31 Gamechangers for Photographers Workshop

Earlier this month I had the a-mah-zing opportunity to attend a two day photography workshop lead by Trevor Dayley of Trevor Dayley Photography.

I have to confess that prior to attending his workshop, I had never heard of Trevor.  I'm relatively new to Phoenix and I don't photograph weddings so I had somehow managed to miss out on the awesomeness that is Trevor Dayley prior to a few weeks ago.  Now I'd have to say that I've been converted into one of his biggest fans!

I heard about his workshop when a fellow local photographer, Ryan Nicole Photography (who is also amazing btw), suggested I attend.  After checking out the workshop itinerary, I decided that it sounded right up my alley and signed up.

Words really cannot describe how wonderful the experience was to learn from Trevor.  For two straight days he poured himself into sharing every detail of his business philosophy and his shooting and editing strategies.  He answered all of our questions with the patience of a saint, and somehow managed to do it all without losing an ounce of his energy or enthusiasm.

The amount of material that Trevor shared with us (and continues to share) seems never ending, and here I am weeks later barely scratching the surface of the notes I took during the workshop.  I feel like I learned more in those 2 days with Trevor than in the past 2 years from all other sources combined.

All of that would be pretty freaking awesome all by itself, but the most incredible thing about the experience was that spending 16+ hours with Trevor Dayley quite literally has restored my faith in humanity.

I. am. so. not. kidding.

Trevor is an incredible photographer, but he is an even more incredible person.  He is one of those rare people who would go out of his way to help anyone in need. Kindness and compassion emanate from him, and it is impossible to be in his presence and not be impacted by it.  Not only did his workshop make me a better photographer, it has made me a better person.  Watching Trevor give so much of himself to us during the workshop, and continue to do so weeks later, has inspired me to try to do the same in my interactions with those around me.

OK.  I'll stop gushing now and share a few photos that I took of the models that posed for us during the workshop.

The stunning Kimberly....

And the gorgeous Tarah...

I am absolutely in love with how the flash shows off the fabulous colors in Tarah's hair...

I wish I had a photo of Trevor and the other wonderful people I met at the workshop, but sadly, I don't. Eight photographers, and not a single one of us thought to take a photo of the group!

If you are a photographer and ever have the chance to learn from Trevor, grab onto the opportunity with both hands and don't let go. Seriously, you absolutely will not regret it.

Michele Whitacre is a portrait photographer serving Phoenix, Arizona and the surrounding area. Visit Michele's website at michelewhitacrephotography.com. Become a fan of Michele's work on Facebook. Follow Michele's updates on Twitter.

Self-Portrait | August 2012

While the trip down memory lane for June and July was fun, this month I was anxious to return to my goal of attempting to capture more emotion with my 2012 self-portraits.  I feel like I've gotten away from that the past few months and wanted to refocus my attention with my portrait for August.

In order to explain my motivation for this month’s image I have to share a bit of a confession…. I have never outgrown my obsession with teenage girly movies, and I have quite a collection of them. Not too long ago I was watching 17 Again, and there is a scene in it where they are cleaning up after a party. One of the characters is vacuuming off a rug, and when he finishes he says something like “All done,” and then as the camera moves out, he says, “with the rug,” and you see the entire rest of the apartment is completely trashed.  That’s the look I was going for with August’s self-portrait.

Kevin and I have spent the past several weeks searching for a new rental house, and packing up all of our stuff to move across The Valley.  Instead of renting a huge moving truck and moving everything all at once, we decided to move as many of our personal belongings as possible in our cars and save the furniture for a smaller moving truck.  Unfortunately our schedules are pure insanity and the belongings made it a few weeks before the furniture so we have been living out of boxes and sleeping on a (very small) futon mattress tossed on the floor.

Things are totally insane for us because along with this move, Kevin has been taking summer classes and studying to take one of the huge tests he has to pass before he is able to practice law.  As for me, I am starting work at a new office for my day job and also made the crazy decision to attend a 2 day photography workshop in the middle of moving (more on that soon!).  Needless to say, things feel a bit out of control at the moment and I really don't deal with that feeling very well!  So, here I am in the little oasis that I have managed to create for myself amongst the mass chaos that is my world right now.

As a side note, I totally love how dirty the bottoms of my feet are in this image.  It absolutely wasn't planned for the image, but I cannot tell you how black my feet are by the end of the day while cleaning and moving into this new rental house.  It's rather disgusting the state they are in, but such a HUGE memory of this move for me!

I have to admit that my exhaustion in this photo is real, since I set everything up for the photo and then realized that my remote battery was dead and I hadn't moved the spares from the old house yet.  So, I was literally pressing the timer on my camera and hurling myself over all that junk to get to the chair before the shutter went off.

As always, thanks for stopping by!

Did you miss some of my past self-portraits?  Clicking here will take you to all of my self-portrait blog posts. Clicking here will take you to my self-portrait Facebook album.

Michele Whitacre is a portrait photographer serving Phoenix, Arizona and the surrounding area. Visit Michele's website at michelewhitacrephotography.com. Become a fan of Michele's work on Facebook. Follow Michele's updates on Twitter.

Jessi's Family Sneak Peek

Yep, Jessi's back!  She's starting to feel like an old friend isn't she?  First you got to see her solo session, and then you got to meet her brother.  Now she's back for another fun-filled family session with her cousins.

As soon as Jessi learned that her family would be visiting her in Phoenix this summer, she contacted me to schedule this session.  After months of planning, we finally settled on an early morning session the morning after her family arrived into town.  The session location was a last minute change to a gorgeous park not too far away from Jessi's apartment.  I have to admit that I fell in love with this location the moment I saw it, and I'm very happy we ended up making the switch!

