16 May 13 \\ 1 comment

May Session Spotlight | Jules Trandem

Senior season is upon us! Those of us who photograph high school seniors have been busy documenting these amazing young people who are getting ready to leave their childhoods behind and enter into adulthood and all of the independence and opportunities in front of them. For many of these young people, their senior session will be the last time they get professional photos taken before they get married. This is a time of so many emotions; excitement and trepidation and joy and melancholy. What a rewarding job we have to be able to document this monumental milestone.

Jules Trandem did just that for a senior this month. I’m always in awe of the beautiful way Jules finds and uses light in her sessions. She has a way of evoking warmth and peace and beauty in her art.

Here’s what Jules had to say about this session:

As much as I love sessions with families, my heart always skips a beat for the opportunity to work with a high school senior. Ms. M was no exception. She was a little nervous before the session and mentioned she didn’t like taking pictures. Um … right! Throughout the session I would show her the back of my camera to prove what a natural she was in front of my lens. Also, we had postponed this session twice due to a cloudy overcast sky. I’m a light junky and didn’t want to do her session without beautiful light. We were all so glad we waited. The gorgeous light was so important to the feel of these. Totally worth the wait! I shot this session with my Canon 5D Mk III and my 85L 1.2 with my aperture set between 1.2-2.0.

You can find more of Jules’ work here: BLOGSITE and FB

24 Apr 13 \\ 5 comments

April Session Spotlight | Krista Keller

As soon as I saw this session, I knew I wanted to share it. Light can be found almost anywhere and as photographers, we are always in search of it. One of my favorite places to photograph is in my garage. Krista Keller of Krista Keller Photography shares this affinity for the light that comes in from the garage door as you can see in this beautiful session.

Here’s what she had to say:

I think I have fallen back in love with garage light. I don’t know how I ever fell out of love with it but right now I’m hooked. It is the most exquisite light there is…and it’s all I want to shoot. Our project 12 portrait group challenged ourselves to shoot using directional light from the garage. It took me awhile to get started because I am so used to shooting outdoors and taking my cues from the sun, but once I did, I didn’t want to stop. I started with Lindsay and shot her through a small door that leads into the garage. My grey background was very far back and thus it looks black with the shadows. I wanted it to feel as if she was there with nothing around her. I shot Grant next and we had the garage door open and the background at an angle to the door’s opening. I positioned him just in the shadows. Katie went last and by then I was feeling a bit more in the groove. She was further into the garage where there was more contrast to the lighting. I love how her shots turned out. It is amazing what light can do and how, by changing up your angle, you can change up the mood of a picture. Light can convey so much emotion- its pretty amazing!

Krista’s work can be found: WEBSITE, BLOG, Facebook.

13 Mar 13 \\ 2 comments

March Session Spotlight | Lara Gilbert Photography

Simplicity at its finest. Those were my thoughts when I saw this drop-dead beautiful engagement session from Bloom’s own Lara Gilbert. So often clients are worried about choosing just the right clothing to make them look their best. This is a perfect example of focusing on the connection between people rather than on what they are wearing. The white fits so perfectly with this incredible seaside location shot with a Canon 5d mark ii and 50mm 1.4 lens.

Here’s what Lara had to say about this session:

I was thrilled when this beautiful couple asked me to take some engagement photos for them. We went to Cape Schanck on the beautiful Mornington Peninsula, in Victoria, Australia. It was a perfect fresh, sunny evening and we all had an absolute ball climbing around rocks and watching the sun set. It was perfect.

For more of Lara’s work:
BLOG
FB

13 Feb 13 \\ 2 comments

February Session Spotlight | Tina Hunter

One of our favorite things over at the Bloom Forum is the monthly personal project groups many of us participate in together. Our groups range all the way from fine art projects, 365 projects to lifestyle projects. In addition to the comradare, these group projects are a great way to motivate each other to get out and shoot more for ourselves so we can grow and remember why it is we fell in love with photography to begin with. This month’s featured session is from Tina Hunter and as soon as I saw the first image, I knew this series was perfect for the middle of this crazy winter we’ve been having all over the United States.

In Tina’s words:
I am participating in a group project called “what ____ looks like” and our theme last month was winter. Since I typically stick to photographing my kids, I wanted to shoot this theme without them. It was fun to head out solo with my camera. I was able to slow down and take the time to look for things interesting enough to photograph. And I rediscovered that the process of just me and my camera out on a date was highly therapeutic!

The only downside to photographing these pictures was I procrastinated on the project a bit and then there was no snow for quite some time. Fortunately, the week we were posting we got quite a bit, which was great, but I think the high temperature on the day I took most of these was around 10 degrees F. It was cold!

Find more of Tina Hunter’s work, including previous “what does ___ look like” posts here:
Photojournal
Pinterest