about two hours.

For this week’s photo, I wanted to use the awesome rim rock landscape, as well as take the opportunity to accentuate the rocks with a colored gel on my flash. I waited patiently until the sun was low in the sky, then found a great little amphitheater of rocks, sagebrush and juniper. While I was testing out the lights, the shadow idea came to me, and I decided to leave the flash in the frame of the photo. I colored the flash with an orange gel to add to the already golden light, then shot bare at full power to get a good crisp shadow against the rocks.

It was an awesome five days, and while we’ve been home since late yesterday evening and started unpacking, my mind will be in the desert for a few more days. Who’s up for a ten hour drive to a photo shoot in the desert ? ?

Thanks for looking,
dani

Two things I’ve been waiting for…
graduation and sunshine!

Ten of the twelve Visual Communications graduates walked at the graduation ceremony, and we all decorated our hats with buttons we made and shared. We didn’t actually throw our hats, for fear that the added weight of all the buttons may lead to an injury.

I was, well, honored, to graduate with honors. Somehow I managed to earn a 4.0 over the course of my whole college career. Not sure how I pulled that one off, but I’m not complaining!

I set up my camera in mid-day sun to intentionally catch the sun flares. I filled the shadows with my SB-900, to the left of the camera, shot bare at full power. My experiment this week was to catch motion blur. It’s not something I do, even in my action shots, as I usually try to freeze all motion. As it is.. I don’t know if I like the blur. Yes it conveys a sense of motion, but wouldn’t it be more awesome to have stopped the motion? Hmm. Something I may always debate..

*Note* Weeks 25 and 26 may be posted the following Mondays, rather than the usual Sunday. Now that I’m graduated… let the summer vacation begin!

Thanks for looking,
dani

As the clock neared 9:00 last night, Abe asked me how I wanted to spend the evening. I said I didn’t know.. then jumped up, grabbed my camera and ran outside. I don’t know how he puts up with me. But the light was perfect and it looked like a storm was moving across the horizon. You see, I’ve got a list of new techniques to try that’s a mile long.. and I keep adding to it faster than I can cross them off! One of those techniques is catching cool rim light.

I set up my camera outside our sliding glass door on the deck, and pulled out my trusty 50mm lens. I set the camera on a tripod and pointed slightly upwards to capture a background full of sky, and not the neighbor’s fence and trees. I set up my SB-900 flash on its light stand, placed it at eye level a few feet behind my head, and shot bare at 1/4 power. Fired using Pocket Wizards. That created the awesome rim light around the hoodie. I set my camera somewhere around 1/100th of a second at an aperture of f/2, which brought up the ambient light to the levels I wanted. The fill light on the face is simply the light from the house coming through the sliding glass doors.

Surprisingly, I got this whole set up dialed in to the exposure I wanted, and got the expression I wanted, in about five shots. Not bad for trying out a new technique!

Thanks for looking,
dani

Two of the past three weeks’ photos have had to do with the upcoming Portfolio Show. After all this preparation.. it’s finally here. Portfolio Show is this Thursday, June 4. All the local design studios, publications, newspapers and other businesses who hire designers are invited to attend, along with friends and family. For three hours they will filter in and out the door, converse with the twelve graduating students as they flip through their portfolios, and indulge in a few truffles.

Bring it. I’m totally ready.

My inspiration behind this show is twofold. For weeks, I’ve been planning some sort of “portfolio shot” the week of Portfolio Show. I didn’t know what it would be exactly, but I knew I would be portraying my portfolio in front of me.

Then earlier this week, I read a post on the Strobist blog about photographer Brad Trent. Now, I know I probably should have heard about this dude before now. But I hadn’t. Now that I have thoroughly enjoyed his entire portfolio on his website, he made it onto my Top Ten favorite photographers. My favorite of his works is a series called Artificial Portraits. Click here to view his awesome work for yourself. He “began taking photographs that pulled away the curtain to show the unreality of it all” meaning he takes these amazing portraits pulled back wide enough to include his equipment in the shot. I love it.

Which brings me to the photo: I started setting up in my photo studio, then quickly realized that my white wall (or black backdrop) was too boring for this shot. So I packed up and moved to the living room, which has these nice brown walls. Really warmed it up. I used my wide angle lens to include the equipment I was using. I lit the scene with my two flashes (Vivitar 285 on the left, and Nikon SB-900 on the right) on their own light stands, shot bare. Fired using Pocket Wizards.

2010 Portfolio Show event page, click here.
Visual Communications on Facebook, click here.

Thanks for looking,
dani

The spring season should be upon us, yet somehow, it’s doing a fantastic job of hiding its pretty face.. The winds seems to keep blowing, and while it does, strange weather keeps heading our way. One day might bring hail, rain, sun, rain, sun, repeat. But, despite the weather’s efforts to keep me inside, I’m trying my best to enjoy the spring!

This weekend feels like the calm before the storm. Somehow, I managed to have a full day to do whatever I wanted. And it’s just two weeks until Portfolio Show! How I managed to pull this one off, I may never know. Regardless, I managed to get our veggie garden planted, and bushels of weeds pulled from around the flower beds.

Abe had the much more difficult task of mowing the lawn.. we’ve let it slide for a few weeks now. It became much more than our little man-powered old school push mower could handle, and we borrowed a mower to do the job. Poor Abe, right as he started mowing, his crazy girlfriend ran outside with her camera and insisted on taking pictures! Sometimes I don’t know how he puts up with my silliness.

For this shot, I propped the camera on the deck, so the angle would be very low to the ground. My tripod just didn’t go low enough. I set up both flashes on their own light stands, one on either side, both with shoot-thru umbrellas. Fired with Pocket Wizards.

Thanks for looking,
dani

Portfolio Show is eighteen days and counting. It’s safe to say we’re all feeling a little nuts right now!

When I’m not sleeping, or at Visual Media Center, or working on my Tree Evolution photography project, I’m prepping for Portfolio Show! Designing, refining, printing, cutting, photographing, writing resumes, designing letterhead, envelopes, business cards, mini-portfolios and… buttons!

Lots of buttons.

These particular buttons are from my Monster Invitation.

Now don’t get me wrong; I’m not complaining in the least. I can’t wait for Portfolio Show. Heck, I’ve been looking forward to for our years.

It will be the end and the beginning.

I took this shot in my studio, using my 50mm lens. Lit with two flashes, off-camera on light stands, fired with Pocket Wizards. Thanks to Abe for firing the camera when I was making the silliest faces!

Here are my three favorites from the shoot:

Please don’t think less of me

Thanks for looking,
dani

With Portfolio Show coming up in a matter of weeks, the panic is starting to set in…

A graduating student’s Portfolio is the culmination of all they’ve learned in the Visual Communications program. I’ve spent four years designing answers to all of the assigned problems. Now I’ve spent the last few months revisiting each one. Yes they were good for the assignment, but how can I make them great?

As each project is refined, I cut them out, find their best side, and take their picture. The business cards have little tabs taped to the back in order for them to stand up. As I move pieces around and adjust the tabs, I have to laugh because it reminds me of playing with paper dolls..

Which, obviously, brings me to this week’s photo.

First, I went with my wide-angle lens to add to the sense of cramped quarters inside the light box. I lit the background scene using my SB-900 flash, on a tripod, shooting through an umbrella. Natural light provided a nice fill from camera-left. The light was further softened from the diffusers on either side of my makeshift light box.

Second, I lit the portrait using two flashes, both on tripods, shooting through umbrellas. Wait.. two flashes? That’s right, I finally got my new Pocket Wizards! Hooray for Pocket Wizards and two flashes. I love them already and can’t wait for some extra time to play and learn!

Thanks for looking,
dani

This week I decided to pay tribute to one of my favorite photographers, in my own humble way.

John Keatley is a very awesome photographer based out of Seattle. Now, I’m not suggesting that my tribute photo is even near the same ballpark as his work. But I’ve been inspired by his fun, often quirky, sometimes silly, always real headshot portraits. Check out his work on his website, here.

Keatley also writes an interesting blog I highly recommend subscribing to. While he doesn’t tell you step by step how he shoots his photos, he always manages to include an entertaining story behind-the-scenes of his world, and interactions with clients. Check out his blog, here.

On to the photo.. I shot this using my SB-900, shot bare, off-camera left, a little higher than eye level. For fill on the right side, I used an open window and a large white bounce card made out of a white foam core panel. Thanks to Abe for pushing the shutter for me this week. I was intending on having my second flash and Pocket Wizards by this weekend, but alas, the shipment has not arrived.

