So it’s been a few months since the blog saw some love. Let one session slip on by without making an update and before you know it you have a mountain out of a mole hill.
For those of you familiar with Tumblr, I’m very much considering switching the majority of my posting on over to it. I’d post whatever random images I’m working on or if something strikes my fancy as I go, and when I’ve amounted enough that it needs to have a condensed place to be viewed, I’ll make a blog post.
Make sense? Well, it at least makes sense to me. When I have it up and running, I’ll have it as a link from my homepage, the blog, Facebook… pretty much everywhere.
The majority of what I need to ramble on about is directed more at my brides, so enough jibber jabber for now (weddings will be part 2). This smattering of images is of a few sessions that need to see some daylight.
A ton of images after the jump. (That means click the link below to see the rest of the images; I won’t say who, but I got an e-mail about my last post missing everything but the beginning. You know who you are. 
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First and foremost, I have to admit one thing — I’m a horrible blogger; I’m even worse at keeping my portfolio up-to-date. You know what time it is when I think about getting around to doing either of those things? Answer: 10 seconds before I fall asleep.
If it’s thought about in the right perspective, that could mean good things — I’ve been staying busy enough that other things have had to come first. So this is the first post in a long while, and in the background, I’m sorting out what will be in my new portfolio that I desperately need to update while trying to get the post production of a wedding off of my plate. God bless the people that will still hire me with what’s up there right now. I’m betting most of them checked my Facebook page before giving me a call — it’s the one thing that proves I’m still in business, getting work, and most importantly, getting better than what I was at when I first put up my online portfolio.
But enough of that. I recently posted the above picture on my SJP Facebook page and got a request from Michelle Hamstra to hear about my editing on this one. To be honest, I’d normally just respond with some witty comment that totally avoided the idea of doing extra work; however, I know Michelle through creativeLIVE, and that place has done wonders for furthering my personal goal to always be better than before, so… I kinda owe it to a fellow CL homie to do this.
Now before I say a single word, read this: PHOTOSHOP IS NOT A CRUTCH, IT’S ICING ON A DELICIOUS CAKE. For the first two years of shooting, I didn’t ever touch Photoshop. It’s not that I didn’t know how to use it — on the contrary, I have a minor in graphic design that put me in front of PS every day — but rather I took the advice of one Zack Arias on the topic. I wish I could remember from what or where I heard/read him say/type that, but basically he preaches that you should be getting it right in-camera. If you look at an image you’ve taken and think to yourself with a bit of Photoshopping, I can save this one, you should slap yourself silly, go back, and do it again until you get it right. Or you should say you’re a “fine art” photographer (no offense to the real fine art photographers out there).
Because I took this approach, I shoot images with the intent of getting everything right in-camera. If there’s something that I can’t pull off in-camera, but know for a fact that I can replicate using PS, I’ll shoot that image knowing what I’ll do to it in PS before I even hit the shutter.
So now that I’ve had my rant for the day, it’s down to the meat of it all… After the jump.
This past weekend involved traveling to one of the best places for a guy with a sweet tooth — Savannah, GA. Now, anyone that knows me can tell you I’m not a fan of chocolate; however, there’s something about fudge from River Street… I can’t help myself. And a place where you can buy that Godsend fudge, a bag of flavored Tootsie Rolls (orange, lime, and lemon) AND ridiculously delicious ice cream all in the same spot?
… I indulged a little bit, but not too much — I had a purpose for being in this sugar-blessed city.
Hailey and Russ, after being together for almost a decade, finally tied the knot Sunday at Forsyth Park in Historic Downtown Savannah. Although the sun tried heating up the place, Hailey and Russ planned for the whole wedding to be in the shade — a photographer’s dream and a nice repose from the heat. They were a dream to work with, and it made me a bit sad knowing that the end of the day meant the end of working with a couple who made my job fun to do.
I put together a little storyboard of the day. Let me know if you like seeing the wedding day laid out like this!
I almost did the blog bomb in one day. So close…
I felt the need to catch up because of the sheer number of shoots that occurred so quickly. This post brings me back up to speed just in time for the coming week, when I’ll have three new sessions. So be happy, there’s more to come. 
This session was this past Sunday. It started off just as normally as any other: Mel and I met Brooke downtown, had a little chat, did a quick walk-through of how the day was going to go, and jumped right in.
But it’s my hopes the images will show this wasn’t just any other session.
Every photographer and subject needs to warm up a bit before the good photos begin to flow. Personally, I find I start hitting my stride about 30–45 minutes into a session, and honestly it’s about the same for subjects. I’ve been nervous before a shoot, while warming up, and even sometimes after a shoot, but once I’m in my stride the nervousness has always melted away. Until this shoot. And I was bothered a bit by that until talking it out a bit with Mel. And by “talking it out” I mean I said a whole big string of words without breathing until I blurted something out that I didn’t realize I realized while Mel stared at me with a look only acquired from hearing my ramblings day in, day out for an extended period of time.
It’s not that I wasn’t getting the images I wanted. It wasn’t that I was trying to think through shots to come, or places to go, or even silly things like camera settings or other technical garbage. It was that I was shooting — without a doubt — the most confident person that’s ever been in front of my camera. And that’s saying a helluva lot, considering that Laine and Kara had been in front of it less than a week before.
Brooke absolutely owned every picture I took without even trying, and it kept me on my toes. I never once just settled for the images I got as “good enough.” And plenty of images did I get; I didn’t have to use all my little tricks and stories — well, I still used them, but I didn’t have to — which meant we moved from idea to idea in a snap.
But I should’ve expected it, especially since I’d heard of tales spanning from wearing a gorilla costume to Wal-Mart to trying to wear a Christmas tree outfit to school (and being asked to take it off by the principal) before I’d even met her. (Mel and her mother work together.)
If this is a taste of how shooting senior portraits can be, I guarantee you’ll be seeing a ton more in time to come.
Now before I go rambling on any longer — and trust me, I can — here’s just a sample of Brooke’s awesome session and the finale to my bombing of the blog.
Ever heard of Willacoochee, GA? I sure hadn’t before I starting talking with Kara. Now I know what some of you are saying — it’s above Lakeland, how can you not know, do rabbits eat lettuce. But to you who are more familiar with the small Southern towns I say this: when I hear something that sounds like a sneeze, I don’t get a map, I say bless you.
Kara came into this shoot with a fantastic wardrobe, great locations in mind, and a smile she swore was hard for her to produce. Unbeknownst to her, I have bad jokes and even worse drawn-out stories that you can either laugh at or cry about until the noises coming from my mouth stop. Either way makes for some good photos.
Again I will have to say I’m eternally grateful to Laine for putting my nerves at ease. Nerves in control and awesomeness all around, the shoot with Kara went without a hitch.
