Tag: street

A single frame

I spent the week at Spencer Lum's photography workshop.  I'm going to write more about it later, but I'm too excited about everything not to share at least one image.  I'd never done a photography intensive before, unless you count double-headers - and you shouldn't, because you present so much of what you shoot.  This was three full days of shooting, pared down to eight images.  Of course, the most time for me was spent trying to find something worth showing - to find something I could put my name on.  It was really hard, and really rewarding.  I'm very excited to share the full set with you, but I think I'm going to wait until Spencer puts all the images together so we can be presented as a group.  In the meantime, here's a teaser... jay street subway street photography I found the process of shooting and review so useful, I'd really love to put together a group of photographers here in town to do this on a regular basis.  If that kind of thing intrigues you, drop me a note.  I want to seriously limit the number of wedding photographers in the critique group, but certainly I realize that's who most of my readers are!  I'm thinking monthly hard-core brutal photo critiques, with more occasional intensive projects.  Ripping off Spencer, of course, but keeping it more or less the same group of people and, obviously, making it free and local.  Let's talk about it.
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by Amber Categories: Personal, StreetTags: ,

Random from the D80

I'm really hard on my cameras.  Lenses, I coddle to death but camera bodies get banged around, dropped, rattled, bumped.  And because I like to have a camera on me at all times, it tends to be the one that can sustain the most damage.  Therefore, my "bang around" camera is the D80, demoted from main camera to backup camera and finally to "oh, do I still have that?" camera.  So it sits in my purse and comes out when I'm bored or on the metro and cursing myself for not doing more street. Today I downloaded the files to see what was on there.  Snaps from a hotel tour, Jasmine Star from her little speaking thing a while back, metro shots and, well... cheese. little girl on the washington dc metro dc metro street photography Sooooo there was this cheese.  Moody Blue, made by Roth Kase.  I tasted this cheese at Cheesetique (a magical place, you must go if you are near!) and then it disappeared from their shelves.  Every time I took David (the best friend, not the husband - that's George, who hates cheese) to a cheese store, we would look for the cheese but it was nowhere to be found.  So for my birthday, the ever-intrepid David actually phoned Roth Kase and specially-ordered an entire block of the stuff.  Yes, folks, what you see here is a seven pound block of blue cheese. seven pound block of blue cheese Oh, that huge cake-like slice cut out of it?  That's the part I had consumed about a month after receiving the block.  At this rate, I estimate it will take me near two years to finish the cheese, accounting for vacations and getting tired of it and such.  In the meantime, isn't it kinda gross?!  You can see where they drilled in to put the mold in.  Fascinating!  Ah, cheese. It is one of life's supreme pleasures.
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by Amber Categories: Food, MetroTags: , ,

What I love about wedding photography

I was asked this recently by two couples who I met with a few days apart.  I didn't have great answers for either of them.  I think I probably said "the photos," because it was the first thing that came to mind!  "Getting the shot" is a great feeling - something easy to get addicted to.  But it's far too vague. I didn't ponder this much more; unless I really have no idea what to say to someone or don't know an answer, I don't like to think through what I'm going to say to clients.  I never want to have a script to work through - that would be too salesman-y.  Instead the answer came to me while I was at a photography workshop this week.  Sometimes if you think too much about something, you can't see the reality.  So when I was asked again, what's my favorite thing about wedding photography?  an answer immediately popped in my mind.  When I said it in front of everyone, I knew it was 100% true. When I first got into photography, really got into it, street is what I loved.  I loved finding a weird scene or capturing people in a moment of their lives.  I love photography's ability to freeze action, to give context or take it away, to frame things so that you have to look at what I want you to look at.  Shooting people on the street lets you tell a story.  It's messy and fast-paced.  And it's also scary. washington dc rally street photography washington dc metro street photography washington dc street photography It's always been love-hate with me for street.  I love the photos.  I love telling the stories.  I love the idea of being a "street photographer."  But when it comes to actually getting up in peoples' faces and taking candids, I balk.  So so so many times, I've seen a great photo and been too chickenshit to bring the camera up to my face.  The wonderful images I've made in my mind's eye! So what I love about wedding photography, what I said in front of all those workshop attendees, is that

My clients pay me to be a street photographer at their wedding.  Read more... (622 words, 6 images, estimated 2:29 mins reading time)

This is a preview of What I love about wedding photography. Read the full post (622 words, 6 images)
by Amber Categories: MusingsTags: ,