I Have A Lot Of Catching Up To Do

I have been super busy these last two weeks trying to get ready for my dance recital. Now that I finally have that over with I have time to update my blog. Including pictures I took of my dance students before the recital.

Here is just few examples of my cute little students. They were much more cooperative that my little Sydnie was, and I was able to get some really cute shots.

A group shot of my 3 year old class. I was so rushed for time I didn't have time to do Sydnie's hair or make-up before pictures. Oh well, luckily I got some cute ones with her all dressed up a few days before. This little class was very hard to pose, I ended up pasting about 3 photos together to get one decent one.

The older class was much easier to pose, I found one that worked without having to cut and paste.

I borrowed my cute little neighbor with great big blue eyes for a challenge entry. It was called "Light on White" here are some of the outtakes:

Now for challenge entries. This first one is for a challenge titled "Gold" I found this mask at a party store and thought it would be fun to pair with Kaylees golden hair. I did pretty well with this photo. I finished 7th out of around 100 entries.

And this next one won me another ribbon. I was a bit surprised to get it because I entered it at the last minute and didn't really have high expectations for it. But others seemed to like it and I won third place.

This next one was for a challenge called fences. I really liked this photo, but it only did a little above average. Oh well sometimes you just have to enter the ones you like and not worry about the score.

Here are a couple other "fence" outtakes, in hind sight I probably would have done better with one of these.

Dance Photos

I am doing a quick post to show some examples of the dance photos I am going to be doing before the recital this Saturday. Sydnie does not like her costume, even though I think it is adorable. I had to bribe her with make-up, sparkles and bubble gum, to get her to pose. She did pretty well, hopefully I will get some cuter smiles and poses on the day of the recital.

Building My Portfolio Back Up

I had the opportunity to get back out there quite a bit this week. I got some great new pictures and re-shot some of my favorites. It made me realize that even though I lost some of my favorite photos, there will be new favorites to replace them.

Here is one of my newest favorites. I have it entered in a challenge that doesn't start until tomorrow, but I have high hopes for it. This was shot for a challenge called "square crop" I thought of this location immediately, I had done a photo of this before without a person in it and I knew I wanted to do it again. The location was beautiful, tulips blooming everywhere. I promise I didn't pick them, I brought some with me from my house. But I was so nervous someone was going to stop me and accuse me of picking them.

Title:

It Takes Courage to Walk That Path

Here are a couple outtakes:

This one I took of Sydnie on Easter. The background was really distracting and it took me a long time to figure out how to edit it out and still leave the bubbles showing. Here is the B&W version of this shot:

This week I got the chance to go out a re-take some of my favorite photos. One like these won me a blue ribbon last time and honestly I think these turned out even better. This first one I have entered in this months free study. So far it is doing really well. With 300 entries I won't have a chance at a ribbon, but I am just happy to be getting a good score in a free study, it doesn't happen very often.

Title:

Stormy Night

This is the one I wanted to enter, but there was a big clump of grass in the middle off the water, I had to clone out. The rules on cloning are kind of vague and I was worried about getting disqualified. So I decided not to use it. But I still really like it.

Another out take for free study. I liked the sky in this one but the landscape was a bit boring.

And one last outtake for free study. I liked it but not as much as the one I entered. That is Mount Timpanogos in the background.

I almost didn't include this one. I am looking very lovely in this photo. The challenge was titled "Seven Deadly Sins" I chose Envy. I don't particularly love the photo but everyone seems to be getting a kick out of it, and I am actually doing quite well score wise. I guess it pays to make a fool out of yourself.

Title:

Green With Envy

Still in Mourning

So, I am still trying to get over the death of a dear friend of mine, and it has been a little hard to pick myself up and get photographing again. Who is this dear friend, you ask? It is my beloved Laptop, more specifically my beloved laptop's hard drive. It suffered a nasty accident and my hard drive was pronounced dead, after getting two separate opinions. The horrible part of all of this is I had not backed up my photos in a really long time, so I have lost most of the pictures since I started taking photo's more seriously. Really really stupid of me not to back them up, lesson learned the hard way. Luckily most of the photos I either put on this blog or my family blog, so all is not lost. I won't be able to print anything bigger than a 5x7 but at least they are not gone forever. The moral of this story: go back up your photos now!!!!

