Elizabeth

Elizabeth and I met last fall when she came IU to start her masters. She and I study with the same teacher. I was immediately struck by her spunky personality. She is hilarious, fun, and nice! And it turns out we both have an appreciation for photography and blogging. I was so excited when she asked me to take her headshots, but I'm not going to lie, there is more pressure when you photograph photographers! 

Elizabeth also has a wonderful, sweet Colombian fiance, Carlos, who Ayron and I got to meet when they had us over for an amazing Colombian supper recently. They are wonderful together. :) I can't wait to go to (and hopefully photograph...no pressure Elizabeth..ha!!!) their wedding this summer. I know it will be beautiful, just like them.

And now, the headshots. Ok. I kind of can't get over Elizabeth. She looks like a woman out of a pre-Raphelite painting. Especially an Edmund Blair Leighton one. This has hands down got to be one of my favorite headshots ever. Elizabeth, you are so so so beautiful!

I love your sassy expression here!

Why are you so pretty!!!??!

This is so you. Your smile is infectious, and real!

I love the fierceness of this. You are so gorgeous! :)

 

:) Thanks for trusting me to take your headshots, Elizabeth. I think it would be hard to take a bad photo of you. :) I look forward to lots of fun times to come! LOVE!

Clayton

I don't get to meet a lot of my clients until right before we shoot. When I met Clayton, I could immediately tell he was a character. Clayton is a theater performer, and he brought me lots of different attitudes during our shoot. He was so much fun to work with. He's hoping to continue on to get a degree in theater, and he needed headshots for the application.

Clayton, your eyes are awesome in this shot!

I love the mischievous eyebrows in this! Such a fun look!

Clayton, thanks for giving me the opportunity to work with you. I had a blast! I wish you the best with everything! :)

struck by blessedness

I frequently have these moments where I am struck with the realization of how blessed I am. It will be a moment where I'm sitting next to my husband on the couch and he reaches over and grips my leg for no reason as if to tell me he loves me, or a moment where I am having a blast photographing a client, or, even better, that moment where I am viewing the photographs from a session and knowing I really captured that person or relationship. It could also be a moment where I am playing with my niece and nephew and and they are fighting over who gets to play with me (that will not last forever) or I'm lucky enough to spend the evening with my wonderful brother, Devin, and his awesome wife, Liz, or I'm sitting on the couch wedged between my parents, just soaking up their love. I think I absorb love in a similar way to the process of osmosis. That would explain why I've been overflowing with it my whole life.

Last Saturday was a day full of moments where I was struck by my blessedness. I spent much of the day with one of my bestest best friends, Laura. We hiked (a valuable lesson in how out of shape I am) and went for a long drive through some country roads in Bloomington (maybe one of my favorite parts of the day), got coffee at Starbucks and sat at a wide table in the afternoon sun and talked (also with my wonderful husband) and topped off the night with Ron Burgundy and cupcakes. That was a day where I wished time would just slow down so I could relish in the slowness of it all. I wanted to relish the stretch of the week that lay before me, unbound by the structure of schedules and obligations. 

This week has been amazing. I still have the weekend, but I am already starting to feel the faint tugs of sadness at the week's passing. It has been the first week since I got married where I didn't feel the constraint of deadlines, sickness, and stress. It has given me time to look inward and to pursue some of my other interests. My only regret is that my hometown is so far away. I am missing my family sorely, as this is the very first spring break where I haven't gone home. I can't help but feel that I've been missing out on some moments with my family, including my sweet, ever-changing niece and nephew. 

I got the chance to test-drive a couple of new lenses and take some fun photos while Laura and I were hiking and driving on Satuday. I realized recently I don't take as many photographs "for fun" as I used to. It is funny how that happens when a passion becomes a career. 

This photograph is an old barn that is resting out in the middle of a field. I wanted to get closer to it, but I figured I was already on someone's property taking random pictures, and some dog was barking somewhere and disturbing the pristine peace.

