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Meredith (Sneak Peek)

May 112013

Last weekend, I met the lovely Meredith Sledge in real life.

We’ve known each other through blogging for a few years, but even though we live relatively close together, we’d never gotten the chance to meet. This changed last weekend when she drove to my college and spent a few days in the DC area. We played tourist on Capitol Hill and went on an evening adventure to Alexandria. The second day, we drove down to visit my family’s farm. (You can see Meredith’s lovely post on it here.)

Since we’re both photographers, it was really fun to experiment with portraits. Unlike shooting for a client, shooting with friends is so much fun because of the creative freedom and less pressure to deliver the photos in a timely manner (as you can see from the lateness of this post).

Here are a few photos of this gorgeous girl.

Merry Christmas!

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Dec 242012

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Part of me cannot believe that it’s already Christmas. It seemed that only a few months ago it was summer, and school was just beginning. Yet here it is, December 24th. Christmas Eve. Time seems to go so fast and so slow at the same time, never stopping, just going on and on. This Christmas, I’m more excited than before to spend time with my family – you never know how much you miss spending time with them (just the normal days, the little pretend arguments, and the laughter) until you’ve spent a significant amount of time away from them. And so this Christmas, I’m just thankful to be here. I’m thankful that I’ve finished a semester and I’m excited for the next. Most of all though, I’m thankful for the gift that Christ gave, enabling us to celebrate this season with true joy.

Snapshots of Winter

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Dec 232012

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Here in the highly unpredictable Mid-Atlantic, winter isn’t generally full of snow. Sometimes it’s just plain nasty out, like right now (30 degrees with I-have-no-idea-how-many-MPH-winds). At school, we all just roll our eyes and say “Ugh, Virginia weather” or “why can’t we have snow instead of rain?”.But not all days are nasty, and sometimes it’s cold out with the most beautiful sunlight that you’ve ever seen. That’s what happened with these photos. The sunflare was fabulous, but the first and last ones are my favorite. The sun was almost done setting, and we crouched down to the level of the smoldering horizon, before brushing briars and grasses off of our clothes and running back to the house, lured by the promise of hot tea. And so, for me personally, the last image so perfectly captures the end of a winters day here. It’s soft, and volatile, but while the sun lasts you’ll find us wandering through the crisp air, chasing those elusive moments of beauty and perfection.

(Kudos to my fabulous best friend for being my model, for freezing for the sake of art and for running off in search of beautiful moments to capture with me.)

Free Lightroom Preset Collection – Bright and Bold

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Dec 172012

I’m super excited to announce that I have a new set of free Lightroom Presets for you. I’ve released presets in the past, and some of my first ones were even featured on PhotoTuts. However, I’ve grown a lot as both a photographer and editor since then. I made the decision to release, for your own use, four of my signature presets that I use to achieve my personal look. Let’s take a look at them, shall we?

Classic Vintage was originally developed for a barn shoot where the weather was overcast. It brightens and gives a film look to photos because of a slight grain (which is easily removed in the Lightroom grain menu).For those of you who are enthralled with VSCO, this is the closest preset I have to VSCO.

Evening Bold is incredibly versatile. I generally use it for half of the portraits I shoot, especially during golden hour or dusk. This was originally developed on beach photographs, but it does great in a lot of different settings. It’s not as film-y as Classic Vintage, and doesn’t bring out as many highlights.

Portrait Brights was actually released before, but because I use it so much, I decided to include it again in this set. It brightens and gives photos a creamy look that is easily adjustable. I also developed this on beach photos, but it does great things for skin tones in a variety of conditions. Just add a little vibrance and you’re good to go!

Saturated Blonde was developed from Portrait Brights. Let’s just say that this preset is the former’s more outgoing cousin. It is full of vibrance, and I love it for some golden hour photos. Colors like reds and yellows tend to pop, but you may need to saturate the green a little bit more, depending on your taste.

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My goal with these presets was to create something that was a good base to adjust. Between these four, I can cover about 70% of lighting conditions for my photographs, and then just adjust it based on the photo’s specific needs.

Please enjoy these. I also want to let you all know that while my previous presets have been a lot of fun, as of January 2013, they will no longer be available for download. I may bring a few favorites back in the future once I’ve modified and improved them. However, you have until then to download them to your heart’s content.

G O HERE TO DOWNLOAD PRESETS

Christmas 2012 Lookbook + New Website

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Dec 062012

Hello there, my friends!

It’s been a while, hasn’t it? Let’s just say that this semester has been a bit crazy, and I shouldn’t be typing this right now. I should be finishing a presentation and a paper, because it’s the week before finals and I’m sure that every college student in the US is going crazy right now.

But life has been good, and blessed. I’m recovering from the flu + bronchitis, and have managed to almost make up for missing an entire week of school after Thanksgiving Break. I’m grateful for my sweet family, who put up with me for an extra week, and grateful to be back at school, learning. (Well, I mean, cramming and procrastinating, but we’ll take what we can get.)

I’m sure you all are wondering a bit about the title of this post. About a month or so ago, I redid my main website, which can be found here. Every season, I’ll be publishing a photography lookbook. You can view the Christmas 2012 Lookbook here – I’m so excited to publish this… Just scrolling through it makes me happy, and I hope it does the same for you.