Foto Friday- My first photo gig

So most of you know by now that I dabble in photography. I have mentioned on more than one occasion that I am NO professional, but I have DNA connections to the art form as my father was once a professional photographer, so the apple hasn't fallen too far from the tree. I have come to love it in my own way, and have a different eye for what I like to see in pictures.

Well, my dearest friend Angie, for whom I have been taking pictures of her little girl for years now, apparently trusted me enough a few months back to offer me a small job to take pictures of her niece for her Quinceañera. Of course I was flattered than she even asked, but it soon turned to shear panic of possibly disapointing her, but she reassured me that they were on a tight budget for this so any pictures I could possibly take would be truly appreciated. Otherwise there would be no pictures. Great! Ok, no pressure, right?!

Wrong!! As time got closer, I'd get sick to my stomach, and honestly thought about chickening out to avoid the possible disaster of ruining some little girls memories. BUT, I knew this was a great chance to get some practice and challenge myself to do something I never thought I'd do. So the Quinceañera was this past Saturday and it turns out that I think I actually did ok, and I'm glad I did it.

Here is where I will take the opportunity to thank another dear friend of mine, Jennifer Counter, who I owe the success of this photo shoot to.  She is a photo wiz and I love her photography , and she was nice enough to let me borrow a 50mm lens and her flash. But more importantly she was gracious enough to look at some of my practice pictures and give me some very practical tips and skills that I could understand. It made ALL the difference in my picture taking and my confidence going in. So Jen, once again...THANK YOU!!

Her tips helped me actually shoot the whole event in Manual mode which that alone was a huge success for me.  Shooting in manual takes practice (and I need more of it for sure) but I found it easier to maneuver lighting situations in this mode.

Instead of posting a long set of  pictures I have this short slide show with a sample of the shots I took throughout the event. My style tends to be abstract and I like catching casual shots of people just having fun. You'll also be able to tell that some of my favorites pictures tends to be shoes. Go figure! ;)



So in 5.5 hours I took well over 1000 pictures and ended up after editing and deleting the ones not worth keeping, there are 775 pictures total! I didn't expect to take this many, but its hard to know when to stop when you're there.

Ultimately I'm happy with what I turned out! They're not perfect but I got some great practice. I'm glad I did it and so was my friend Angie who loved the pictures. It was fun, but definitely a lot of pressure in making sure that I got the shots they wanted and would like. The one thing I have to say is that with digital photography today it is soo much easier to delete and re-shoot as you go along, so I'd like to give props to my dad and those photographers from years past when digital was not being used for professional photography. They were basically shooting blind and trusting in their mad skills that the pictures they shot would actually come out as they expected. Editing was not as easy as it is now either...so cudos to them!!

I hope you enjoy the pictures, and Dad I hope I made you proud!

Happy Foto Friday everybody!!

From my corner to yours...