Day 150

Last post of four today! I am still excited about my weekend. I hope that you all have a blessed and safe Memorial Day today. We are having some friends over for a bbq, but before we do that, some yard work has to be done. I captured my husband teaching our youngest how to mow. Precious! I will love this photo for a long time... these are the moments, right? 

I walked out onto the porch with such confidence today! Guess what MeRa Koh's workshop is called? Confidence Workshop. Yep, it works! I set my settings, metered, even knew why, and voila! A great SOOC photo.. just like I wanted it! I'm liberated. Really!

Day 150

Settings:

ISO 400, f/4.5, ss 1/1000, 50 mm

Day 149

Day two! I was so excited to get up this morning and dive into the day...again! Today in Chicago it poured. Thunder and lightening, the whole package. We had family models that were coming, and had to change plans and not work outdoors. This did challenge us, but guess what? We learned so much! I've never pushed my ISO so high on my camera. I just figured it wasn't possible without grain. You know what? IT IS! 

This photo was such a typical moment for this weekend. I love it because it will always be special to me. The people, the instruction, the personal stories of hardship and life challenges, everything! This is MeRa walking us through a shoot before we started. The rest of the day was mostly families and working on Lightroom. I was so excited to learn lightroom, too! Then, see the lens she's using? I actually got to practice with it later. It's the 24-70 mm 2.8 and I'm in love with it! I've had it on my wish list for almost a year. My wish list is a note of one item on my homeschooling wall. :)

Day 149

Settings:

ISO 1600, f/2.8, ss 1/40, 50 mm

Day 148

The time had come! I was FINALLY at a MeRa Koh workshop! 

I'm back! I had THE best weekend! I was mentored by the one and only, MeRa Koh and her husband, Brian at an all weekend workshop here in Chicago. I've been waiting for her to come here, and she finally did! Let me just recommend this weekend highly! I think if you want to be a photographer in any way, shape, or form, go to her workshop! It will liberate, challenge, inspire, excite and educate you! Most of all, I feel like I was given permission to go out there, and get my business going!  

Day one, the workshop featured baby models. A family came, and I couldn't get past the dad and his son's shoes. I am more determined to look at details that ever before, and I also can attribute that to our 365 challenge! This was a step one for me, and I am so happy that I just dove in and kept it up!

Day 148

Settings: SOOC

ISO 400, f/1.4, ss 1/30, 85 mm 

(yes, I said, EIGHTY FIVE mm! Finally something different. I got to use MeRa's!)

Day 92

What a great day! It was beautiful, the clouds were absolutely gorgeous. I grabbed my camera bag as we took the girls out for the day. I commented on the perfect clouds above, ripped open my camera case, and.... no camera. 

Scratch.

We came home after a fun day, I had a migraine, so I went right to bed. Woke up to evening, with my husband and youngest giggling away downstairs playing Pirates of the Caribbean LIFE. I had just watched a snipped of the MeRa Koh video Refuse to Say Cheese. She had talked about capturing a moment. Not asking them to look up and say cheese, but actually capturing what they are doing, and who they are. So I grabbed my trusty 50 mm because of our dimly lit living room, and started snapping away. 

I got them playing their game, but also captured a moment that we can enjoy whenever we look back and see the difference between the size of their hands, and a fun time shared between the two of them.

 Day 92

Settings:
ISO 200, f/1.8, ss 1/25, 50 mm

(not sure why ISO was 200 - probably because I was aperture priority?)