I always get a bit overwhelmed when I go through my year in pictures and try to pick out my favorites. Each year I find I generally favor emotion, or how I react emotionally to the picture, more than technical greatness. I figure that is why most of my favorite shots this year are of smiles and laughs.
2011 has been a good year for me and for my pictures. I feel like I have found a style that is uniquely mine. I no longer cruise photography blogs for ideas and wish that my photographs looked like theirs. I also can't seem to find any other photographs that look like mine. And darn it, I am totally proud of that!
I don't take pictures to make money (although I certainly can't imagine working so hard for free). I take them because it honestly fulfills something within me creatively and socially. I am certainly not a shy person, but you can imagine how daunting it can be to head out of the house to meet a large family that you know nothing about, get them to warm up to you, and get them all laughing, all while trying not to look like a total dork or say something offensive in the process. After worrying about that and then getting all technical with my camera there isn't much left in my brain for what the picture is going to look like artistically. So the final product you see on my blog and website as a photograph is pure, subconscious me. It is my complete abandon to the camera and the people in front of it. I feel a picture, and it is how I see the world. I guess, in this light, you can see why this work is so personal for me, and how it takes loads of guts to put it out there where it can be criticized. I am still just waiting for someone to say "What in the world are you doing? You are not a photographer!"
So 2011 was great because I think that this year I finally decided that I am a photographer, and I am not trying to be anyone else but me.
Thank you to my wonderful clients, new and old, for making this year awesome. Especially my newlyweds--I always love my brides and grooms!
2011 has been a good year for me and for my pictures. I feel like I have found a style that is uniquely mine. I no longer cruise photography blogs for ideas and wish that my photographs looked like theirs. I also can't seem to find any other photographs that look like mine. And darn it, I am totally proud of that!
I don't take pictures to make money (although I certainly can't imagine working so hard for free). I take them because it honestly fulfills something within me creatively and socially. I am certainly not a shy person, but you can imagine how daunting it can be to head out of the house to meet a large family that you know nothing about, get them to warm up to you, and get them all laughing, all while trying not to look like a total dork or say something offensive in the process. After worrying about that and then getting all technical with my camera there isn't much left in my brain for what the picture is going to look like artistically. So the final product you see on my blog and website as a photograph is pure, subconscious me. It is my complete abandon to the camera and the people in front of it. I feel a picture, and it is how I see the world. I guess, in this light, you can see why this work is so personal for me, and how it takes loads of guts to put it out there where it can be criticized. I am still just waiting for someone to say "What in the world are you doing? You are not a photographer!"
So 2011 was great because I think that this year I finally decided that I am a photographer, and I am not trying to be anyone else but me.
Thank you to my wonderful clients, new and old, for making this year awesome. Especially my newlyweds--I always love my brides and grooms!
My favorite of the whole year. My brother Tyler and his new wife Courtney:
