Monday, July 7, 2014

Project 52 - July 2014 {1}

Week 1 - Motion

Welcome to my first blog!  

Last week I decided to start Project 52 where I have a different theme each week for a year and will document the images from each theme here.  Denise Love is the photographer that put this thought in my head and lit a fire under my butt!  

I re-started my photography business this year and am trying to be patient as it takes time to grow but it is very hard to do.  So, in between business research, advertising, marketing, client sessions, editing, doing house work, continuing education (because you can never learn enough about photog), driving my daughter to her sports/camps and oh yeah, did I mention editing...  I wanted to do some photography just for myself.  To motivate me and keep the inspiration flowing for myself and my business.  

Denise also opened a Facebook group for all the photographers that wanted to participate in their own project and post those images.  She also is doing a theme every other week for the group to post images on the Facebook page.  So, if you don't want to commit to a project, you can participate in the group's theme.  Plus, she is doing challenges every so often and might even be a prize for the 1st place image!  

I look forward every day to see what new images have been posted to the group's page and what I can contribute to it.  If you're a photographer looking for something different to do, some motivation, to inspire and to be inspired, I suggest you look into doing a project for yourself and maybe even join the Facebook group.  

Week 1 was motion.  I started to look around my surrounding at my house and noticed it was windy outside.  So, I grabbed my camera, went outside and started shooting.  I wanted a blur of motion, not stop action motion so it took me a little bit to figure out my settings.  This is something I'm not use to doing all the time so I had to stop and think about it.  Plus, I just got a new camera (upgraded to a Nikon D610!) so I'm still trying to figure it all out.  I tried out many different plants/trees around the yard that were moving with the wind.  I finally looked up and saw the image I wanted (see below).  

I love my yellow lab, Abby like she's another child of mine (from another mother - haha!).  One thing about Abby is her tail is almost always moving.  She's a very happy dog and that's what I wanted to capture in this theme.  

Next, I had to take my daughter to Appleton, WI for two basketball games.  I thought what a perfect opportunity for motion!  If you've ever taken photos of a sporting event, you might know you have to take a few hundred images to get a handful of good ones.  I felt I got two really good ones so I had to share them both!

The rain drop images might seem boring or not too motivational, however there's a story behind it so I just had to make this bad situation into something good.  I'll try to make this short and sweet.  We had some items for donation and a truck was coming to pick them up (I won't say the company's name because I'm nice like that).  I was in the house when I heard an awful noise and felt the house shake.  You might think this is an uncommon event but we live close to a quarry and we can feel the house shake every time they blast.  This was different though and I looked outside as fast as I could.  I saw the truck in the driveway and the driver looking at our house.  Oh no, he didn't just hit our house!  Oh, but yes, he did.  Thankfully, he only hit the gutter (crunched it about two feet) and not the house structure.  So, as we are waiting for a quote for the gutters, it rains (of course, right!).  It had finally stopped raining but since the gutter was all crunched up, water was dripping constantly.  I thought, lets make this into a photo opportunity!  So, I took a blanket, laid it out on the driveway so I wouldn't get wet when I went belly down and snapped away.  

We visited a relative at his house on Lake Butte des Morts and the two girls went out on his boat to go tubbing.  It was windy by the lake so I decided to practice my first attempt at motion in my backyard.  Hoping to do better this time.  I don't know if it's better but it didn't take me as long to get my setting correct.  So, that's good!  

Well, I hope I didn't bore you too much with all this talking (or typing).  I would think my other posts will be shorter because they're not the first one and no need to go into detail about the project itself, only the theme/images.  If you decide to start your own project or are already doing your own, please let me know about it.  I'd love to check it out.  Maybe we can inspire each other!  

If you're a photographer or not, please leave me a comment to let me know how I'm doing.  I'd love to hear from you!












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