through Emerald tinted lenses

My Beautiful Nephew Beau

2008-07-29T20:41:00.000-07:00

In January, our friends Jarrod and Julia acquired Beauregaurd, a full-blood Basset Hound. Baby Beau posed for these pictures in February, but, alas, I am a negligent auntie and am just now getting around to getting them back to his parents. In any case, he's a pretty cute kid...even now that he's learned his "big-boy-bark..." which my own darling Claire (pictured in image 3) continually reminds us he has. Little instigator!

Jonathan

2008-07-16T15:20:00.001-07:00

Of the list of friends I have made through my husband and his crazy Friday Game Nights ("game" meaning World of Warcraft, Dungeons and Dragons, etc.), Jonathan is one of my favorites. Jonathan is always considerate and caring and willing to help with whatever catastrophe we're handling--like the time he bailed out my mother and I as we attempted to repair my rent-house closet after it collapsed on my two rambunctious dogs... ::sigh:: Memories. This portrait session is no exception. Jonathan asked me to take a few pictures of him as Graduation from ACU pictures for his mom--and I got the best smiles by reminding him of who they were for! Here are my favorites:

to view the rest of Jonathan's portraits, click here

Rick & Laura

2008-07-14T13:58:00.001-07:00

A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of shooting Rick and Laura's engagement photos. Rick is a friend I dearly miss since he moved to Fort Worth to be closer to Laura. His move was for a worthy cause, though, as he and Laura seem sincerely happy together!

We shot at two Fort Worth locations I had never been to--the Water Gardens, which were amazing...though not at all what I expected, and the Rose Chapel (which was adorable!), where Rick and Laura will be married next summer. Here are my favorite shots:

you can view the rest of their pictures here

Kaci and Dusty

2008-07-14T12:29:00.000-07:00

On May 10th, I had the pleasure of shooting the wedding of Kaci & Dusty in Olney, Texas. Here are a few of my favorites.

to view the rest of their images, click here

Kaci

2008-04-14T20:39:00.000-07:00

Two weeks ago, I had the pleasure of taking Kaci's bridal portraits. We had a LOT of fun and I found my dream home--believe it or not, still in Texas! This house had tons of natural light, beautiful details, and it was out in the quiet with a fantastic view. Thanks Kaci! I'm looking forward to working with you again at your wedding.

to view the rest of Kaci's portraits, click here

John & Anna

2008-04-07T19:15:00.000-07:00

While on a trip home in Louisiana, I had the pleasure of shooting John & Anna's engagement pictures. John is the brother of one of my best friends from school and acted as my older brother for the majority of high school. I had an absolute blast meeting John's bride-to-be and watching her laugh off his quirky antics.

to view the rest of John and Anna's pictures, click here

By the way: I'm testing frames and logos...what do you think of this combination?
Please leave a comment!!

Gensic-Finch Wedding

2008-03-24T12:55:00.001-07:00

to view Alison and Breandon's wedding photos, click here

an infamous hat makes a smokin' good time

2008-02-19T20:40:00.001-08:00

For Christmas, my parents surprised me with an antique photo light--bought off Ebay of course. So, a few weeks ago, as our husbands/friends were playing some silly boy game, Julia, Jen, Claire and I decided to play dress-up and test it out. My "new" toy has a 600 watt lightbulb in its itty-bitty, Model-T-headlight-shaped enclosure. After blasting ourselves with it the first time, we decided it needed to be shaded a little. We tried wax paper...and melted it. We tried the scrap material from my curtains...and set it on fire. Then we decided to just go out into the pitch black darkness and see how lit-up we could get Jen. Thats when we noticed the light itself was smoking from the inside. So we took a picture.

One of my trusted associates claims that you can only have this light on for 30seconds or less at a time. As someone who is used to working with hotlights, I find this hard to believe. The box it came in and instruction manual claim the light is for video--it even lists weddings as an event at which to use this product. If anyone else has some input as to how to use my toy without setting a grass fire, I'd love to hear it.

Not inclined to give up so soon, we substituted the fancy-smancy-flaming-photo equipment for a floor lamp my friend Jarrod found at a garage sale. Here are the results:

Jen a-la-1940's

Julia a-la-United Colors of Benetton Ad

Add to the mix: one innocent looking puppy and a feather boa

...and then let her speak her mind.

A perfect evening!