Hopefully by next week.. I’m so impatient.

Thanks for looking,
dani

About six months ago I took a (very) high key shot of my nephew. We were to design a book jacket for The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman. It’s a story about a young boy named Nobody Owens, who is raised by ghosts in a graveyard, and learns the things that ghosts know.

To see that image, click here.
To see the finished book jacket design, click here.

I’ve had some interest in that shot lately. Two local moms, who found me on Facebook, asked me to take portraits of their sons in that style. Pretty cool

This shot was my challenge to recreate the lighting style, while taking it a step further. I let most of the highlights blow out, but still managed to retain some more detail. My goal was to use that style and create an artistic composition. I set up my camera on a tripod, placed the flash on the camera (gasp!) and got a chance to use my Ray Flash! It was a good exercise in trying to recreate a previous style.

Thanks for looking,
dani

*Note* the bobblehead and the sweet “clappers” were borrowed. Thanks Bonnie and Carolyn!

Honestly, I begrudgingly started watching Blazers games four seasons ago because my boyfriend Abe saw potential in their new player Brandon Roy, and started watching games. I grumbled while I started watching a few games with him. But in learning how the game works, learning about the players, and from my unbiased outsider’s perspective, you know what I saw?

I saw the start of a brand new team. I saw a team getting rid of the losers, and getting not only talented young players in their place, but really good guys and good teammates. I saw chemistry and hope for a future together. And look how far we’ve come in those four seasons! We’ve grown a lot.

Oh, and I’m a big Rudy Fernandez fan. For three!!

Okay, enough about that, on to the photo… I tried this originally with just myself on the couch, then convinced Abe to join in the fun. I rearranged our living room to create the balanced composition, which gave me the nice brown wall for the background. Since the composition was so symmetrical, I intentionally placed Abe and myself off-center for some interest.

Lit with my SB-900, shot through its diffuser, on a tripod, camera-right. I played around with some settings to keep the lamp light visible, as I thought that would add another interesting visual element. Directly behind the camera are two large glass doors, allowing a lot of natural light into the room and fill into the shadows.

If it wasn’t official before, it’s totally official now: I need more lights! I’ve learned a lot about my little flash in the few months since I got it, but now… I want more. There is only so much you can do with one awesome flash before you want two awesome flashes.. then three awesome flashes.. and oh man, what could I do with six awesome flashes!? I want light here and here, and a rim light here… hopefully one day soon!

Thanks for looking,
dani

I put up the black backdrop, grabbed Nibbler, and got to work in the studio. I went with a real simple light setup, well, because that’s all I have for the time being! I lit the shot with my SB-900, shot bare, high camera right, and triggered using my Nikon CLS. I wanted to get that really cool reflection in Nibbler’s big dark eye.

I had a really tough time deciding between my two favorite photos this week, which can be seen below. I decided on the photo above for two reasons: Nibbler looks more relaxed, and also, he seems to be more of a focal point, allowing me to be secondary.

Which one is your favorite, and why?

Now to find a gray bunny…

Thanks for looking,

dani

Last weekend was the third Salem Strobist meetup, and I’m totally excited about getting involved in the group. If you haven’t heard, Strobist is the term used when you light your scenes using small off-camera flashes, or strobes. The intention of the group is to get all these like-minded photographers together so they can practice and learn from each other. They also provide fun local locations and models looking for photography work, usually from Model Mayhem. Links to local groups at the end.

At first I was nervous about going to the meetup and being inexperienced and slow. There’s also the weirdness of shooting in front of other more experienced photographers, and working with real models. But after two sessions, I’m much more comfortable, have made a few friends, and learned a thing or two about ambient light and off-camera lighting. I know I’ve got a lot to learn, but I’m ready!

On to this week’s photo. During the Salem Strobist meetup, I got a few compliments from the other photographers about my weekly portraits. A few asked how I managed to hit the shutter while in the photo. And one suggested I take my weekly photo there, in the garage. So here it is. I worked on lighting and position for a while, moving the flash all around to try to bring out the reflection from the puddle. Thanks to the persuasion of Jeff Mawer, and help of Heather Jones, I got this image. Heather kept braving the puddle in her sandals, and had the great idea of holding the flash right down by the puddle. Thanks guys!

Strobist info: Shot with a Nikon D80, using 11-17mm lens. Lit with an SB-900, shot bare, low camera right. Triggered using Nikon CLS.

Now I’m totally inspired to go take more images with intentionally awesome shadows..

Salem Strobist Flickr Page
PDX Strobist Flickr Page
David Hobby’s Strobist.com

We’ve both mentioned lately that we never used to care much for the seasonal changes. Never really gave it much thought, except whether you had to wear a coat, or wear short sleeves. But in the four plus years we’ve been dating, the excitement of the seasons, um, blossomed! After a long wintery autumn, and a long autumny winter, we are both ready to get outside and enjoy this beautiful Oregon spring. It’s a time for new growth, recharging one’s spirits, and starting fresh.

The feelings are also enhanced because it’s our first spring in our new home. We bought and moved in November, so things have been dreary, and we’ve focused on making the interior to our liking. Now all those conversations of gardens and arbors and berries and veggies and fruit trees can be a reality! As you can see by the sparse garden and the unruly apple tree desperately in need of pruning… there is lots of work to be done. Time to get busy!

The goal with this photo was to capture the feeling of the first real spring weekend: you know the feeling when your chores don’t feel like chores because you get to be outside. The thought came to me while I was being entertained by General, Ranger and Aten. All morning they chased each other through the yard, up the ladder, across the fence, over the wheelbarrow and through the trees. Using my wide-angle lens, I set my camera on a tripod, and my flash on another tripod. The flash was set to about 1/16th power, and shot bare, fired using the built in wireless system. I moved the flash around, but kept the camera stationary, and snapped shots each time they gave me a good pose. Feeling proud of my gardening accomplishments, I finished off the day with my own silly pose. Then all that was left to do was mask them together. And there you have it!

Note:
General is the silly orange guy in the front.
Aten is the little sandy one.
And Ranger is the big raccoon.

Thanks for looking,

dani

For those of you not from the Dallas area, you probably haven’t heard of Summerfest. Well… this year may change that. For four days, vendors set up booths in the downtown area, and there are all sorts of fun activities to do around town. Sure, it’s a small town thing, but our parade alone attracts thousands. It’s fun, and it’s one of Oregon’s biggest small town events.

Summerfest is put on by the Dallas Area Chamber of Commerce. But fortunately Visual Media Center, the design studio I work for, is behind all of the advertising, promotional materials, and the Chamber’s float in the parade!

This year’s theme is: Thar Be Pirates. And we’re going all out! I don’t want to give away too many surprises, but let’s just say it involves a 25-foot Pirate Ship. And lots of awesomeness.

Which brings me to this week’s photo! Two weeks ago we had a great brainstorming session about the construction of our Galleon, with the help of a few friends. We spent a big portion of Friday planning details, and should be starting by the end of next week. Needless to say, I’ve got pirates on the mind right now. My goal with this shot was to create an atmosphere. I put up the black backdrop in my studio. It’s lit with my SB-800 off-camera, shoot through umbrella, from the right side. I opened up the window for a little bit of natural light fill from the left. The key was to dial down the exposure a bit so the background stayed totally black, then pumped up the power on the flash so things were well lit, and a little dramatic. Looks like a movie poster to me!

Here are my two favorite shots from this week’s shoot:

Thanks for looking,

dani

At the beginning of the term, we were given the general topic of Human Interest and Economy and told to create a magazine. Can’t be that hard right? Over the course of ten weeks, as a group, we decided on a title, direction, identity and general feeling of the magazine. Each class member was responsible for coming up with their own article to contribute and an advertisement design, as well as being assigned a role for the production of the magazine. I must admit, for being a bunch of stubborn designers-in-training, we worked together very well. There were only a few fist fights.

In the end, we created a great little mag called Hi: Human Interest.

As Photography Editor, I was responsible for making sure everyone’s photos were at the correct resolution and not modified, scaled or rotated in In-Design past acceptable levels. I was also able to help out two friends by taking photography for their articles, and was volunteered to take the group shot.

Which brings me to this week’s photo! Meet the production team of Hi Magazine. Taken in the Visual Communications photography studio, this shot was lit with one large softbox to the left and right, one hair light up top, and one off-camera flash to the right. Man, it was dark in there! We chose to include the lighting equipment in the photo as it speaks to what we do. Big thanks to Wayne Knowles, our very awesome photography teacher, for getting everyone to smile and for actually clicking the shutter. Thanks, Wayne!

I learned a bit about Studio Lighting from this shot. There are some things about Studio Lighting that I appreciate more. And there are some things about Studio Lighting that I dislike even more! All the more reason to keep at it.

Thanks for looking,

dani

The idea for this shot came to me while I was waking up this morning. I knew I had a little extra time to work on my photo this week so I wanted to make it something really creative. Also, I haven’t done any sort of photo illustration lately, so this seemed like a perfect opportunity!

I created the background first, in order to get myself pumped to take the photos. I didn’t know if I could create the whole scene in one morning, but I knew if I built an awesome background it would get me motivated. Starting from a blank yellow canvas, I added some textures from Von Glitchka‘s book Crumble. Crakle. Burn. as well as some cool vintage pattern brushes I found online.

The next step was to create the scene of “Alice” at the table. I went searching for those cool teacups my Mom gave me a few years ago, and found one of the little dishes was broken. Sad for the dish, but great for the photo. Only took about ten shots before I got the lighting just right and found an expression I liked. I used my SB-900 Flash, mounted to a tripod, shot through an umbrella, above and to camera-right. Natural light coming in through the window on camera-left created the fill light.

Getting Lunan to look cute was the easiest part of the whole morning. I didn’t even have to ask. He just turned to his good side and looked stoic. Of course I treated him to a delicious fresh carrot for being such a good little model. After I had all the pieces, it was just a matter of compiling them together, then blending.

I have to say, this was one of my favorite shoots so far! When I started, I wasn’t sure if I could pull all of this together in one morning! But I’m happy with the way this turned out, and I hope you enjoy it as well.

Thanks for looking,

dani

Here’s to an awesome early spring! When you walk outside with short sleeves on, see blue skies sprinkled with fluffy little clouds and smell the spring blooming flowers, it’s really hard to remember that it’s only February! And I had started to think I was getting behind in my gardening, needing to prune trees, get bulbs planted, but… it’s February!!

Abe and I managed to spend (a little) quality time in our backyard this weekend. We got our waterfall up and running, then gave the grass its first haircut of the season. Had a good time planning out where the veggie garden will go… and where the berries and fruit trees will go… very much looking forward to our first spring and summer in our new home.

Which brings me to this photo! I wanted to create a dreamy scene, while focusing on the texture of my curls and the fresh grass. While I didn’t actually lie down and nap in the grass, I sure felt like it! Using my 50mm lens, I set the camera up directly above me and pointed it towards the ground. I set up my flash on a tripod to camera left, low to the ground, just out of the frame, and shot through an umbrella. The sun was behind some clouds, turning them into one giant diffuser, so I didn’t have to use much power on the flash, 1/8th power.

Thanks for looking,

dani

Here are my two favorites from this week’s shoot:

The only room in our house that gets really, really dark is the bathroom. So I told Abe not to tease me, set up my equipment, and went to work. I lit this photo only with the light from my SB-900 on a tripod to camera right. I used a snoot over the flash head to create a small beam of light.

There are two keys that went into this photo:
First, getting the position of the flash just right. Because the flash is casting the only light in the shot, moving it just a tiny bit made all the difference with the shadows. If I moved my head back just a bit, the light would miss my face entirely and light the wall behind me. If I moved my head forward just a bit, the light would hit my whole face.

Second, using manual mode to dial in the exposure. This was a great challenge for me, using complete manual mode with the flash for the first time. It takes some getting used to, knowing that the shutter speed always has to stay the same, but the aperture affects the brightness of the whole image. Bumped this baby way up there to keep the blacks looking black!

Thanks for looking,

dani

P.S. Here are the color and the black-and-white versions, for comparison.

So my sweet tapedeck-to-mp3 converter broke a few weeks back, again, prompting a raid of my old cassette tapes. Since then I’ve been listening to a lot of Descendents, The Ataris, MxPx, NoFX, old Green Day, old Offspring, Face To Face, etc.

