Archive for October, 2006
I’m preparing for a trip to the Lake District. So my home looks like a Chinese laundry, as clothes are drying everywhere – not a tumble dryer fan myself. And I keep remembering stuff I need to take with me. So piles are building up off “mustn’t forget this” stuff. I have managed to pack for a trip before and completely forgotten my card reader – not good!
I’ve given up trying to get my telephone to act as a modem via Bluetooth so I can download emails on the road – Vodafone bounced my call off to Nokia – Nokia insisted I join their club before running for the hills on discovering I’m a Apple Mac user and telling me to call Mac support.
I’ve gotten it to work successfully in the past, but I really can’t be bothered to listen to Elevator music any longer, as I think I need to call Vodafone back to get their GPRS service enabled on my account. It’s obviously not something most people use. It’s swept into the too difficult box. Keswick has two sources of Internet access anyway – so I’ll use them. It’ll probably be a lot cheaper – and a week off from checking emails everyday won’t hurt.
Part of my preparation is to research locations. I’ve been to the Lake District before and have a list of places I’d like to return to. I’m also using Google to source other people’s pictures of the area – this gives me an idea of other possible locations, and I’ve checked the more arty websites to see what they have on this subject too, as I will be shooting photographs suitable for my stock photography library and fine art on this trip.
The other source of ideas is books on the area. I’ve found one that offers detailed descriptions of locations, so in theory I should be able to find them! The book is 20 years old – so paths/access may have changed.
I then mark all the possible locations onto an ordnance survey map, so I can plan a route, and have a rough idea what I want to photograph in any given day. Once I’m in the location I also check out the local Tourist Information and look at the postcards on sale.
In theory I should end up with a long list of locations, but in practise – some of the locations & ideas will only work at certain times of the year. The sun is much lower & the light generally softer in late autumn, and I may have gotten a picture idea from a postcard shot in high summer, when the lighting conditions will be vastly different. I also prefer to photograph when the weather is a bit moody – and not all chocolate box locations will work – photographically speaking – in these conditions.
October 31st, 2006
I went to a seminar on photographing children; simply because my sister in law was pregnant, and I was being ‘told’ that I’d have lots of opportunity to photograph the baby.
So I thought I’d brush up on my techniques – go to a seminar and continue my professional development. Then I had a light bulb moment – the photographer speaking was a fan of natural light and operating as a mobile photographer.
Suddenly I was thinking of a whole new angle for my photography business. No way was I interested in factory photography – which is what I feared having a traditional studio would result in. Lots of photographing people in the same poses – just different faces, and frankly not the kind of photography that would get my creative juices flowing.
Ok so I know my clients may not want loads of creativity, but they still want me to photograph their child as they are, to see their child’s many faces photographed, and I want to give them a range of shots so they can decide themselves.
I prefer relaxed and natural portraits of children, and whilst not every parent wants a stranger coming to their home, a lot more appreciate the convenience of not having to load the children into the car, drive somewhere, arrive and wait their turn, whilst fretting that the child won’t cooperate once in front of the camera. And believe me a child is much more confident in their own home, than in a strange new environment, and that shows in the photographs.
Given my other love is outdoor photography it’s no surprise that I wanted to incorporate this in my kids photography business, by photographing on location – either at the clients home or garden. In fact I want to extend this – I have an artist studio on an old flour mill, the building is listed so it’s got lots of quirky bits to it, and I think this location would make a fabulous backdrop for photographing children.
Every photographic session is different because every child is different. And that’s what makes it fun to do. It’s like a breath of fresh air each time. And to me that’s important, I like the fact that every child responds to their environment differently, and that I have to respond differently too – photographically speaking that is.
Ultimately the parent wins, because they get to chose from a unique set of prints, that captures their child’s personality during those precious childhood years.
October 27th, 2006
Vision boards are coming up a lot for me. Different people keep mentioning them to me, so I think I’d better take the hint and get on with mine.
It came up last night, and this morning I started gathering pictures that I needed to add to the collection that I started a couple of weeks back. Then I download my emails and discovered Velma Gallant had written about it in her ‘Welcome Changes’ newsletter. Spooky! So now I have to share …
Velma’s article with you:
I’m Changing my Processes ~ Are you?
Every single day we move through this Divine life of ours, we are growing and expanding. Things we thought yesterday begin to shift to the thoughts of today, and continue their change on to tomorrow.
I used to use a process; I’m sure you’ve heard it before. It was called a Dream Board.
I’m changing the name.
My Dream Board is now a Vision Board.
Why am I changing the name? Why am I changing my process that’s been working?
Because it is my belief, it is my INTENTION that this process work better–work faster.
I was watching The Secret. (Have you watched it yet?)
My son was watching it with me for just a moment. He heard about making lists. He wanted me to help him write his list. He’s 5.
So he could be a more active part of making his lists, he’s starting his Vision Board. I’ve started a new Vision Board too.
For those of you who are not sure what I’m talking about, here are detailed instructions for you.
1. Get some poster board or a cork board. If using the poster board, you can get your favorite color. You can get a color that represents something for you. My favorite color is purple. A very rich color. 
Green is the color of money. You get the idea.
2. Fill up this board with pictures or thoughts of things you desire. I have a Million Dollar Bill I got from a workshop. That’s going on it first. Then a picture of the beach on Maui.
3. Put up your Vision Board in a place where you’ll see it every single day. I’m putting mine in my room. That way I see it every morning when I wake up. I see it every night.
4. Spent 5-10 minutes every day seeing and feeling you having those things on your vision board. What is it like? How do you feel? What’s fun about it?
5. Stop. Once you’re done visioning, move about your day. Just 2 hours of visioning is NOT more powerful than 5-10 minutes of visioning. This is much like homeopathy. Less is more. (Not none is more, or more is more, but less is more.) There is more power in 5-10 minutes of intense, pure vision.
So why am I changing the name of this process from Dream Board to Vision Board? Dreams are just that–Dreams. Vision is real. I want my intentions to be real, not dreams.
If you want your intentions to be real, you may want to create your Vision Board today. And when you do, make sure you include all 5 steps. They are each important. It’s like your car operating on one less cylinder. It looses power.
Are you ready to move from Dreaming to Visioning?
Create your Vision Board. You are what you think. You are what you see.
*~*~*
Velma Gallant is an Author, Speaker, Trainer and Abundance Coach. She’s a co-author in a best-selling book series with Mark Victor Hansen, Deepak Chopra, and Wayne Dyer called ‘Wake Up Live the Life you Love: Finding Personal Freedom’. Velma is the creator of Living Abundant Joy where she interviewed 19 outrageously successful speakers, marketers and coaches on Abundance. She publishes a weekly e-newsletter called ‘Welcome Changes’. Velma coaches entrepreneurs and business people to be abundantly successful in both business and life. You can visit Velma’s website at www.WelcomeChanges.com
October 26th, 2006
Chatting with a friend today we were discussing the challenges of being in business, and how you can become trapped by the reality of where you are now. This sparked a discussion on the ‘laws of attraction’ as she’d been reading a book on that very subject. Spooky!
We got to talking about how we could attract more of the things we’d like into our life, and whether there was a right way to do this. After all it’s no good saying “I’d like this to happen”, when your sub conscious is thinking “because it never will”.
She suggested starting with “wouldn’t it be nice if …” instead. So as Christmas is coming up, I’ll be chanting “wouldn’t it be nice if I received £2,000 of unexpected income within the next thirty days” instead of signing along to the radio!
October 20th, 2006
I was reading Nicola Cairncross’s blog earlier, and it made me smile. She was writing about “the dangers of asking for feedback”
It was a great post telling the truth about the situation, and it hit a note because I’ve often asked for feedback on my own website & yes people do use it as an opportunity to give their opinion. It doesn’t always help & it’s not always constructive. Far better to have the feedback of the buying public, as Nicola states.
When I started out in business I got so much advice that had I taken it all, I’d have gone round in a big circle. So much contradicted or came with hidden agenda’s, that I now chose who’ll take advice from very carefully.
When I started photographing children, I took the opportunity to speak to the parents about what they wanted, what they liked & what they disliked. It was a fantastic way to learn, and I adapted my business to suit them.
October 19th, 2006
Another photographer recommended that I read Photographic Composition by Tom Grill & Mark Scanlon.
In it the authors make the point that our visual education is poor. The arrival of the first camera in the early nineteenth century helped improve knowledge, but ultimately the written language is still top dog.
Go back to the Middle Ages and the common man was used to obtaining info from sketches and paintings. Once books became more widely available, the written word gained dominance.
Visual arts are still on the back foot in my view, and certainly our schools do not value the arts as highly as subjects like maths, English or the sciences.
October 16th, 2006
The human eye is flexible & adaptive. When we look we see things as though everything is in sharp focus.
A camera lens freezes focus – so we notice when viewing the results the resulting photo that parts of the image are no in sharp focus and those that are.
Photographers use focus as a compositional tool in two ways
- To direct attention (as the photograph below demonstrates)
- To obscure distractions
By controlling focus, you can control a viewer’s attention, as sharp focus helps to build & support visual relationships.
So how do you achieve selective focus?
Selective focus is otherwise known as depth of field (the angle of distances in front of a lens that are rendered in sharp focus).
Photographically speaking there are three ways to control depth of field
- Lens aperture. The smaller the aperture (the larger the f number), the more extensive the depth of field.
- Lens focal length – although an aperture value produces the same exposure on any lens, depth of field will be shallower on a longer lens.
- Focusing distance – most lenses have on their barrels numbers that indicate how far away the lens is focused, as well as depth of field indicator lines that show the range of distances in sharp focus.
October 13th, 2006
… is a photographer hoping to say something meaningful.
It may be as basic as preserving a memory, or making a record of a place or event.
However clear intent is the key. Clear thoughts are the foundation of good composition – and there’s nothing like a cold wind to clear your head and focus your mind!
October 11th, 2006
I took two days off work and made a 500 mile round trip, only to be told by Argos that they had no record of my order. The order number they had given me two days earlier was invalid. (3 days later they found it & also realised they had a flaw in their IT system).
In the end I spoke with 7 different call centre operators as they bounced my call around their four call centres trying to resolve this.
Having read lots of doom and gloom stories about lack of consumer spending on the high street I’m now firmly convinced that is due to poor customer service. Poorly trained staff are literally scaring the customers away with their attitude.
Unfortunately for Argos’s Customer Relations team I am in no mood to simply put this one down to experience.
October 9th, 2006
I made a client cry today. Not on purpose you understand. I’d photographed her baby daughter and had returned to show her the results. She was so happy with them, she cried!
It is hugely satisfying when a client loves your work. Makes it all worth the effort. She doesn’t know it, but she made my day!
What was also interesting was I had shown her all the pictures that I had taken, including a few when her daughter had a very thoughtful look on her face. She really liked those, and appreciated the fact that I had captured her daughter as she is.
I sometimes worry that I show the client too many pictures, give them too much choice, and then they can’t decide what to do. On the other hand a mother wants to see all the photographs taken, and who am I to try and second guess which ones I think she’ll like.
October 3rd, 2006