Our goal for the session was to capture some fun family photos of the six of them without passing out in the insane Phoenix summer heat.  So, I did everything I could to prepare for the session and plan out the shots ahead of time, and enlisted Kevin to help me stay on track.  By the end of the session we were definitely all hot, sweaty, exhausted, and starving, but the kids were total troopers and managed to hang in there long enough to get some really great photos.

So, I once again give to you the fabulous Jessi.  And I am pleased to introduce you to Darren, Libby, Bailey, Kate, and Braxton!

I thought it would be fun to get a photo with some of the Phoenix buildings in the background, so we started out our session with this one.  I really love it in black and white (but that's nothing new!)...

I had already planned on taking some group shots in front of this door, but once everyone arrived and I saw their outfits I knew this was going to be a perfect location!  I just love the contrast of the black shirts against the white door.  I adore how Libby and Kate are holding hands and how Braxton is leaning into Bailey. Too sweet!...

Here is another fav in black and white! I have to admit that Braxton was a tough customer, and just might win the award for the toughest kid to get a real smile out of ever! Luckily, cousin Jessi was there to get Braxton laughing for this set of photos. I asked Jessi to stand right behind me and talk to Braxton to get him to smile, and she did a great job! Thank you, Jessi!...

Jess with all the kids...

How about a gorgeous photo of each of the kids by themselves?

Braxton, once again with the help of Jessi in the background...

Kate, who was nothing but smiles the entire session!  I didn't mention it to her during the session but Kate is my all time favorite name EVER.  If I could have named myself I would have picked Kate, so it was so much fun getting to meet someone with my fav name...

And the gorgeous, Bailey!  From the first moment I meet Bailey, I kept calling her Ashley. I felt bad for constantly confusing her name, and kept apologizing to her over and over. She final told me not to worry about it and she would just answer to Ashley for the day. Isn't that just the sweetest thing ever! ...

It just wouldn't be a Jessi session without a little bit of fun and craziness! I can not describe how much I love this one!...

Jessi, thank you so much for allowing me to capture these photos for you, and for single handedly keeping me in business this past month.  :)  Everyone else, thank you for spending a few hours of your vacation with me and allowing me to take your photos. And a huge thanks for getting up at the crack of dawn and hanging in there with the Phoenix heat during our session. I hope you enjoyed your visit and your time with Jessi.

Michele Whitacre is a portrait photographer serving Phoenix, Arizona and the surrounding area. Visit Michele's website at michelewhitacrephotography.com. Become a fan of Michele's work on Facebook. Follow Michele's updates on Twitter.

Self-Portrait | July 2012

Kevin and I got engaged three years ago this month (July 23, 2009 to be exact), so for July's self-portrait I decided to look back and remember this special time in our lives.  Our engagement wasn't exactly typical in that we decided we wanted to get married, picked a wedding date, booked our wedding cruise (yep, we got married on a cruise ship), purchased my ring, scheduled engagement photos, planned an engagement party, and then officially got engaged. Because seriously, who wants to be normal anyway?

Obviously, I wasn't too shocked when Kevin proposed to me. He opted to pop the question at a Cheap Trick, Poison, Def Leppard Concert, which also came as no surprise since Kevin is one of the hugest music fans on the planet!  So for July's self-portrait I decided to take a photo of my hands, showing my ring, with the tickets from the concert and the photo on my iPhone that we took immediately after making our engagement official in the background.

I also decided on this for my self-portrait this month because I have always been drawn to photographs of hands.  There is just something so personal and intimate about hand photos, and I wanted to create an image of my own hands for myself and my loved ones to look back at years from now when my hands no longer look like this.

I really want to start capturing images like this for my clients, as well.  I often think about it before, yet I never seem to remember during the session, and then I kick myself for it afterward.  It about killed me when I realized that I did this when I photographed my parents back in April.  Before their session, I told myself over and over to take some photos of their hands, and then I completely forgot while I was shooting.  I guess it's just an excuse for another session with them in the near future. 

I also have to say thanks to my wonderful hubby for actually taking this photo. This would have been a very tough one for me to set up using the tripod and the remote, so Kevin was kind enough to help me out. So, thanks honey! :)

Did you miss some of my past self-portraits?  Clicking here will take you to all of my self-portrait blog posts. Clicking here will take you to my self-portrait Facebook album.

Michele Whitacre is a portrait photographer serving Phoenix, Arizona and the surrounding area. Visit Michele's website at michelewhitacrephotography.com. Become a fan of Michele's work on Facebook. Follow Michele's updates on Twitter.

Puppy Love

Kevin and I are gearing up to move soon, so I know that my opportunities to photograph Zoe & Lexi in our huge backyard are getting numbered. Last night I took them out and snapped a handful of quick portraits of them since I had a few free moments and the light was perfect.  It's been a while since I posted any photos of them on the blog, so I thought I'd share a few.

I love this first one! I was focusing on Zoe's tongue because she was panting up a storm and I managed to catch her just as she licked. It cracks me up how her tongue curls up like that!...

This little session was just the opposite of last time, with Lexi being the angel who sat patiently posing, while I took as many photos as I wanted, and Zoe being a little turd and not wanting to sit still for more than a few seconds at a time.

One of the very few photos I captured of Zoe....

And another of sweet Little Lexi Lou. When I see photos of her, she always look so sweet and calm, but anyone who has ever met her could tell you that's not really the case! She is sweet, but she's a tad on the crazy side!...

Thanks for stopping by, and allowing me to show off my sweet fur babies!

Michele Whitacre is a portrait photographer serving Phoenix, Arizona and the surrounding area. Visit Michele's website at michelewhitacrephotography.com. Become a fan of Michele's work on Facebook. Follow Michele's updates on Twitter.