I just love old houses. This one was no exception.

Leaves are one of my greatest obsessions. I have leaf dishes, leaf jewelry, you name it. It is only fitting that I take lots of photographs of leaves in all of their states.

I don't know what it is about this photo, but I really love it. I like that you can start to see the green peeking through the leaves, as the cycle of life keeps its promise and the earth is again being reborn.

Happy St Patrick's Day! :) 

Gina

Meet Gina. She's a gorgeous musical theater student at Indiana University. I had the pleasure of meeting her  this past fall when she, of course, was in need of some new headshots. 

Gina is so sweet and super beautiful. I remember getting to see her perform in IU's production of West Side Story as Anita last spring - she was fabulous of course! It has been so awesome to get to meet several awesome musical theater students since I've opened my business. Gina, thanks for being one of the first! You're beautiful! 

I love your eyes. You are so gorgeous.

Hel-lo awesome dimples!

 

Gina, thanks for being so wonderful. I had such a blast working with you and I wish you all the best in your future!

something great

 I stood quietly in front of the sculpture, my eyes trying to take in every detail of the craftsmanship, wishing my Italian was fluent so I could carry away the words on his tomb as tangible reminders of the truth of what it is to be great. It was September 7, 2004, and I was nineteen years old, attempting to find myself in churches, cloisters, art museums, restaurants, and new experiences in Florence, Italy. I was visiting the cathedral of Santa Croce for the first time. In Santa Croce, I laid eyes on the resting places of Machiavelli, Michelangelo, Rossini, and Galileo, just to name a few. That day, I felt overcome by the realization of the greatness of all of the lives of these men; of their influence on art and music and shaping worldviews of men and women. And deep inside of myself, I wished I could slice off a piece of that greatness and hold it in my hand.

I'm the type of person who has always searched for greatness, whether it is a feeling, an experience, a conversation, or an expression from inside of myself. I have felt the restlessness inside of myself of the possibility for greatness more times than I can count, and it is one of the most exciting and intoxicating feelings I have ever felt. I love being dwarfed by endless possibilities. I think everyone secretly wants to be great, whether than be through the over-arching meaning of that word, beyond expression, or simply great at something. Deep inside of myself, I know that being great at one something is not enough for me. I want to be great at a lot of things. I would never say I want to be remembered for greatness on the level of Machiavelli or Michelangelo, but I'd love to hold just a slice of their innovation and fearless thought in my hands. I believe all human beings hold the capability for such greatness deep inside of themselves. Some people have a harder time accessing it than others because of things getting in their way, such as a lack of resources or a fear of where that greatness will lead them. 

When I glimpse the possibility to do something great (and everyone has different definitions of what is great; I subscribe to many of them) I am seized simultaneously by an excitement that I recognize the possibility that I could reach that level of achievement, and I am also gripped by the fear of uncertainty of the details. How will I get there? What happens when I make mistakes? What would I do when I'm there to maintain that level? What will people think? What if, what if, what if? But I try to catch myself in that mindset and remind myself of how many things I have accomplished in this life and how many things I have overcome, and I realize that anything is possible. I just need to work hard and believe in myself, and I will reap the benefits of success.

To be a successful photographer would be accomplishing something great for me. I want to show people their beauty and be there for them at pivotal times in their lives. I want to document those moments that, no matter how hard you try to hold on, fade as time goes on.

And I think documenting moments is important, otherwise it is possible to lose the idea of how you've become the person you are.

 

I took this image when I was in the cloisters of Santa Croce. I remember being overwhelmed by the peace and the beauty of that moment, and I wouldn't be able to remember if it not for this photograph. I'm glad I have it to remind myself of the life-changing experience of studying abroad, and the way I felt on that extraordinary Tuesday afternoon that I spent wandering around in the shadows of greatness.

