The Camera Life

Just a shout out to this wonderful article full of crazy photographers, please check it out here –>  http://www.boredpanda.com/crazy-photographers/

Because this is already me… 

 …and this will be me one day

Over the past a couple of days I have been asked the same question: “what are you gonna do after graduation?” And as much as I want to punch right in the face the next person that asks me that question…figuratively of course :)… I can’t help but think and wonder what would I actually be doing with my life.

One of the things I have thought of is, what would be the best thing I could do if money wasn’t an object or I was just offered the opportunity of a lifetime? And my answer tends to be the same lately: TRAVEL.

I want to travel the world, see everything imaginable, and take 1000s and 1000s of photographs of everything I see. I would love to work for say National Geographic and just get paid to photograph a cultural event in Taiwan, or the beautiful scenery in Iceland… the list just goes on and on and even though it is one of my wildest dreams I still like to think that it is realistic. I mean you never know where life is going to take you, and honestly I would like it to take to different places around the world.

Why would I want to photograph all these different places, isn’t the experience about simply being there and seeing and observing?

Well, it comes with the photographer in me, but it is more than that. Think about the places you have travelled to, let’s say you went to Paris and you visited the Eiffel Tower, and you took a picture. Why would you do that? There are a million pictures of this monument pretty much everywhere, you know what it looks like, and you were there… so why take your own photo even with an iphone? This is one of the most interesting facts about the art of photography; it commands a certain amount of responsability, ownership, and pride. Taking your own photograph enhances your experience of your travel site by taking an actual record for future reference. That photo that you took of the same old Eiffel Tower has more value to you, or is at least seen a better light simply due to the fact that you took it. That photo now holds your memories, the time of day, who you were with or around, all circumstances you took note of when you took the photo are now embedded in the picture itself.

I think that is fascinating, which gets me more excited to go out into the world and take my own photos of all the breathtaking places the world has to offer. There are so many unbelievable places in the world that you just have to see them for yourself…

     Turkey

     New Zeland

     Australia

     Madagascar

Check out some more breathtaking places here –> http://aplus.com/a/25-unbelievable-places-on-earth?ref=ns&so=RdNBbD6WEehodkrrRQotzW One day, I’m going to be at those places, and even discover some of my own, and you bet I’ll have my camera with me!

As the end of the year approaches, I have been reflecting on the different things I have learned through my photography class. One of them is that you never stop learning, granted, I still consider myself a photographer in training, so technically I’m not even out of the learning and training phase. However there are so many things I know I have yet to learn, things that I already know and understood fairly quickly, and then there things that I have been doing wrong or things that I didn’t know about. All of this information would have been so helpful had it came at an earlier time, but I believe it came now for a reason.

So let’s get to it…

I learned that I have been holding my camera wrong this entire time

Tip #1: Hold your camera lens from the bottom not the top, it will provide so much more stability and greater support from the main camera frame. Also, it could disrupt the flash when trying to use it since your hand is on the way 🙂

I learned that sometimes centering a subject is not always boring

Tip #2: Place the dominant eye in the center of the photograph for a more captivating and personal portrait shot

I learned that I look funny and will climb into the weirdest positions during a photoshoot

This is my little side step I apparently do while trying to stabilize myself as I try to get the camera to stay in the same place

Tip #3: Don’t be afraid of moving around, climbing, extending, laying on the floor, never mind what people would think of you while you are laying on the floor and looking through a bush trying to find a hole… been there

If you are looking for more basic tips on photography check out this little infographic with gifs–>  http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/260czt/1w@@UMX$+:bgYCOBDE/imgur.com/gallery/c9Uvr

Another way I keep on learning is by finishing out how other people use photography. It’s actually very inspiring, innovative, and creative the way certain people use it and make the medium their own.

Check out this person who decided to make Van Gogh’s paintings look like photographs with a bit of photoshop editing and photo tilt –> http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/2RPHmS/Km39KlED:aMbDTYRf/www.photoguides.net/16-incredible-van-gogh-paintings-tilt-shifted

                     

What about French photographer and illustrator Thomas Lamadieu who takes photos from within courtyards, and fills the sky with imaginative and fun illustrations. For him is all about perspective, and finsding that right courtyard and set of tall buildings, it’s just amazing! http://emgn.com/entertainment/this-imaginative-artist-uses-the-bright-blue-sky-as-his-canvas-giving-us-a-new-perception-of-our-surroundings/?utm_source=emgn&utm_medium=emgn&utm_campaign=skyart

                    

Or what about the mom who became instagram famous due to her food creations so her daughter would eat everything on her plate? –> http://fb-694.lifebuzz.com/art-food/2/

     

These are just beautiful pieces of art as well as incredible food photography! Hence why she now has so many followers on instagram. What are some of your photo experiences/lessons while on a shoot? Do you use photos in a creative or innovative way?

Have you ever been amazed by how small the world actually is? I know I have lived through and heard about many different ‘small-world’ stories throughout the years, yet somehow I’m still surprised every time I hear a new one. I think that’s the beauty of it, nothing ceases to surprise us in this wonderful world.

I just came across an amazing and probably the craziest story I have ever heard of… this real life tale is about a guy whose phone is stolen and follows it all the way to China, only to become famous and gain a best friend for life. If you haven’t heard about it, please check it out… it’s so worth the long read: http://www.buzzfeed.com/mjs538/i-followed-my-stolen-iphone-across-the-world-became-a-celebr?bffb&utm_term=4ldqpgp#.ggnkQD3zy

This story is amazing by itself, but the reason I decided to share it with my photo enthusiasts is because of the way these 2 individuals found each other and became best friends: through photography! So it goes…

A guy gets his phone stolen at a bar, months later, after he gets a new phone, these kind of photos start appearing on his new phone…

        

He’s freaked out, doesn’t know where the photos are coming from… turns out that his stolen phone ended up in China and this man in front of the oranges had it and any photos taken were saved through the cloud since the stolen phone was not disconnected. What I found interesting was that he was able to learn about this man’s life through the different photographs or snapshots on the iphone. He was able to gain some insight into who this man was, what he liked, and the places he visited or frequented. It’s crazy to think that you can get to know someone simply through a couple of snapshots. Once he met the strange orange man in China, he figured out this man had a small restaurant, famous for his oranges, lived in a small town in China and has a couple of little kids. Knowing this information helped to explain those photos.

I thought it was crazy how much you can find out about a person through a simple couple of snapshots, not only that, but they bonded over taking selfies and even more photos. They didn’t speak each others’ languages and yet they could communicate, hang out, and become life long friends. You can actually see as the days go by how better friends they become through the photos, I loved that part of the already crazy story.

I just love how much power photographs can have, how much you can tell from a snapshot, how much they can reveal about our personal feelings and lives in general. We might not think about photos this way, but we just don’t realize how personal snapshots can be, they can even include inside jokes that no one will understand unless they knew you. From now on, let’s try to think about how much our photographs can reveal about ourselves and thus understand the reason behind why they are so meaningful to us.

I came across this short animated film a few days ago and thought it told a great story. Check it out here: http://designtaxi.com/news/374100/An-Adorable-Short-On-Love-And-Photography/#.VRrcxp4vfYs.facebook

The short feature tells the story of a photographer out on a photoshoot by the park when he runs into another photographer trying to capture the same thing at that park. I just loved how they bonded over their photo-taking passion and no words needed to be said.

It’s just like a fantasy… wouldn’t it be great if that could happen? I know several times I am out on a photoshoot and it would be great to have some company, but not any company, not any friend, somebody that understands photography and is trying to capture different shots simply because they are passionate about it. I know some of my favorite times have been when my photography class goes out on a field trip to take photos. It’s just great because we are all trying to see the world through the camera lens, we can laugh about how a photo is not working, give pointers, find something we hadn’t noticed on our own… Everyone needs a camera buddy, I can only bother my friends to come with me and/or model for me so much 🙂

Pretty sure they all hate me already for taking so many pictures of them or for causing us to be late because I had to stop to take photos of everything!!!

I hope I find one one day, even if it is just for the day or as long as the photoshoot lasts. That’s sometimes all you really need, the company of a stranger who at the end of the day becomes a close friend simply because you both share a passion for something. So I’ll leave you guys with this: be open to the people around you, to the people with cameras out in the world, maybe they’ll surprise you… who knows…

IMPORTANT NOTE: people out with phones or ipads or that look like tourists do not qualify for the photo buddy position 🙂

What do you think of when you look at an old photograph?

Maybe it reminds you of better times or great moments with loved ones… for me, looking at an old photograph brings back so many memories, emotions, feelings, events, people, places, scents, basically the whole scene is brought back to my mind and played over and over again, but I not only dream and remember this, I am there once again with all those people, scents, feelings… A photograph helps me relive a moment in time… deep enough yet? Just wait 🙂

But do you ever think about how much of an effect a photo is going to have on you in the future? In other words, when you are shooting or making a photograph do you really think about the idea of preserving a memory or stopping time?

Sometimes we do it intuitively… if something funny or interesting happens you take your camera out right away because you know you want to remember that moment.

Sometimes we do it because we know we are going to loose whatever we are photographing… think about those photographers that seek to preserve old buildings or places that are about to be torn down and they photograph them in an effort to remember those places that were significant in some personal way. Take Vivian Maier for instance, she spent basically her entire life documenting different cities, people, and basically the life she lived in the 60s, but none of it would have ever surfaced to the public if John Maloof hadn’t found all these boxes of info. Find out more about this amazing almost lost story right here: http://www.vivianmaier.com/about-vivian-maier/history/ If that doesn’t inspire you to make photographs yourself maybe this next person will.

Meet Holly Spring, the most loving and dedicated mother I have come across. Holly portray’s her 4-year-old daughter Violet in the most whimsical manner to show her she can be anything she wants.

                              

Violet was born with Hirschsprung’s Disease and no left hand and after almost loosing her life when she was 2, Holly decided to start taking photos of her daughter in an effort to capture memories. Check it out: http://sfglobe.com/?id=3813&src=share_fb_new_3813 You could never tell this beautiful girl has any problems, until you look closer at her arms, but it doesn’t even matter because out of any bad situation someone can be inspired to photograph, to be passionate about something, and find happiness in something they previously didn’t see.

A photograph requires much more than one glance, you have to truly see it to find the emotion and significance behind it, but without this human need to preserve history and memories we wouldn’t have photographs such as these.

So this week I thought I would post something a bit different. I just wanted to share some beautiful photographs I have come across for the past couple of days. Why am I doing this? Well… spring break is coming and I am so excited to be traveling to a beautiful island with my best friend. So I have been looking through photographs to gain some inspiration and ideas for what to shoot or what to look for when I go to a new place that is so different from where I live.

So I started with wildlife and I came across this article showing motherhood among animals… I just thought it was beautiful, and amazingly captured. I hope I can take some beautiful wildlife shots where I am just there at the right moment to snap that cute animal close to me. Read the article here: http://m.atchuup.com/wild-animals-and-their-youngs/

                      

       

Or just a funny photo… it’s crazy what animals do right?

So what’s next… People!!! People are so interesting, it is just great to travel to an exotic place because there is an entirely different culture, with different customs and traditions. It is just fascinating to think about who will I meet when I’m there…

What inspired me to think about this was this photographer’s project where he captures portraits of people ages 1 to 100 and asks them about their dreams, wishes, or anything fun they would like to tell him. I just thought it was an amazing project to take on, and he executed it so well and managed to capture each and everyone’s personalities in one shot! Keen Heick-Abildhauge photos can be found here:http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/02/27/100-years-project_n_6763534.html?utm_hp_ref=photography

So I guess I will just leave you with the message of take photographs that inspire you, and it doesn’t have to be anything deep, just something that makes you happy…

Be Creative, Be Playful, Be Imaginative, Be Daring

I just wanted to send a shout out to my Photography professor: Benita VanWinkle who has just been featured in the local news with her 30 year long project of photographing vintage movie theaters from around the country. You can watch the video footage here: http://www.wral.com/photographer-captures-vintage-america-through-pictures-/14490816/

Her collection of North Carolina Vintage Movie Theaters are now in display at the High Point Museum. I had the pleasure to be invited to the beautiful reception, but everyone should go!

The reason I wanted to post this was not only to spread the word about my professor, but also to recognize her achievements as a professional photographer as well as an educator. Benita was the first person to teach me photography: Digital Photography class my sophomore year, was definitely a highlight in my life. I would never have discovered that I had a passion, an eye, or any talent for photography. if it wasn’t for her I struggled so much the first couple of months trying to understand how to make a DSLR work… my favorite phrase was: “It won’t click!!! I’m clicking, and it’s not clicking.” I would get so frustrated with the technology that I almost quit the class halfway through. I talked to Benita about it and she encourage me to stay and told me that if I hated photography by the end of class then at least I could say I gave it my best shot. A week later, all of a sudden all the different settings made sense to me while on a photo field trip with some friends. Fast forward 2 years, and I have now won a national photo contest, started my own freelance photography business, and even gotten a job as a photographer for the school newspaper. And to think that I almost quit because I was struggling. That’s something that I like to look back on and remember whenever I think of quitting something I previously committed to.

All I have to say now is… thanks Benita for bearing with me and helping me grow as a skilled photographer and just as a person in general. Congratulations on your own success.

So this past week I had a lot of free time, and by that I mean I procrastinated on my work a lot… so I went on different blogs I follow… Pinterest, Stumble Upon, and some other sites. I came across many different articles that I really made me think about the life of a photographer.

With every passing day I realize how much more there is to photography that many people, including myself, give it credit for. As I have talked about before, it requires not only a certain talent and ability, but a sense of responsibility and a strong commitment to the art of documenting life. I realize how brave photographers have to be to take the best, most beautiful, and most influential photographs of their lifetime. Just think about it… people talk about just being in the right place at the right time, but sometimes that requires not only to remember to have your camera at all times, but to be willing to travel and go places where most people simply don’t go.

You have to be daring, willing to take risks… and not be afraid to be called crazy 🙂

Some photographs are just the result of extreme bravery… Check it out right here: http://www.buzzfeed.com/h2/fbso/toyotacamry/photographs-that-were-the-result-of-extraordinary-bravery?b=1#.fgaD5jRn7

Even famous early photographers, like Lewis Hine, went above and beyond to get the right shots for their professional assignments. I’m sure you would recognize some of his photographs

…especially those of the construction of the Empire State Building…

There are many photographs that we see as extraordinary because of the person being portrayed is on the edge of the tallest building of the world, or the scenery is just breathtaking…

Aerial view of Central Park, NYC

But have we ever thought about the person behind the photograph who must have gone through extreme lengths to get that perfect shot. Think about where they had to be, the connections or just luck they must have had to be there at the right time. We all know those famous photographs plastered everywhere, but we tend to forget about the photographers. Thus, I dedicate this post to those who have gone the extra mile to take those daring and extraordinary photographs, whether it was by chance, an assignment, or whatever. I only hope I let myself be more daring for the sake of photography in the short future.

Click here to see the photographers behind those famous photographs: http://www.boredpanda.com/famous-photographer-portraits-behind-photographs-tim-mantoani/