My personal favorites are the old mix tapes: originally belonging to my older sister and containing some kind of 90′s dance or rap music,
I took them and taped over the corners so they could be recorded on, scratched off the original band name, and wrote in sharpie “misc. punk”. Sorry Lissy.

Maybe that’s why I shot this week’s photo.. of the eight or so pairs of converse in my closet, these are the oldest pair, which date back to roughly 1999. Others have lost their lives along the way, worn down to nothingness, misplaced during moves, or lost at various rowdy concerts. But I never could bring myself to part with these green ones.

This photo is another attempt at using HDR, this time combining eight images. I’ve been doing some reading on the subject, and this time I managed to avoid most halos. I hope you enjoy.

Thanks for looking,

dani

Okay… as I write this, it’s Sunday at 3:11 in the afternoon. So far this weekend I’ve only done a grand total of….. one hour of homework. You know what that means. Pretty much the rest of the night will be spent entirely on the Magazine project and the Catalog project. Silly looming deadlines.

So what did I do instead of homework? Oh, you know… some stuff. I attended the reception for the Keizer Art Association‘s Photography 2010 show. My photo Laces earned a Juror’s Merit Award! I also attended the Artist Reception for the Four Fabulous Females, which I was honored to be a part of, along with Jami Moffett, Melinda Dalke and Dayna Collins. I filed taxes for Abe and I, as well as the first year figuring out business taxes for Dani Photography. And I worked on this photo, for your viewing pleasure.

I lit this shot using an off-camera flash, shot through an umbrella, for the key light. I used the natural light coming in through the window as the fill. This was an idea I had floating around in my head for a while, but was a bit thrown together at the last minute. I hope you still enjoy it.

Thanks for looking,

dani

My Layout 3 class is creating a group magazine. We’re each responsible for our own article spreads and content. Since I just happen to have a rad bike, and I’m all about driving cars less and riding bikes more, I chose to write my article about bicycle commuting.

I’ve been waiting for TWO weeks for a time that
1) I was home
2) it wasn’t dark outside
3) the sky wasn’t boring blah gray and
4) it wasn’t raining.
So when the universe aligned this morning, and the beautiful blue sky peeked out from behind the clouds, I jumped at the opportunity! I grabbed my camera and my Abe (who has recently been promoted from Boyfriend to Key Grip Assistant #1) and ran out the door.

I set up the tripod low to the ground, to maximize the view of the sky, as well as take full advantage of my wide-angle lens. I dialed down my camera exposure to bring out the color and detail in the clouds. Then I had to build back up the light for my subject: I set up my flash on another tripod, and placed that at an opposite angle of the sunlight. In the final photos, the flash is the key light, and the sunlight provided some fill.

Wow.. if I didn’t know any better, I might think I actually know what I’m talking about, LOL.

Here are the two photos that came out of this week’s session. The one that shows the full bike will probably be the one I use for my class magazine spread, while the other was more fitting for the purpose of this blog.

Oh, for any of you photographers, check out the Strobist blog. It’ll change your world. Or… at least the way you think about light. I know I have a lot to learn about using off-camera flashes and balancing light, but I know that the Strobist website and DVD set will be a big help along the way.

So far each week’s photo has tied together, in some way, with events going on in my life that week.

This week… oh man. This photo embodies my week.

I won’t bore you with the details, but responsibilities include gathering pieces and prepping for the Four Fabulous Females in February, gathering pieces to display in a wine shop opening in Independence, prepping for my first entry to the Keizer Arts Association‘s Photography Show, on top of work, school and homework. Oh yeah, life? What’s that? Pssh.

On to the photo! I created Controlled Chaos by merging seven photos of different exposures together. I’ve played around with HDR a little bit last summer, to create my pieces Lichens Rock, Fort Rock Sky and Plush Church. This time I wanted to not only practice creating an HDR image, but to push it and create a different effect with it.

Two things I did learn:

One:
My camera has a setting to expose three images in a row, each exposed up or down one or two stops. When I merged the tree together, I was getting lots of noise in the shadows, and not quite as much detail as I’d hoped. Apparently, this scene had more of a dynamic range than three exposures would cover. So… seven exposures was much, much better.

And Two:
It’s very difficult to sit perfectly still for seven exposures.

There is much more I need to learn about HDR photography, I’m very excited to keep trying! I need to learn how to avoid the “halos” around certain objects, and how to capture moving subjects, to name a few. I’ll be doing a lot of testing on this in the next few months, so keep an eye out for more HDR experiments!

Thanks for looking,

dani

Some of the most beautiful portrait lighting stems from the early 1900′s through the 1940′s. Yes, the film stars of that era were beautiful, but they were lit in such a way that made their portraits timeless. Much of this has to do with the old glass in the lenses used at the time, and the soft focus, but the lights played a starring role. The lighting was well crafted to create drama with black and white film.

This photo is my humble attempt to light in such a way. I used two large soft boxes, a hard light, and a diffused off-camera flash. I intentionally had a soft focus in an attempt to capture the soft glow. I just have to say… this was really challenging! It was not a matter of setting up the lights and… done. Testing and retesting, changing angles ever so slightly to get the rim light… and I still didn’t quite get it like I wanted it. I can tell this is a style that I will be revisiting regularly, as it’s something I would love to prefect. Not quite there yet.

P.S. Here are my top three photos from the session.

P.P.S. Thank you Jade, for letting me borrow your book about classic Hollywood portraits. And thank you Wayne, for the link so I can buy my own copy. I have a feeling there will be more where this came from!

Week two.

Okay, okay I’ll come clean. Contrary to popular belief, I’m not actually a pool shark. I did, however, grow up with a pool table at my parent’s house. I love the game and have played quite a bit in my day, but unfortunately, the doesn’t mean I’m any good. Abe still wins every time.

On to the photo. Lately I’ve been fascinated with high-contrast black and white images and, for lack of a better word, grungy photography. The grunge thing really isn’t my style, so I thought I’d give it a try and see what happened. I pulled out the big guns for this and went with the wide-angle lens. Lit this scene with one soft-box on either side (as you can see from the reflections in the pool balls) and my digital flash mounted on-camera, with the ring-flash adapter to bring the light down close to the lens.

If there are any readers out there, I hope you’re enjoying the adventure so far. I’m already looking forward to all the new styles I’ll get to try over the course of the year, and can’t wait for next week!

dani

P.S. Thanks Mom and Dad, for handing down the pool table. I promise I’ll take good care of it

We adopted this tiny little guy from our local Humane Society on New Year’s Eve, which was not only a full moon, but a blue moon.

You see, last year my sister found a lost bunny in our town’s city park. Never able to turn away a stray, my boyfriend and I took him in and kindly dubbed him Nibbler. At first, our youngest cat would hang out and snuggle him. Cute as heck. But lately, all the cats ignore him, and he seemed a little down. It’s been two days since we adopted Lunan, and Nibbler has never been happier.

Okay, back to the photo… this is the very first week of my photo challenge!

I had a few weeks to think about what I would do for this photo. In the end, I threw all of those ideas out and decided to kick it off with a white theme. We’re all starting fresh with not only a new year, but a brand new century. Lunan is starting his new life. Abe and I are starting our life in our new home. I am starting my new photo challenge, and have new goals and aspirations.

Out with the old, in with the new!

Welcome to 2010,

dani

P.S. this session had two out-takes I’d like to share, but this theme doesn’t allow more than one photo per post. To view all the photos in one gallery, please visit dani photography here!

I love photography.

Among other things, I’m a graphic designer and photographer and a student.

But I really love photography!

I’ve often admired other people’s self-inflicted blog challenges. I once saw a mosaic-a-day blog. That was cool. I can see the benefit of doing something you love, and doing it regularly, over and over, while finding new and creative ways to do so. It forces you to push the envelope. It’s inevitable that every artist will one day come to a brick wall of creativity, and when that time comes, the artist will have to push through and expand their artistic prowess. It will be challenging, but in the end, the artist will be better for it.

So, I’ve decided to challenge myself by creating a photo-a-week blog. It doesn’t stop there, however, as this challenge is two-fold. I’ve never been a fan of having my picture taken. In order to challenge myself even more, each week will be a new self portrait. Or, as I like to call it, a new take on the old self-portrait. My goal with this personal challenge is to move past any self-consciousness I have behind the camera (where I prefer to be) as well as in front of the lens, and learn new techniques along the way.

I’ll start the first week of January.

Well……….. here goes nothing!

dani