Mark

Mark is a wonderful baritone here at IU. The first time I got to see him perform it was as a bouncy and energetic Papageno in last year's production of Die Zauberflöte. He's also a wonderful pianist - something I'm super jealous of. I have a lot of artistic passions, and sometimes people tell me I'm good at anything, but my automatic response is always that I'm not good at playing the piano. Or at bowling. And plenty of other things! 

But kudos to you, Mark, for being so good at many things. It was a lot of fun working with you! Thanks for being so quick to smile and for bringing your true, wonderful personality to the shoot. 

The "non-smiling" face. Love it!

Mark, you've got one of the most approachable, friendly smiles I've photographed.

Here's a model shot! I love the completely different character of it.

I love how sweet you look in this photograph. Perfect!

 

Thanks for giving me the opportunity to get to know you better Mark! You're awesome! :)

Erica

Erica is a fabulous young dramatic soprano who lives in Germany. She went to IU and we just missed each other by a year or so, but I'm so glad I got to meet her when she was back in town and needing some headshots. As you can see from her photos, she was a lot of fun to work with and so nice! She was one of those people who I wished I could just sit down with and have coffee or lunch - too bad she lives in Deutschland! :)

Erica, you are beautiful.

Hello creamy, caramel-y eyes! LOVE!

Women are so beautiful when they laugh.

Gorgeousssssssss! I love the sassy red lips.

This picture makes me happy every time I look at it.

Erica, you are so fierce.

PS - LOVE that dress.

Erica, you were so much fun to work with, and you're so gorgeous. I wish you all the best in your career, and I can't wait to see your new website! I hope our paths cross again sometime in the future! Thanks for being fabulous! 

Dan

Dan will always have a special place in my heart. He was the first person to book me via my website, literally hours after I launched it. I was so scared and excited when I launched my site for the first time back in August, and I was not expecting anything really from the site itself, at least not for quite awhile after I launched it. It was so exciting to get a booking, and from someone I didn't know personally.

Dan turned out to be such a wonderful person to work with. He is so sweet and wonderful, and I was lucky enough to have seen him sing an amazing Cesare in Giulio Cesare a couple of years ago, so I knew I was working with a person who is as talented as he is nice. 

We got together and took headshots and fun promo shots for his website.

Dan, you have such a great smile!

So fierce!

Dan, you're a model. Just sayin'.

Dan, thanks for giving me the opportunity to work with you. You're wonderful!

inch by inch

I'm writing this post from the dressing room of our last performance of Faust . I'm sitting here in my strawberry blond wig, looking at myself and feeling like I am in for a big life change. This week, my friend Laura pegged my Enneagram type as a 4. (If you've never checked out Enneagram testing, you should; it is pretty cool!) Type 4s are artists. They love creating things, and that includes constantly reinventing themselves. The most exciting times of my life have been marked with reinvention. I am feeling ready to reinvent myself now. I can feel it on the horizon. I am restless and excited. I'm pretty sure that when I'm reinvented, I will still be a blonde, though.

Sometimes I have this fear that I'm going to wake up one day and my potential life as a photographer is all going to be a dream, or I won't be able to book clients, or some other irrational fear. Staring a business is scary. I am the type of personality that plans and plans and plans, which makes the process all the more exciting. I like to have spreadsheets and to make lists and to know exactly what steps I have to go through to reach my goals. Sometimes, when I just sit back and let myself think about this whole process, it is sort of terrifying. There are so many little tasks to complete when you run a small business that at times it can seem insurmountable. But there is something about that feeling that stirs something inside of me and makes me excited to conquer the insurmountable, and to do what seems impossible. I know how good it will feel when I get there, and how much I will have grown as a business owner and a person and a photographer. 

Now, on to complete my to-do list and stretch myself and try the unexpected, and reach my goals! I'll do it with my camera in hand. I have been learning more about my new camera recently, and I was playing around with taking some ring shots of our wedding rings. My photographer didn't get a ring shot on my wedding day and so I need one for my album. This is one option...I love sparkles!