The First Post

Its come down to this, Ive been excited but dreading it at the same time, not because I don't like to write, but because I can never make a decision of how I want to start. So here it goes, lately Ive been getting a lot of people asking me how I started and how I got to where I am today. Let me just start by saying I received my first DSLR a year ago, and no I didn't go to school for it. 

My ambition to succeed is fired by the urge to prove to society that age doesn't limit the possibilities of achieving dreams.

 This journey hasn't been easy, ive stayed up plenty of nights in tears comparing myself to other photographers doubting myself. Always in fear of being judged as " that girl with the camera" and not as a professional young woman that I feel that I am. I am pouring my heart and soul into my photography so that maybe one day I will be seen that way. 

In high school I was not the athletic type ( okay I made the winning basket for the other team my first and only year of playing basketball) I naturally floated towards like minded creative minds who expressed their feelings in graffiti, skateboards, and Indie music. In 11th grade I made the decision to go half time to a technical- trade school and study graphic design, little did I know that would alter my life completely. Six years ago now I wanted to work in advertising, my dream was to design ads for muliti-million dollar companies and take weekend trips on my Yacht to Maui. Talk about having high hopes in an extremely competitive business. I navigated through Photoshop like it was the high seas, studying every ridge and wave.  I have never been good at listening to people talk, in my regular classes I would find my eyes closing and sensing the feeling of falling within two minutes of the period bell starting. 

back in 11th grade

 I needed to be doing something, I needed to be creating. 

Come senior year I knew I wanted to do something in art but there was always the fear of " is this a waste of money" I was accepted into a very promising art university in San Francisco but I declined because I was afraid of the unknown, moving to a place where no one knew my name, it was too much to bear. Instead I went to the local community college just like everyone else and studied Graphic Design. The second day I wanted to quit, my main professor was a the type who didn't believe in giving A's, and didn't believe in failure, what pushed me through was that yacht dream in the back of my head. Back then I knew that the only way to make it to my hopes of being a creative director was to move to the city, and gain experience. Experience I soon discovered took 15 years, with 6 years of schooling who has time for that? It was then that I met my fiance Cody, moved in with him, and made the ultimate decision to stay in the area despite of feeling weary of what would become of my Graphic Design career. Half way through college I found myself in the dark room more often than the graphics lab. All of my projects consisted of photographs I had taken altered slightly to comply with the assignment requirements. In November of 2011 one of my old colleagues asked me if I would do her engagement pictures. Nervously I said yes, not knowing a thing about engagement pictures.
       
 I took those first engagement photographs with my Iphone. 

If I told you that those turned out great and I loved every single one of them, Id be lying. Back then I didn't know the different between f-stops, exposure, and shutter speeds, depth of field  whats that. I started up an online portfolio and put those images on there, I booked three more engagement sessions from them. The woman also asked me to photograph their wedding. A wedding? I had only ever been to one before that. The thought of capturing someones most sought after and dreamed about day both terrified me and excited me at the same time. My father bought me my first camera that year, and I had just started playing around with it less than a month before her big day. On the wedding day, I showed up with no external flash, two kit lenses, no backup anything ( yes including BATTERIES). I had three cans of Redbull, a bagel, and 2 memory cards.

In no way am I an adrenaline junkie but the rush that occurs the morning of a wedding could possibly move mountains.

It was there at that first wedding that I discovered what I was truly meant to do, capture intimate moments that only happen once in a lifetime. After that day my photography spread like fire, my facebook blew up as my reputation spread.

My best advice for anyone trying to build a photography business is simple, shoot everything, bring your camera everywhere, find beauty in the unexpected.

Ask anybody and anyone who has any sort of special occasion coming up in their life if you can photograph them. After all, what do you have to lose? the worst is that they will say is no. In a creative business like this refferals are the best way to get your name out there. Your job does not end after the shutter is released, there is so much more work that goes into it. You have to be a business person as well as a creative person or you will fastly become a " starving artist." Ah business its the part that I hate to love but love to hate. I couldn't imagine what my business would be like without the internet. With today's technological advancements if you aren't web savvy, if your not using social media, your losing out on potential clients and opportunities.
Create lists, write down your ideas, hopes ambitions, if they are written down they turn into goals.