more sportraits

Sorry for the long string of pictures, I have a hard time deciding on which ones to post here. You should just go look at my flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/31463212@N04/. But anyways, I think the hardest thing this semester has been figuring out what I want from these portraits. And the fact that I'm getting to know the athletes both helps and hurts my artistic purpose. Because I'm trying to put them in poses that is natural for them based on their position or sport or personality and that seems virtually impossible when I'm not sure what I want out of the pictures in the first place. Luckily, I've found some pretty great people along the way that have put up with it all and even formed a few friendships. And I think I've gotten some decent photos out of this semester. Sure, I'm not a professional yet but I also don't have thousands and thousands of dollars to spend to get there yet. As for these three shoots specifically, I'm not quite sure what there is to say. Yes, I'll remember the lights falling over time and time again or the sky I can't get to look the way I want in photoshop but this semester was more about me I think. And my experience as a photographer and a person. As well as making friends, connections and putting myself out there. After all, this was only preparation for next semester and studio topics where the real fun begins. I'm hoping to continue this project through the fall and we'll see where I am after that with it I guess.

end of the semester

Well hello there blog, after all this time apart, so much for posting regularly. An understatement would be that this semester did not turn out the way I planned, my entire life just surprised me in every way possible. I think it's a good thing though, I'm not officially home and able to actually relax... which is hard for me. And photo wise this summer is going to be lots and lots of research and practice and pulling everything together to get ready for senior year and the rest of my life, oh wow. I hope to have a website, an actual website, which I am in the process of figuring out and have been for a while now. But I think I may go with a pbase one? Because I was going to have a friend help me design one, but you know how I am with relying on other people for things so I guess we'll see. This http://www.pbase.com/pitchertaker is Frank's and I think it would work for what I need it for at this point. Of course, something like this http://www.robertseale.com/index.php#mi=2&pt=1&pi=10000&s=0&p=0&a=0&at=0 is the end goal but I'm not quite sure I'm there yet to say the least. Though I have come a long way in just this short time. Moving on, this semester I concentrated on my sportraits, bettering myself with action shooting and attempting to expand my portfolio in general. As for the sportraits, I have my final 3 for you, all amazing athletes, great people and wonderful models. But I think I am going to post those in a separate post for now. But I did pictures of Vagina Monologues, Devin's campaign, Gala, the Psychology Conference, Relay for Life, the Athletic Awards, senior portraits for a friend, and the usual anywhere from 2-5 games a week. And you know, trying to have a life somewhere in there as well, haha. I believe I am shooting a one year old's birthday party next weekend too, in addition to it being my 21st birthday (yay!), my little cousin's first dance recital (awww) and my brother's first soccer game of the summer (which sadly I can't make due to everything else, but there will be more). But I'm sure I will have lots of pictures for you this summer, I hope, I always say that and I always disappear for months on end, but I'm really going to try this time. Mostly, I just need to get a website up and running to display all these images. And I need to fix the living out of a suitcase situation, among everything else, redecorating to start hence the changes this year. But moving on, I'm going to post those sportraits now :)

oh life

So it's been a pretty interesting week, photographically and otherwise. Unfortunately I don't have many pictures to show for it though. I had my photo shoot with Jordan and one of the lights fell over :O sad times. Needless to say, we didn't get many pictures in and I was pretty emotional. So these two are workable images ... better yet, poses that I wanted to try with different lighting but couldn't. So I'm going to have a reshoot with her this week and hopefully everything will go more smoothly this time.

But now I have moved on and I actually purchased my own light (yay!) and strobe (yay!) and umbrellas and light stands and the list just keeps going. So I already have two people scheduled for Thursday and Friday of this week and then I'm working on scheduling someone for next week already as well. This semester is almost over already, oh no. I've decided it's going to be okay though, the surprises keep coming and I keep dealing with them, it's nothing I can't handle :)

first official sportraits

My first official sportraits, aren't you excited?! Haha, I am :) I am still having mixed feelings about this project though. I still can't decide what I want. I don't want them to be too cheesy but I want them to have that typical sports passion/emotion. That's what I love most about sports, the passion that goes into them. So I need to find that in relation to these sportraits. I need to find my passion for them as well. I've just been so frustrated with the little problems (that there always seem to be a lot of!) and I'm letting them get the best of me. I just need to keep remembering that these are my first portraits I've ever taken with lights I've never used in places that are some of the hardest to shoot in. I will get better.

However, I am adding another personal goal to my list for the semester. As I figured out at this shoot, not that I haven't gotten it before, I need to be louder. When we were in the gym with other people and lots of noises, my voice disappears. One of my 7th graders at Claremont told me the same thing last week, I was talking too softly for her to hear me. And I've been told that forever, so I guess we'll see if I can work on it. I mean I'm going to have to if I want to be a teacher. On Wednesday, I was helping a group of three 7th grade boys with a worksheet using PEMDAS. One of them got SO excited when he finished it and had done the whole second column by himself with me just checking it. And Justin, my personal favorite, was like "Yeah, it's because she's just a great teacher!" awwwww. It made my heart melt. And it's times like these I remember why I want to be a teacher.

Because lately, photography has been taking over my life. This past weekend I shot for the Special Olympics Saturday and Sunday. And Tuesday I met with a fellow Clarkie who's running for City Council in Worcester and I am going to be his campaign photographer. So that'll be a new experience for me but I'm excited :) Photography is what I love. But so is teaching. I'll find some way to make it work. I'm sure there are still plenty of chances for life to surprise me.

Back to the real reason for this post, the actual pictures. I'm happy with them considering they're my first shoot. However, there are still things I need to improve on to get better for next time. And I've accepted it's always going to be that way, there's always going to be something I could've done or should've done better. So for now I am happy with these :) I picked my favorites I guess to post here. But I don't remember if last time I said I'm also posting all of the pictures I've edited from each session on flickr so here's the link for that http://www.flickr.com/photos/31463212@N04/?saved=1. Hopefully that works. And for this time, Eileen and Dave were very wonderful to work with and for that I'm so incredibly grateful. Everyone has been wonderful through all this. And though it was a stressful Thursday, it was definitely a productive one. It all worked out in the end. And with that in mind, I know I'll get through this project and this semester :)

it's me!

Haha, this seems to be a reoccurring theme lately - but I think that's a good thing :) I found this before break but forgot to post it, well actually I didn't really find it. Kevin actually told me about it, he saw my picture in the paper and saved it to show me. It's very exciting :)

http://www.telegram.com/article/20110227/NEWS/102270503

Anyways, this weekend was the Winter Olympics for Special Olympics so I shot basketball skills drills yesterday and basketball games today, fun times. And I thought I was done with basketball, but I think this time I officially really am. However, I did have a break through, of course, at my last game, to change the white balance on my camera so I don't have to do it to every single one in RAW. Sadly, I don't have my new pictures to post yet, I'm editing them tomorrow in the lab because my laptop still isn't calibrated yet. But I have more people lined up for this week and the snow is starting to melt so maybe that means I can go outside next week or soon! I really need that to happen or I'm going to be way behind and have to cram like 15-20 people into the month of April, that'll be great. And I really love snow, but this is the one time I just wish it would go away. But I think spring sports start this week as well, at least at Clark, they already started in general. So I have lots of stuff to do, but that's always how I like it :) Well, I am done talking for now I guess. I need to do statistics homework and choreograph for tap (YAY!) and submit photos to a contest thing but I'm sure you'll be hearing from me soon

it's my picture! :)

http://branford.patch.com/articles/hornets-basketball-seniors-get-send-off-and-graduated-students-having-success-at-the-college-level#photo-4960169

This is kind of exciting, and look - it actually has my name! This is Tucker, as you can see, and I guess it's his high school that ran the story/photo. It's a cute idea, a "where are they now" kind of thing.

it's been a looong week

It really has been a long week, a very long week, and it's not over. BUT... I made the new header for my blog, as you can see, and I like it :) I haven't made final decisions on all the pictures but for now it is done. Just one of the perks of having photoshop on my new computer :) it's so exciting! So anyways, this week was pretty much a research and redevelopment week in the project. Hopefully this weekend I will get the lights all figured out in the gym/pool and then next Thursday I believe I'm doing a diver and a basketball player, yay. That'll be a long day but oh well, I realized I don't have as much free time as I thought I did this semester. And that plus trying to coordinate with models' schedules is going to be wonderful. But it'll all work out, I'm convinced. I've decided that no longer really want to shoot in the studio though, the black background was going to be dull compared to the ones one the field/court/etc. So I'm going to try to do all of them "on location" now. Sadly, that means most of the outside ones have to wait till at least after spring break and I'm really hoping then the fields will be clean. It was funny because that's what I told Sean Sullivan, the new athletic director, when he asked if he could do anything to assist with this project. He said he's working on it though, so that's good news. And the models I have so far are being very agreeable and helpful which is more than I was expecting I guess. But there's a big difference between working "professionally" with someone and being friends with someone so we'll see if I can accomplish both. That's my personal goal for the semester, to be confident as a photographer and to branch out. I need to be more comfortable with directing models (for this project) and I need to believe in myself more in general as a photographer. In addition, I'm hoping to become actual friends with the people I'm taking pictures of too. So I have a lot to do this semester as you can see :)

First Studio Portraits :)

Hi again! Twice in one week, that's definitely a change. So I have (almost) officially started my project for this semester. My idea is to take sports portraits, mostly of athletes at Clark, in the studio or hopefully on the court/field/etc that they play on. This Wednesday, I had my first actual athlete model, Joe, he's a cross country runner here at Clark. I had a bit of lighting help though from Frank and Michael, they showed me a few tricks and then I took some photos. I'm not really sure what I want at the moment, which is the problem. However, I'm trying to figure that out and in the meantime I'm just kind of going with it. So here are a few shots from Wednesday :) I attempted to show some different poses (or the same poses with different lighting) and then my favorites too I guess.

So these are just a few, I mean I only edited about 30 or so images out of the many I took. But this first session was about experimenting with lighting. So I am aware in some of these photos that the black background isn't actually behind him as I wanted but I'll figure that out later on. I just need to try different ways to light someone's face or body using the lights in the studio and various reflectors. But he was very patient and wonderful throughout the whole... I think it was around 2 hours. And it definitely gave me renewed hope in this whole experiment. However, at the same time, I still have a long way to go before I'll be really happy. Because while I can now adequately use the studio lights, I'm still very limited (both in the space itself and with the lights available). Ideally, I think I would like to take pictures on the court, field, in the pool, etc. However, that poses the problem of that lighting and finding a time when the space is available as well as the model and everything else. But it would add a lot more dimension to the images, make the more interesting and give me a bit more freedom in terms of poses. But who knows, I have a lot of ideas running through my head in general. Like if I were to put this in book form, if I had an action shot of the athlete on the right page and their portrait on the left. Or just in some way incorporate the two halves as a whole. It'll come to me eventually. What I'm trying to focus on now is coming up with ideas for poses and looking into how plausible location shooting would be. So until next time :)

I'm baaack!

Hiii! I've been feeling a bit inspired lately (and I've been missing this) so I decided I should start posting again. Plus, this semester is certainly going to be an interesting one. First of all, I'm still working for the athletic department and that is going great! Secondly, I have two pictures in the ARTSWorcester show this year (the same show my soccer was in last year)! The first one here is from Midnight Madness at Clark. And the second is of Karissa during the huge snowstorm we had at home over break - the night we got snowed in. This picture is obviously very out of the ordinary from my usual style, or at least what people are used to seeing in class and whatnot from me.

Lastly, this semester, I am embarking on a sports portraiture journey. That's going to be the interesting part, I'm still in the testing stage at the moment and it's proving to be much more frustrating than I had anticipated but hopefully I'll make the desired progress this week. I had never realized that studio lighting could be so difficult. But I have a decent list of athletes so far willing to pose (18ish I believe) and I am determined (as usual) to make it work. I mean, I've come to realize, when I started out taking action shots freshmen year with a film camera I felt the same frustration I'm feeling now and look at where I am at the moment with that. So I won't lose faith! And I intend to keep my blog updated throughout the process, which I'm sure will come together shortly, I already can't wait till Wednesday, haha. I've clearly been thinking about this too much lately.

That's all for now :)