The Start of Groupon

In all the years of being a photographer, I have never been brought to tears. Today we started a groupon deal with a salon. To our great surprise, a GREAT SUCCESS! But one of the buyers was in a time bind. She called and asked if she could schedule an appointment today. She told me about how she was in going in tomorrow to have her left breast removed and this was the last chance she had to be brave and have boudoir photos done. I was put in a bit of a bind knowing how Groupon worked and it was not guaranteed that the deal would go on. On top of which, I was not entirely sure if I was being told the truth and she understood that. So I gave her the benefit of the doubt.

When I arrived to the salon to fix up my mini studio, the girls were talking about their concern if this woman could be scamming us. I told them either way, I am not worried.

The woman arrived in her hat, and I immediately knew she was telling me the truth. She was diagnosed with breast cancer last year and after a year of chemo therapy, more lumps grew. Everything  happened so fast for her, and she finally decide to be brave on the last minute and have her photos taken to remember how she looked with her breast.

During the session, she showed me her scars. All the while telling about all the things she went through. I came to conclusion that she is a brave woman with positive attitude.

At the end of our session, she asked to do one last photo. She wanted one with a pink feather boa wrapped underneath her breast. I took 2 shots, but the last one I knew IMMEDIATELY it was the one. The photo was the epitome of my company's name. Her photo was truly worth a thousand words. And with that thought, I had to step out. It brought me to tears. I will never forget her!

February 22, 2011 Update:
The brave woman has consented for me to use the very image that brough me to tears.

 

 

 

February 6, 2014

 

RIP Theresa! Thank you for letting me share this with the world. You reminded me of why I wanted to be a photographer. Whenever I want to give up, I think of this moment!

Never To Be Taken For Granted

Transformer Barricade

The link I have posted is from my DeviantArt account. As promised, I am retelling old stories from my previous blog.

This photo was taken a lil' over 2  years ago. It was a calendar project to raise money for the "Make A Wish Foundation". Needless to say it fell through, but the experience and lessons were greatly earned!

This project was a two day photo shoot with Mustangs and models. I had to learn real quick about shadows and reflections! Posing a model with cars is not as easy as it seems.

Day one: COMPLETE FRUSTRATION! I was given some experienced  models and models who knew nothing about being a model! I was also given wannabe models. Oy, what headache! I am sure if you have experience with models, you would know that if you have to pound out photos and the model is not listening to your directions, you are not going to use her very often! This poor model looked like I was going to kill her with my camera!

Day Two: This day truly tried my patience. I set a time and it is not a time of day I care for, but I am where I was suppose to be at 5am! 2 hours later, the models and everyone else shows up! I am a bit disgruntled at this point!

At 8am we leave finally to our location of photo shoot. This part was actually fun for me. Most models that day knew what to do and how to do it. HOWEVER, I did get a wanna be model! I did my best to make her look good, but to be honest, she is past her prime and she refuses to admit to it! I know that may seem harsh, but I am being honest and realistic. I am shooting a hot all girl calendar with sexy cars, not cougars with sexy cars!

At the end of the day, I was dead beat tired. Unfortunately, I had to get cracking on the photos. Editing photos can be a lil' gruesome. After quite a few hours, I was done.

I had delivered the images, only to be told that they decided to not go forward with the calendar. Not only that, but they demanded me to hand over my images so that they can do as they please with them. First of all, that WAS NEVER in our agreement. I made it PERFECTLY clear about rights to my images. They claimed they understood and was ok with it!

In the end they claimed they contacted a lawyer, and when I hear those claims, I actually do talk with a lawyer. I was assured they had no case. I did what I was suppose to do to protect my images. Oh what a sigh of relief!

I think what upset me the most is that for 1) I gave a big discount rate since it was for charity. 2) Their claim for business ethics, and how they have been taken for granted. 3)All who were involved got SCREWED!

I learned a great deal from this, but the best lesson I took more then anything is never be taken for granted!

2011

Since I have become a professional photographer, there have been so many ups and downs. Every once in a while, I go through my portfolio and see how far I have come. Such a big difference from then and now! There are times that I can't believe how much I have learned and changed. To me, all of it is truly amazing!

Yet even though I do find all of this to be amazing, I am still frustrated. I am not where I want to be in my career. I am constantly looking for ways to breakthrough and be noticed. Sometimes I get close to a glimmer of hope, but it quickly fades away. I am hard to encourage and easily discouraged.

I put 2011 as the title because this is going to be my year! So many random opportunities have come to me that will help make me shine since the 1st of this month. I pray and hope that it will continue to reach my goals. And even if doesn't, I will never give up. I have come to far to ever give up! This is my life, my love and joy!

A new beginning...

Once upon a time, we had blog with word press. And we have decided we no longer like it. With a little research, we decided to go with blogger.com! It is so much easier and simpilar! Which makes it easier for us to return to blogging about our adventures, or even news about products that can be useful for any level of photographers!

We hope our stories will be inspiring or even found to be amusing. At this time we will try to update everyday with our past posts from our previous blogs!

We would love to hear from you about your adventures with photography or your experience with a photographer! Until then, we will keep capturing wonderful moments!

~Kitty & Doug