We had a fun weekend in Zion National Park and Bryce National Park. I was able to take some amazing photos. Unfortunately most were casualties of my dead hard drive. I was only able to post a few to my portfolio on DPChallenge before my computer died. Here are two of the survivors:

The Watchman in Zion National Park

Bryce Canyon

Despite crying most of the day Monday, I was able to pick myself up and get photographing again later that week. There was a huge flock of Pelicans, around 200, all grouped together a little way of the main road where I live. I decided to walk out there to see how close I could get. I was knee deep in swampy marsh land and never could get close enough to take a decent shot. Here is the best I could do:

On Friday my neighbors thought I was crazy laying on the grass, trying to get some shots of these tulips for a challenge entry. I didn't even end up using them, I got something better today. But I still like them so I decided to post them here.

Today I took pictures of my girls in their Easter dresses. I ended up liking this one of Sydnie so much, that I decided to use it instead of the tulips for my challenge entry. The challenge is called "bokeh". Bokeh is a photographic term that means, blurred background. Really good bokeh has those circular or octaganal patterns.

Title:

Waiting

I also took photos of my other two girls. I like them as well but the focus is a bit off and they would get hammered in a challenge. Since I wasn't entering it in a challenge I took the liberty of playing around with the editing style a bit

Kaylee

Brianne

I had a lot of fun with this next challenge entry. It was an "expert editing" challenge so you have the freedom of combining multiple photos into one photo. Most of the time only one photo is allowed. For the photo below I combined 5 different photos to make this one shot. The challenge theme was "Visual Puns" a photographic play on words.

Title:

Haywire

This next one I was trying to decide whether to enter it in the "Empty Room" challenge or "Sadness" challenge. My intent was to show a girl in an empty corner in time out. It ended up looking more like a little girl who is left out of something and had a very sad feel to it. So I considered entering it in the "Sadness" challenge. I should have, it's doing okay in the Empty Room" challenge. But in hind site it is much more suited to the Sadness one.

Title:

Always Picked Last

Keeping Busy

I have started doing a little side work with my photography lately. I decided it was about time I put a price list together. If you look at the top of my blog you will see a new header entitled "Schedule a Session" in it you will see my prices and how to get in touch with me to schedule a session.

This photography stuff has been keeping me pretty busy lately. My friend Holly had me take some photo's of her cute kids. I had them edited awhile ago but wanted to try a re shoot of her littlest one. I'm glad we did he was in a much better mood the second time around and we were able to get this cute shot of him:

The rest of her cute kids:

I have also been really busy entering challenges. We have had a couple extra ones in the last couple weeks so I have been extra busy getting ready for them, shooting for them, and editing them.

This first one was my free study entry, it really is one of my favorite photos. I thought it turned out just about how I pictured it in my head. I did pretty well with it but the voters didn't seem to love it as much as I did.

title:

Alice: Through the Looking Glass

This one is sort of different. It was for a challenge called "between the neck and the knees" All I kept thinking when I was editing these is I wish I didn't have to cut off the head. I tried to figure out ways to show emotion or tell a story without seeing a face so I attempted to do it with her hands.

Title:

Just a Little Stage Fright

This last one was for a challenge called Black and White so it could be anything in Black and White. I ended up going with this one. I really liked it. I guess no one else does because it is not scoring well. Oh well you can't guess them all.

Title:

Grazing Peacefully

This was my other choice for the B&W challenge. In hind sight I should have gone with this.

For a lack of better models...

I have had a few challenges lately that require a more grown up model than what Kaylee can pull off. I feel kind of funny asking other people to pose for my challenge photos, so I have to pose for them myself. I don't like doing it, mostly because I suddenly become a lot more critical of the photo when I am in it. I have a hard time being objective. I won't like a photo simply because of the way I look in it.

This first one is me very glamorized. It was for a challenge called "What DPC love the Most" Meaning: take a picture of what people on the website tend to score really high. I must have figured it out, because I am did really well with this one. I got 4th out of 95 entries.

I posed for this one in a huge wind storm, Brianne was a trooper and climbed the hill with me and pushed the shutter button. My girls are going to learn photography by default Brianne is already off to a good start.

Title:

DPC Loves: Flowing Robes and Brooding Skies

Now for a much less glamorous shot. I wore absolutely no make-up for this one. We are studying a photographer from the 1930's Named Edward Weston. He did quite a few portraits most of them are complete side views and almost all are in black and white. This is what I came up with. I did my hair in a 1930ish sort of hairdo and did my best to pose looking to the side and pushing my remote for my camera at the same time. The feedback has been extremely positive on this photo, and I think I should do quite well with it. Scoring doesn't start until Tuesday so I won't know until then if I hit the target or not.

Title:

A Weston Style Self Portrait

Here is another view, I actually liked it better but it wasn't a side view so I decided against it.

Kaylee did get to model for one shot this week, this one was for a challenge called "Focus Point" a focus point is something that draws the eye into the photo and keeps the viewers interest. I had the idea for a bright umbrella against a stormy sky. I really lucked out with this one. We took it just as a hail storm was coming in, I was able to capture some really mean looking storm clouds coming in. This one is doing extremely well, I will get the best score I have ever gotten for an image and complete one of my goals of getting a score of 7 or higher. 7's are really hard to get I have come close so many times, only to see it drop to just below a 7 at a 6.9. This one should make it, I am at a 7.3 and holding steady! I should ribbon with this, you almost never get a 7 without ribboning. The results come in on Tuesday, and I am anxiously awaiting the results on this one.

Title:

A Bright Spot in the Storm

This last one is sort of a ho-hum shot. It was taken for a challenge called "Lucky Thirteen" I had a hard time wrapping my mind around this one and it shows in my shots. I think they are kind of boring. This challenge hasn't started yet, but I doubt I will get a good score. Who knew I had so many clocks!!!

Title:

The Thirteenth Hour

Here is another shot. How do you make thirteen gourds look interesting??? Well I tried, but everyone liked the clocks better so I went with that one. I still sort of like it better than the clocks but if everyone else said the clocks were better so that is what I will go with.

Late Additions

I wasn't going to post so soon, but I purposely left a few photo's out the last time I posted here. I thought I might be winning a ribbon for a recent entry and last night the results came in and I DID! I got first place for this photo:

Title

The Tower

Kind of a strange title I know, it was for a challenge called "Tarot Card" it wasn't a challenge I was planning on entering, but I got these amazing long exposures of our lake and the mountains and I wanted to enter them in something, and friend who was helping me with them suggested they may work for "the tower" tarot card. I really don't even know what tarot cards are, so I just went with the suggestion thinking it probably wouldn't do all that great because it didn't really fit the challenge. Well I was wrong, and happy to be wrong! You can veiw my entry on the front page of this site http://www.dpchallenge.com/

Here are a couple others I got that night, I will most likely enter one of these for my March free study, but I haven't decided which one yet. I'm sure neither will win, as the free studies usually have over 200 entries and really amazing pictures, but I hope I can at least get a good score with one of them.

This next one I just entered, it is doing really well but it won't ribbon or even come close. There are some really amazing entries in this particular challenge. Now before you criticize me for putting make-up on Kaylee let me tell you about the challenge. It has to be in the style of a fairly famous photographer named Manny Librodo. He does amazing portraits mainly of models. So I wanted mine to have a kind of a high fashion feel to it. So poor Kaylee had to have her eyebrows plucked (she earned a $1 for that) and get some pretty heavy eye make-up applied (I don't think she minded that so much) I had her cover the rest of her face so you couldn't tell how old she was. Anyway, I thought they turned out pretty well. Here is my entry:

Title:

Through the Eyes of Innocence

Here is an out take I had a hard time deciding between the two:

And one last challenge entry. This challenge was called "Urban Nature" we had to take a picture of some sort of nature in an Urban setting. So I decided to try and get some shots of the birds that always hang out at the Walmart parking lots. They turned out okay, these are my first "wildlife" shots and I really don't have the lens to pull them off. Despite that I am getting a respectable score, so I am happy with my first attempt.

Title:

Walmart Shopping is for the Birds

And here is an out take, I almost entered this one because the quality on the bird is a bit better, but the Walmart sign wasn't obvious enough.