The Trees || Portraits

“I couldn’t live where there are no trees – something vital in me would starve” Anne spelled with an e

Downtown || Portraits

Best way to practice photography is to go shooting with this girl! I met up with an old friend that I had not seen in a while and I found out that she recently go into photography. When I heard about Elyse’s new hobby I knew I had to shoot with her, so I convinced Hannah to pose for us. Downtown Mckinney is filled with the most wonderful nooks and crannies, which makes it such a wonderful place to take pictures. I had so much fun with you guys, and we need to do this again!

I do not know much about photography, but one of the ways I am learning is simply by taking pictures. If you have looked around at tutorial and advice for taking good photos you have probably heard take lots of photos. Why do you need to take lots of photos? Well, you can learn from your mistakes. These past few weeks I have learned that I should start cranking my ISO up one notch to 400 so that I can bump down my shutter resulting in crisper photos. I got some gorgeous Easter photos, but I wish some of them could be crisper, but I have only been shooting since December. I usually have mine set at about 1/100-1/200, but most of the photos I have seen have a shutter speed of 1/600 or higher. I love my photos to be crisp; some of my photos are not crisp enough for me except for some of the close ups. I have learned a lot about my camera and is capabilities through my pictures. I have learned:

1) It’s ISO is terribly after 400 it gets really grainy and does not help the light that much. So I give up when it comes to night photos. 🙂

2) The flash makes faces look flat and lifeless, so I will put a homemade diffuser over it whenever I use it.

3) I have trouble with focusing, but I think my close ups come out way better than the larger views.

With all things considered I love having a DSLR, and I hope I can learn more about my aperture, RAW, manual white balance, and how to make my pictures sharper. What is your camera like?

xoxo Emma

Easter Thoughts

A short summary of what I think Easter is:

A poem

A quote

A thought

A word

A verse

A little excerpt from a school assignment:

“This past weekend was Easter and I think it is really easy to pass over this holiday without really being reminded of why we are celebrating and what it really stands for. I mean it doesn’t stand for the holiday of magical rabbits and candy – or does it? The society we live in has taken a precious day and turned it into some kind of springtime celebration by using rabbits that lay eggs to celebrate the that spring has arrived! Although the true meaning of Easter is about new life it is quite a different type of new life than the Easter eggs represent. It doesn’t mean the birth of a flower, but rather the chance Jesus gave us to be reborn and to be renewed. Jesus died so we could have life. Last Easter I was sitting in church and our Pastor told us that death is coming, death is real, death could come at any moment, and we all will eventually die. A few moments after this reminder of this very true reality a man two rows in from me kind of jerked and then before I knew it he was laying on the ground suffering from a heart attack. The congregation was dismissed, 911 was called, people gathered around to pray for this man, and I sat there thinking death really is real and it could come any year, any week, any day, any hour, and there is no escaping it. But Christians have the hope of 1 Corinthians 15:55 which says, ‘Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?'”

“By His wounds we are healed” – Isaiah 53:5

Hope your Easter was a wonderful day!

xoxo Emma