Michele Whitacre Photography

Thursday, January 24, 2013

Self-Portrait | Januaray 2013

January has been a whirlwind of preparing for visitors combined with scheduling portrait sessions, taking personal photos for upcoming blog posts, and photographing our adventures while my brother-in-law and his girlfriend were in town. Since so much of my month has been spent behind my camera, I knew I wanted to include it in this month's self-portrait. I also wanted to do something to remind me of the fun time we had showing our family around our new home city. It wasn't until we were viewing the gorgeous sunset that I decided on this spontaneous, spur of the moment location for this month's self-portrait.

This photo was taken at Hunt's Tomb in Papago Park, which we visited after spending our day at the Phoenix Zoo, and checking out the hole in the rock at the park. When it comes to playing tourist, I'm all about comfort! So, here I am sporting pigtails, a hat, and my comfy walking shoes while holding my camera for January's self-portrait...

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.
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© 2013 Michele Whitacre Photography LLC

Thursday, January 17, 2013

Photo Project | Christmas Light Bokeh

Over the past few years I have complied quite a list of photography tips, tricks, and techniques that I am interested in trying out some day. However, no matter how well intentioned I may be when I add the items to my list, once there they take up permanent residence and never leave. It's high time I evict some of them, and in order to help propel me in that direction I have decided to add a new monthly feature to the blog.

Every month I will be experimenting with one of these ideas and sharing the results. Some of the ideas are new tips and tricks that I have read about and want to learn how to do. Other things are subjects that I have seen photographed and want to try my hand at photographing for myself. Some are simply challenges that I want to give myself to help me think outside the box. No matter what the subject for the month, the photos will show up on the blog in the form of a photo project post.

For my first personal photo project, I decided to tackle something that has been on my idea list forever! As you probably know, I am a sucker for soft dreamy bokeh in photographs so it makes perfect sense that I would want to try my hand at creating some using Christmas lights. So, before I took the tree down this year, I did a little experimenting with my camera.

The first thing I did was put my camera on my tripod and take photos of the tree using different apertures and corresponding shutter speeds. I wanted to compare the size and the shape of the bokeh balls using larger and smaller apertures. I did take all of the photos for this project using the same lens, but it would have been interesting to compare the exact same settings of different lenses to see how the bokeh balls changed. For each of these images, the aperture, shutter speed and ISO is listed before the photo.

(Note to self: clean your lens before doing anything like this again in the future! Every smudge is easily visible in these photos and it looks like you let the dogs lick your lens before your took these.)

f/1.6 1/125 ISO 400

f/2.0 1/80 ISO 400

f/2.5 1/50 ISO 400

f/3.2 1/30 ISO 400

I then decided to play around with placing some of my other holiday decorations at different distances from the tree so see how the bokeh balls changed as I moved my subject closer and farther away from the tree lights in the background. In general the closer I am to the tree, the smaller the bokeh balls and the farther away from it I am the larger they are.

This first photo cracks me up because it looks like it is just a floating snowman head. It is actually attached to a little post, but the scarf is covering it up so it looks like it has no base on it...

My brain was apparently stuck in portrait orientation. Sorry for the monotony of the rest of the images! Hopefully the pretty colors make up for it!

I have a thing for singing christmas stuffed animals. The cornier the better! My mom bought me this one for Christmas a handful of years ago, and I decided to take his portrait this year...

If you haven't figured it out by now, I love snowmen holiday decorations! About 90% of my ornaments and other decorations are snowmen. Poor santa and his reindeer get left out in the cold at my house!

Can you believe that I don't own any white lights? I didn't realize it until after I had already done all of my holiday decoration shopping or I would a bought a strand or two! I had a few other ideas up my sleeve that I wanted to try with some white lights, but I guess they will have to wait until next year. Until then, I hope you enjoyed my first photo project and will join me back next month.

Sunday, January 13, 2013

The Little Trooper

The weather in Phoenix has gotten a little chilly recently and I don't think our rose bushes are loving the colder temps! Last week I noticed that there was only one flower left, and he was hanging on for dear life. I decided to grab my camera and honor the little trooper with a few photos. I ended up with these 4 images that I thought did him justice.

What I liked so much about this flower was how the color changed from a pink in the very center to a darker, almost red at bottom and I was attempting to capture this in the first two images...

I liked how the veins (is that the proper term for a flower?) stood out in black and white...

Something about the curving folds of the petals grabbed me in this one...

Tuesday, January 8, 2013

Up Close and Personal

When I take photos of Zoe and Lexi I always use one of my zoom lenses. Admittedly, they are used to being photographed and do a good job of posing most of the time. However, they do have the tendency to creep their way toward me while I'm shooting, as they get more and more anxious for the treats that they know are coming. If I have a zoom lens on my camera, I can quickly and easily change my focal distance as they inch their way in, and keep right on shooting.

I'd never tried photographing them with a prime lens because it just sounded like too much work. I knew that as they kept moving closer to me I was going to have to keep repositioning myself over and over again. But it is impossible to beat the image quality of my 50 mm. It takes such pretty pictures that a few days ago I decided to give it a try with them and see what I managed to capture. (For the non-photographers reading, this lens focuses at a single set distance so instead of zooming in and out with the lens I have do it with my body by moving closer or farther away from my subject. Not an easy feat when I am sitting or laying down to take all of the photos.)

It took a lot longer than it usually does, but I did end up getting a few good portraits. I also ended up capturing a lot of interesting close-up images of each of them. As they moved in closer to me, I just kept shooting until they got too close to focus on any longer. Because the clarity of this lens is so freaking amazing, I ended up digging some of these images and decided to toss them on the ol' blog for something a little different.

Zoe and Lexi: Up close and personal...

As always, thanks for stopping by and I hope you enjoyed the photos!

Sunday, January 6, 2013

Photography Goals | 2013

But first....

I'd like to take a brief glance at my 2012 goals and review how I did.

Last year I declared 3 photography goals:

1. Dedicate more time to photography

Perhaps I should have been more specific in declaring this goal, but what I meant was dedicate more time to getting my photography business up and running after our relocation and to start accepting clients again. I did reopening my shooting schedule in early April 2012 and continued to do sessions throughout the year, so I'm declaring this goal a success!

2. Get outside of my comfort zone, and start exploring more areas of photography

Again, I wasn't super specific, but my intent with this goal was to gain experience with other types of photography: nature, landscape, food, architecture, abstract, etc. With the exception of a couple of coward's attempts at street photography, I must admit that I really didn't make much progress on this goal in 2012. But no worries. It reappears slightly altered in my 2013 goals.

3. Create more emotional and symbolic personal photographs

When I added this goal to my list, my intent was to try to create personal photographs that moved people. I wanted to create images that provoked an emotional response for my viewers. I got down to business with my self-portrait for January 2012. And I provoked an emotional response, all right. I posted this image and ended up getting phone calls and emails from friends and family more or less asking me if I was suicidal. After repeatedly reassuring everyone I know that the image was staged and meant to be dramatic. (Notice that only ONE eye has tears coming out of it.) That I wasn't really crying (even though the feeling behind the image was real, it was a horrible time in my life, and I had been doing more than my fair share of crying off camera). And that I wasn't planning on doing any bodily harm to myself. I decided that perhaps this goal should be set aside for the greater good of everyone who knows and loves me.

OK. Moving on to this year's goals. Last year I didn't get around to declaring my goals until February, so I'm already ahead for 2013. Look at me go.

2013 Photography Goals

1. Blog more

I know some people who keep a business blog view it as a bit of a chore, but I actually enjoy blogging. I like writing and I loving sharing my photos, so my thinking is why not spend more time doing something that I actually like to do? Especially if it can potentially help grow my business! Blogging more will also have the natural added benefit of keeping me behind the camera more regularly since a photography blog pretty much demands to be filled with new photos.

2. Do more good

I've been thinking a lot recently about finding a way "do good" using my photography. I'd like to volunteer my services to an organization that I feel would benefit from it. I'm still not exactly sure what I want to do but I'm leaning towards finding an animal shelter that needs photos of the animals up for adoption or perhaps a service that offers free family portraits to families with sick children. If you're reading and know of a worthy organization to fit either category, I'd love to hear about them!

