Admitting my weaknesses

So.  My first post on this blog was in the fall of 2010, about two and a half years ago.  This is the first photo I ever put up:

Let's please take a minute to celebrate Carrie's beauty and ADORABLE STAR TATTOOS.  I love this girl; she is gold.

Let's also take a minute to be thankful for the fact that through no talent or magic of my own, I have gotten a little bit better at taking portraits.  Here's one I posted recently I'm particularly proud of:

Eden is devastating and beautiful, yes?  Yes.  This photo is not perfect.  I would like for her face to be lighter.  I would like a little more softness.  But I love, love, love this, because Eden is devastating and beautiful.

Let me lay out for you a few things I've learned in the past few years.

1. How to work my camera.  We're talking ISO, aperture, shutter speed, white balance.  I have more to learn, but the "no flash" setting on my camera hasn't been used in ages, and I'm very glad about that.

2. How to make photos bigger on my blog.  May not sound like a big deal, but I much prefer it.  So there.

3. Posing.  Still not perfect, but we're talking major improvement.

4. Patience.  Not worrying while I'm working.  Enjoying myself.  How to give immediate, encouraging feedback.

5. A little bit about marketing, and what battle is worth fighting.  I work with high schoolers every day.  You'd think it'd be super easy to recruit for senior portraits.  HEY GUESS WHAT THAT'S ILLEGAL.  Totally can't use my position to pressure kids into hiring me.  Major bummer.

So, that's good news and all.  Very practical.  But here's what I want to learn.

1. Art

2. Balance between deep color and minimized contrast

3. How to market for the kind of models I want.  I want to shoot families, babies, couples, etc.  It's fun and I love getting to celebrate life with you folks.  But I live for high school seniors.  Don't ask me why, because I don't know.  And it'll probably change.  But right now, I love those seniors.

I also have a confession:  I am not a natural artist.  I have to work pretty hard at this.  I bust my tail to do what others seem to do effortlessly.  I've gotten to the point where I can be consistent with simple, straightforward work, but try as I might, I do not naturally think like an artist.  But I want to.  And I think it's something that, to an extent, can be learned.

I'll tell you what I am fairly natural with--people.  My first major was human relations.  I changed quickly when I realized what that actually meant.  In retrospect, I meant to sign up for sociology.  That's what I thought human relations would be.  ANH, wrong!  It all worked out though, and I have plenty of relationships with humans as a teacher.  Puh-lenty.  But anyways, I like making people laugh and think and feel good.  So that's something I bring to the table with photography, with teaching, with friendship.  I am so not perfect.  So so not.  But I do have a natural bent towards desiring the best out of myself and wanting more.  In other categories, it's easy for me to get lazy and decide "this light will do," or "that's pretty much the pose I wanted," or whatever, but if I sense that someone isn't more comfortable, genuine, empowered, courageous while they are with me, I am distracted and disappointed, and work for something better.  I worry about how people feel because of me.  My job is to turn that worry into productivity and betterment, and I am satisfied in that work.

But what about the art?  What about the natural bend of a woman's arm, the side-smile of a cocky teenage boy?  The difference between eyes up and eyes down?  The difference between looking at the camera and looking into the camera?  That's hard for me.  And it's hard for me to admit my weaknesses.

So.  I guess there's always work to do.

New Years resolutions a little late, I guess.

xoxo Bec