Up Early with Liv

I'm mentioned my model Liv many times.  We've known each other since she was in elementary school with my sister and is home from college for winter break right now so we decided to do a shoot.  Liv wanted something kind of vintage, which reminded me of a senior picture shoot I did over summer.  We decided to revisit that location with some great thrift store finds.  At sunrise.  Getting up early is not my strong point but something I really need to work on, plus the light is always beautiful.


Of course, switching between lenses made it difficult because I was using the f1.4 and the first frame or two after switching would be either too dark or completely blown out.  HOWEVER, there is this magical thing called camera RAW which allowed some saving.  Check out how awesome this before and after is!

The top is straight out of camera.  The bottom is after some tinkering around in LightRoom.  Sometimes mistakes turn out really well!!  Now for the intentional images....

I just had to edit this all old-timey.  The fall-off from the f1.4 is beautiful and I love how the necklace and lace of the dress look.  She looks straight out of the 19th century.

Love her poses!

The light and lines in this makes it a favorite.  Plus Liv has a stunning profile - having a good model can make or break a photo.


Of course, I had to go and love the vintage look in black and white which took out the lovely colors but there's an image on my facebook page from this shoot in color.  Go love it!

Seniors 2012 - Abbie

This weekend, I photographed Abbie, who is from the opposite side of the city.  She wanted me to do her pictures, though, as I had done her cousin Janelle's two years ago.  We met partway, at Janelle's mom's house and I set up my background in the living room.  Ended up using the prime lens (still on that manual kick!) and window light, and the pictures turned out beautiful!!

We went around the house and yard for a bit, taking pictures and trying to convince Abbie's little cousin, who is about two, that it wasn't her turn.  I had been photographing her on the background while Abbie was changing and the little one was all about it.

In my years as a photographer, and having a strong tendency to convert to black and white (probably due to my days in the darkroom), I've realized some people look better in color and some look better in black and white.  There's also sepia and faded color.  Vibrant color.  A big part of this is a personality thing, but there's also style/wardrobe (which plays into personality but can change) and even just physical appearance (face/body type/etc) or location.  Abbie is a sepia.  Sepia makes me think of pretty vintage things, classic portraits, World War II and the 1940s, and she definitely has a vintage kind of style.

We went to the old railway station in Coraopolis to shoot.  I've always wanted to photograph there - my bus drove by it every day for the two and a half years I rode it - but never have.  When we were emailing, setting up our shoot, Abbie suggested the station and I jumped on the chance.

How classic is that?!