3. Feel the fear

Growth does not come from sticking with the status quo. In order to expand my abilities and my creativity, I'm going to have to force myself to get uncomfortable. I'm going to have to feel the fear that comes with the uncertain and the unfamiliar. Only then will I begin to experience true growth. What this means for my photography is that in 2013, I am going to stand on the ledge, look into the deep abyss of everything I don't yet know or understand, feel the fear of all that unknown, and then jump in with both feet, trusting in my ability to succeed.

4. Get some guts

I've been talking about wanting to try my hand at street photography, but I just haven't been able to get up the guts and do it. That is going to change in 2013!

And there you have it. My goals for 2013. It is going to be my year to soar!

Saturday, January 5, 2013

Saturday Morning Cuteness

I caught Lexi and Zoe cuddled up together on a pile of blankets on the couch this morning. I think they've grown accustom to the warm Arizona temps and they don't know what to do with the morning chill that has settled in the past few weeks.

Friday, January 4, 2013

The Best of 2012 | Portraits + Furry Friends

As 2013 makes its grand entrance, I find it impossible not to look back and reflect on the year I am leaving behind. This is a common theme in my world every new year so if you were here for The Best of 2011 a lot of what I am about to say will probably sound somewhat familiar.

I'd be willing to bet that if I asked those people who know me best to come up with some words to describe me, hard working, over achieving, critical and perfectionist would probably rank somewhere in the top 10. While those qualities have served me well and gotten me through many challenges, they also tend to be a bit of a curse.

In so many areas of my life I am my own worst critic and I find faults where none really exist. Instead of celebrating the many successes, I dwell on the few failures. Instead of recognizing the massive accomplishments, I fret over all that is still left undone. Instead of feeling proud of all that I now know, I feel shame over everything that is still left to learn. No where is this more apparent than in my pursuit of my photography business dream.

As DSLR cameras become more affordable and information about how to use them becomes more readily available, more and more professional photographers are hanging out their shingle every single day. It can be a tough market to compete in, and sometimes it can be so tempting to compare my work to that of others and feel that mine falls short. It can be difficult to watch other's businesses appear to take off virtually over night, while I'm left dreaming of the day that mine will do the same. And some days it is impossible not to wonder if I should just give up the dream and call it quits.

I think it is important to stop and remind myself that no matter where I am on my path, there will always be people who are better off than I am and people who are worse off than I am. The important thing to concentrate on is my own growth, and the best way for me to do that is to look back at all that I have accomplished this past year and realize just how far I have traveled.

I set out at the beginning of 2012 to try to realize that I am enough and I deserve to be successful in my photography venture, and in life. I actually wasn't sure if I would ever manage to accomplish this goal, but I can honestly say that I have finally reached the point where I do feel like I am enough. I am talented enough. I am creative enough. And my photos are good enough. It's been a long, hard, uphill hike to get to this point in my photography journey, but I finally made it. Whew!

I've recently begun to realize that the real joy in life must come from the journey, not the destination. Because let's face it, there is no final destination. Life isn't a race with someone standing at the end of it to let me know where the finish line is located. No matter where I am along the path there is always something greater to aspire towards. If I can't celebrate the success along every step of the way, happiness will forever be out of my grasp.

The goal for 2013 is to concentrate on finding the joy in the journey. I need to learn how to be content with the fact that my facebook page has 500 likes instead of depressed by the fact that it doesn't have 600. I need to be happy when I get 1 comment on a blog post instead of upset that I didn't get 10. I need to be thrilled at the opportunity that I am given when a single client chooses me to capture their special memories instead of upset that several more aren't waiting in the wings. Because let's be honest, spending my life doing nothing but reaching for that next number is a recipe for a never ending cycle of disappointment.

To start the year off headed firmly in the right direction, please join me as I find the joy in some of my favorite portraits of 2012, in no particular order. I'd like to send a HUGE thank you to all of these wonderful and amazing individuals, who allowed me to capture these images and to share a special moment with them and their families.

I didn't take as many pet photos in 2012 as I did in 2011 so I didn't think my furry friends needed their own post this year. Below are a few of my favorite pet portraits from 2012, in random order...

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