Whether you’ve come straight here or you’re working your way around the Life Unscripted Blog Circle, thank you so much for stopping by.
I am beyond thrilled to have recently joined the Life {Unscripted} team. Seriously! LU was the first photographic community that I found on Facebook, or any other place for that matter. The support that the team showed me from that initial contact 2 years ago, as well as the amazing array of talent that they showcase each month, shapes the photographer that I aspire to be now. It really is an honour to have been welcomed into the team. I feel like I have circled back around to where I began.
The past few months have been a bit of a blur. With germ infestations on a seemingly weekly basis for the smaller people in our family and my own camera fatigue, I have barely picked up my camera, so for this post I want to focus on getting back to normal. A “normal” day: not trying to do fancy things in-camera, not stressing about capturing every part of every day in magic light. Just a normal, balanced and relaxing day – a dog walk that is more about the children running than the dog walking (hence why you will barely see her here) and some boy time in the garden on our new-to-us hammock. This may be just “normal” but for me it was a breath of fresh air. Enjoy!
Next up is our wonderful LU Mama, Crystal Raynard of Crystal Raynard Photography. Please click HERE to keep following the circle.
I will admit, this month’s colour had me completely stumped. Unless I really go hunting there is nothing grey here, just the desert. So if it is not here right in front of my eyes, what is it fundamentally? Grey is black and white. I almost said “merely black and white”. But in photography black and white is everything. It is the crux and backbone of it all so I should not say “merely” at all.
With that in mind, I would not be me if I did not take that as an opportunity to try something new. You see, these two boys in this desert location, I would never see a black and white image. I am just not that photographer. Some photographers, some very wonderful talented photographers, see their images in black and white before they have even taken them. To me that happens but only occasionally. These boys to me are life. They are bounds of energy. They are love. They are colour. Similarly, so is the desert. I moved here expecting a barren wasteland but I was so wrong. There is a full spectrum of colour (just maybe not grey) and so much life, I struggle to see it in monotone.
And so I took a walk from last month and made it {grey}. (And I did the conversion in a way I had not tried before, because, hello my name is Ceri and I can’t help but experiment). In the process I had a lightbulb moment. I see texture. I see connection. I see I need to make more effort to love the black and whites in my life.
This blog is part of the Artists Inspired Blog Circle series. Click here to continue the circle and see how talented photographer, Brandi Geoghagan, interpreted this month’s theme. Be sure to follow the links all the way round to complete the full circle.
The Artists Inspired Blog Circle is made up of an exceptionally talented group of photographers from all walks of life, from all over the world. They are wives, mothers, friends, daughters and visual storytellers who draw from their own experiences to create art that is inspiring, unique, beautiful and thought-provoking.
Spring in Scottsdale is a wonderful time to be a photographer and a perfect time for daily photo challenge. Yesterday I published a gallery of my favourite nature images from my Spring Freelensed Project (Part I), but Spring isn’t just about nature; it’s about making the most of the great weather (and conversely, getting out the heat as the summer approaches). So today I bring you my favourite people (and dog) images from the project:
If you’d like to see more images from this project, you can see them on my facebook page…here. If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to leave them below.
Spring in Scottsdale, AZ is a wonderful time to be a photographer. The blooms, the blossom, the outdoor lifestyle, the light. Oh, the light! The perfect time for another freelensed project! A freelensed picture every single day, from the first day of spring to the last.
“Ok but hold up, Ceri! What is freelensing?” I hear you cry. Simples. It is a technique that can be done with any camera that has interchangeable lenses. Detach the lens, hold it close to the camera body and manually focus by tilting and adjusting the position of the lens. Using this technique, you can create really interesting slices of focus, extremely shallow depth of field and amazing sun flares. It takes some practice, believe me it did not come easily to me, but with perseverance your results can be magical!
As I sit here in the sweltering heat of the summer, avoiding the outdoors at all costs, I am finally finally finding time to share a few of my favourites. First up, a blog post dedicated the best of the natural world. Enjoy!
If you’d like to see all of the images from my Spring Freelensed Project, click here. If you have any questions or you’d like to share what you like (or don’t), please feel free to leave a comment.
2016 is going to be my year. My year for growth. My year for exploration. For learning. For building up my confidence. And for working out photographically, who I want to be and where I want to go. So what better way to round out January than to reflect on where my love for photography comes from and who has influenced this journey of mine. My inspiration.
Let’s start in the present day and work backwards.
My gateway to the online photographic community came through the Life {Unscripted} Facebook page almost exactly a year ago. I started 2015 convinced I was going in a certain direction but finding that page, and then many others after that, my eyes were opened to other possibilities. And I quickly realised how much I still have to learn! I love supporting other photographers, and watching their journey; it pushes me to try harder and be better. There are many many individuals I could list here, but my favourites, each inspiring me in different ways – their images, their words of encouragement, the size of their hearts – are Natalie ~ Act Naturally Photography, Crystal ~ Crystal Raynard Photography, Jen ~ Jen Dzen Photography, and Holly ~ Holly Nicole Photography. They are each their own light.
Helping Hands
Rewind 15 years. When my boyfriend (now husband) and I travelled the world after graduation, we spent some time in the Everglades, Florida. We’d spent a few days kayaking through the mangroves (a whole other tale) before we visited Clyde Butcher‘s gallery. His black and white landscapes are vast and so full of texture; they capture the magical essence of the environment and more. The experience, his work, was eye-openingly wonderful. As we left the gallery I realised I was standing in the middle of a piece of art; the landscape was an artists canvas set out all around me. I opened my eyes to our surroundings and spent our remaining time in the Everglades looking for new perspectives, new angles, trying to recreate what I’d seen in the gallery with my simple point-and-shoot. Although I’d owned a point-and-shot camera for many years and used it constantly, and always been artistic in other ways, the visit to Clyde Butcher’s gallery was a defining moment. Creating this photographic art for myself had become a distinct possibility. When my point-and-shoot broke a few weeks later I replaced it with a 35mm SLR (…but it wasn’t until after I went digital that I got off Auto in 2014)!
Black & White Landscapes
There is however no doubt how my light for photography was lit. By my dad. This is him!
He documented our family holidays religiously (and by family holidays I do not mean just standard family holidays: there were epic pilgrimages to far flung European destinations, fully-laden campervan expeditions, for weeks on end) and we re-visited them every slideshow night. On one of these family holidays, somewhere in the Alps I think, I climbed a tree at a campsite and got stuck. As I cried and screamed perched in the branches of this tree, my dad stood watching, documenting the event for eternity (after which point he finally came to my rescue). I realise now, I would have done exactly the same with my own children: I even did it last week at my son’s birthday celebration as he ran away when his friends sang ‘happy birthday’, and I photographed the moment before I went to comfort him.
Birthday Party Distress (this also demonstrates the power of the Montessori School method: his older classmates were first on the scene to comfort him and successfully helped encourage him back to the party… I love our school!)
Documenting. Capturing memories. Un-posed, lifestyle photography. That was just what he did, there was no name for it, it was just part and parcel of everyday life. It’s only in thinking about this blog post that I had a moment of revelation: it all comes from my dad, the spark of interest, the subjects, the style (…not to mention a few lenses, lens cleaning kit, tripod etc etc). I am so very grateful for all that and so much more.
Abstract Landscapes
Thanks for stopping by! If you’re following the Inspiration blog circle, up next is Jenny of Snaps & Sprouts Photography.
