My partner in crime, Chrissy and I photographed a wedding this past Saturday and I’m

busy working on the photos from it today.  We had a great time and the family and friends

of the family were just awesome!

Shooting a wedding this weekend!  Stay tuned to the blog for some sneak peaks starting Sunday!

And I’ll leave you with these two cuties….

My husband had to get up early this morning and leave the house by 4:30am.  That

means, I’m up too.  And I can’t go back to sleep.  Bah.

I miss those days when I was younger and I could actually sleep in till 9am no matter

who or what woke me up.  I could always fall back to sleep, not any more.

So, I figured I’d do a post here on the blog and share with you some

information that some wonderful professional photographers have been sharing lately!

Holly McCaig did a blog post about how she edits her images.  Her process is quick,

and gets the results she needs.  She even created an action in photoshop for what

she does and you can too.  Check out her blog post here.  Be sure to scroll through

the rest of her blog, Holly’s style is just lovely, especially her senior images!

I just stumbled upon Melissa Jill’s blog the other day (thanks to a post on Holly’s blog!)

and realized she has a ton of information on starting your business, products,

lenses, and photo tips.  I’m always thrilled when a pro shares information like that.

She shares a ton of information in her FAQ section.

Also after reading this post by Melissa Jill, about back button focus from Chris Humphreys, I’ve since gone

in and changed the settings on my 50D, and am so far really liking it!  What a difference

it makes in composing scenes….whether you’re doing portraits, pets or even wildlife.

Speaking of Chris Humphreys, he’s got some great sections on his blog about photo

tips and photoshop tips.

The other day on the MCP blog,  Jodie Otte posted an article on ‘How Should I Price

My Photography.”  And I’ve since bookmarked that, sent it to some fellow photog

friends and have read it several times myself.  She talks about starting a photography

business with real numbers.

I love to read Jasmine Star’s blog, especially her FAQ Reader Questions posts she

does, she shares a lot of information that is great for pros and beginners.

Shooting wide open.  I’ve always thought that when I do portraits with the 50mm 1.8

that I should be at least at f/3.5, and I’ve since found out that shooting wide open at

f1.8 is the way to go!  Jasmine Star recently did a Q&A just for Facebook, check it

out here!  The best information on understanding shooting wide open is farther

down in that section when she replies to a question, “actually, the farther from the subject you stand, there’s more room for plane of focus. and by this i mean, if i’m shooting at a f/1.8 three feet from two subjects, the depth of field and focal point will be so much more noticeable. if i stand six feet away, it becomes less noticeable because the focal plane has widened. if i stand 12 feet away, the focal plane became so much greater.”

Since I don’t have any subjects to test shooting wide open on because I don’t have

any sessions set up till next weekend, I figured I’d test it on what was available,

my doggies

Unfortunately with Duchess (above), she has to stay on a leash when we go outside.

We live on five acres and if she was loose she’d never want to come back inside and

I’d end up spending a half an hour walking around the pastures chasing her while

she;  barked at the horses,  sampled their poop and looked for bunny rabbits to chase.  So, I couldn’t get

as far back from her as I’d like to shoot her wide open at 1.8, but it did work out

nicely with the shot above, especially shooting an all white dog in the mid day sun.

On the other hand, there’s Gunther.  My baby.  My first Great Dane.  He’s seven years

old now, I can’t believe how time has flown since we brought him home at eight

months old.  He’s such a good dog, having him from a puppy has helped a lot.  He

listens so well, and was easy to train.  He can go outside without a leash.  He runs

around like an idiot for a bit (in Great Danes this is called the ‘zoomies’), then he’ll

attempt to eat horse poop and look for rabbits till I tell him to stop, then he’ll do

his business and he’s ready to go inside.  We adopted Duchess four years ago, as an

adult, and I have no idea what they taught this dog…if anything…but we love them

both so very much.  What great dogs!  And they are always happy to oblige me and

my camera.

I’ve got a new holiday card in the shop at Pink Ink Studios this weekend.  It’s 5″x7″, in

.png format, 300dpi and sized to print at WHCC.com

Click preview to view it in the shop: