Senior Portraits with Samantha--the Softball Version!

Remember Samantha from my last post?  Well, before we ventured out to the beach for her senior portraits, we did some softball photos as well.  As it turns out, Samantha is a talented softball player!

I was able to go to one of the Samantha's games and get some shots of her in action!  She was the pitcher for the majority of the game.  Honestly, I don't know much about sports, but I think she did awesome!  Way better than I could ever dream to, anyway ;)

I love to photograph sporting events.  It is a great challenge because you have to keep up with all the action.  This was my first time photographing a softball game--it was awesome!  Because Samantha was the pitcher most of the time, I always knew where she would be standing and when the action would be happening.  That meant I got to try getting many different angles of her during the game.

Okay different day than the game.  We actually got up early on a Sunday morning to get these shots.  It was important to Samantha that we do her posed softball shots on her home field.  We had to get there before the sun was up too high, otherwise the lighting would not have worked.

Even though it was early, Samantha did great!  Just as smiley and giggly as she was during her portrait session on the beach :)

Samantha's mother and I both found a photo similar to this one online, and we wanted to re-create it for Samantha.  Can't have softball without a chain link fence, so you might as well include it in a few photos, right?  And yes, I love the B&W!

In just a few weeks, Samantha will be officially graduating high school.  I'm sure she is ready, and I know she will go on to be an amazing young woman.

Congratulations, Samantha!

Cheers :)

Senior Portraits with Samantha!

A couple weeks ago, I had a new experience as a photographer--senior portraits!  I had never done this before (most of what I have done involves more than one person in the photos), but I was definitely excited :)

My senior was Samantha--a beautiful young woman who is ready to move forward on to the next stage of her life. 

Samantha had a specific vision for her portraits--she wanted to be on the water.  As it turns out, she and her mother found an absolutely gorgeous spot that was everything Samantha was looking for--North Beach in Calvert County.  I had never been there before, but I fell in love with the place as soon as I arrived. 

Of course, the beauty of the location was nothing compared to that of Samantha :)

See what I mean?  Beautiful!

These two shots were actually incredibly difficult to capture.  Samantha's back was to the setting sun, so I was looking directly into it--it was so bright!  I could barely see through the viewfinder and had to pretty much guess on the composition and settings--it worked!

Samantha smiled so easily throughout our session.  I think this smile was right after I told her my one-and-only corny joke of the session.  Well, actually, I think it was right after she rolled her eyes at my corny joke.

 No only did Samantha smile easily--she laughed and giggled, which provided me with so many wonderful shots to choose from.

Samantha was even bold and daring enough to wade into the water for a couple of shots.  She did great!  No worries--the dress was not ruined.  And we saved this for the last of the shots we took in the dress before she changed :)

In addition to all of her smiles and laughter, I was able to capture the more serious side of her as well.  This shot turned out to be one my favorites.  Her gaze into the camera is so piercing, you just can't look away.

Keep an eye out for my next post--I also did some softball photos of Samantha, including some of her in action during a game that will be featured :)

Cheers :)

Throwback Tuesday: My Time in NOLA

Ok, I know that it is supposed to be "Throwback Thursday," but I have the post ready now, and I didn't want to wait until Thursday to share it.

A little over a year ago, I decided to give myself a birthday present in the form of a spring break trip.  I'm sure you have heard of a company called National Geographic....but did you know that they host Photo Expeditions where you can take a trip to a location and work with National Geographic photographers?  Yeah, that's what I did.  Awesome!

I chose to take part in the workshop in New Orleans, LA.  I had never been to NOLA before, and I was excited to travel somewhere new and to take my camera with me to capture every moment.  It was only a weekend (Thursday night to Sunday morning), but still an amazing experience.

We started on Friday morning with our first assignment: Jackson Square.  We arrived at the square before the sun had even risen and spent a good 3 hours photographing anything we thought was interesting.  Believe me, there was plenty for us to photograph!

St. Louis Cathedral.  I also got plenty of shots of the cathedral head on, but I caught this one through the bars of the fence around the park in the center of the square.  It was considered one of my "top shots of the weekend" by our instructor, Tyrone Turner.

I spent a lot of time trying to get this shot to be perfectly centered.  As I have said before in this blog, I love symmetry in photos, and architecture is one of the places you can find lots of it.  If you look closely, this isn't perfect, but it is still one of my favorites.

Something that you will see a lot of in the French Quarter of NOLA is wrought iron.  This stuff is everywhere......windows, balconies, doors, fences.  I just fell in love with it, and I really wanted to capture its beauty in a photograph.  As it turns out, it was harder than I thought.  Thanks to Tyrone's advice, I was able to capture what I was imagining.

Another wrought iron that I converted to black and white.  I think the B&W works really well for this shot because the pattern of the wrought iron in the foreground is echoed in the shadow behind it.

Another thing you will see in the French Quarter: colors!  Houses and buildings are not neutral colors, but vibrant ones like this door.  Too bad it was padlocked...I bet there was some cool stuff inside.

This shot was from our Friday night assignment: photographing the night life on Bourbon and Royal Streets.  During this time, I decided to go to a burlesque show--why not??  This was the featured dancer of the show, Bella Blue.  It was rather difficult to get decent photographs in the club because it was so dark, and I could not use a flash.  I was lucky to get this shot of her looking directly at me.  She was a powerful dancer.

Another photo from our Friday evening assignment.  We found this backstreet that featured an artist market.  These lights were draped over the entire marketplace.  I had to precariously stand on a chair in order to get this shot, but I had to get it.

This was taken on Saturday afternoon.  A few of us decided to take a ferry ride on the river before dinner--which is where I got this shot.  I love the rim lighting around him, which came from the reflection of the water.

If you ever have the desire to travel, I highly recommend going on a Photo Expedition with National Geographic.  It's pricey, but sooooo worth it!

Cheers :)