Waiting for Daddy...

2008-02-09T14:58:00.000-08:00

Just thought I'd post a picture of my babies waiting for Eric to get home.

Baumgartner Family Portraits

2008-02-04T18:46:00.001-08:00

The Baumgartner family:

Pierce Family Portraits

2008-02-03T12:12:00.000-08:00

A long, long time ago--well maybe not so long ago--the Pierce family helped me immensely in pulling off my wedding. Though it doesn't come close to repaying the debt, I offered to take a family portrait in return. Here are the results:

Lady Claire Bailey

2008-01-01T14:17:00.000-08:00

Todays post is coming not from Emerald, but rather her husband Eric. Yesterday, New Year's Eve, Emerald and myself were heading out the door to get the appropriate material components for some festive New Year's Eve beverages, when out from beneath the truck appears a surprise. It was the four-legged and furry kind of surprise. And it was cute...very cute.

Now, I am not a dog person (or at least I wasn't a dog person until I married Emerald and she came home one day holding a fuzzy black thing named Indiana saying, "Please don't kill me."), but this cute little thing somehow weaseled it's white and black spotted self into my heart a little too quickly.

When she was found she had a little leather collar and four paws of painted finger-nails. So for now we are assuming she was some child's Christmas present and that child will want her back. We walked around the neighborhood, but nobody had ever even seen her before. I went and put signs up this morning with my phone number. We will give it a week and if we hear nothing, well, Indy has needed a playmate, right?

In the meantime, we needed to call her something. So I present to you, Lady Claire Bailey; disturber of Indys, snatcher of chewies, and Queen of cuteness:

Busy Weekend!

2007-12-16T12:12:00.000-08:00

This weekend my husband graduated from ACU and I've had three portrait sessions--my brother and sister-in-law yesterday, Abigail (again, yay!) and her family this morning, and another sister-in-law with her boyfriend later this afternoon. Add the rest of Eric's family into the mix and it's been a very busy weekend...although Indy has been !thrilled! to have so many people to play with--especially his Auntie Kayla.

Here are some pictures from the weekend:

Abigail and her family

Chris, Melissa and Emma Rose

Chris and Melissa

Emma Rose

Indy, my darling Indy

Baby Emerald

2007-11-12T20:40:00.001-08:00

I am among those lucky enough to have someone named after me--Meet Baby Emerald, my friend Jarrod's niece. Jarrod's sister Andra says, "if you don't want someone to name their kid after you, don't leave your business card laying around with your name in pretty script."

The Lovely Miss Abigail

2007-11-12T19:25:00.000-08:00

Today I had the pleasure of photographing the lovely Miss Abigail for Christmas Card photos. Here is one of my favorites!

Miss Abigail

Indy's First Halloween

2007-11-04T13:12:00.001-08:00

As someone, ::cough, Kalyn:: very near and dear to my heart recently pointed out, I have left my readers with over 90 days of "blog-less" disappointment. To remedy this situation, Indy has written a post he likes to call...

"How to Schnooker a Pretty Lady out of Halloween Candy."

#1-- Position yourself next to the pretty lady passing out Halloween candy.

#2--Look really cute.

#3--Lean in close to the candy to get your ears rubbed.

#4--Lean in closer and give the pretty lady a kiss.

#5--While she's reeling from your kiss, put a paw in the
candy to rake it from the pretty lady's lap.

#6--Get caught.

#7--Foiled again. But at least I look cute in my pirate costume!

Here are some other pictures from Indy's first Halloween...where he escaped from the house--leashless--and ran up and down the street barking at innocent trick-or-treaters.

Emerald-the-pirate and Belle-the-Arabian-Princess

Jarrod, looking dashing in Medieval dress

Eric, looking, well, like Eric

Jarrod unwrapping Jen
(Julia is supervising from outside the frame)

Aaron and Brandy

From left to right: Sarah as a child on Christmas morning; Jen as a Christmas present; Ben, Sarah's boyfriend, as a Christmas tree; Paul, Marnie's boyfriend, as Zorro; and Marnie as Sarah's twin on Christmas morning

Rick as a "horny (get it???) little devil"

::sings::
Our House, in the middle of our street
our house, in the middle of our

our house it has a crowd
there's always something happening
and it's usually quite loud...
(--Our House, by Madness, just in case you were wondering)

Happy Halloween!!!!!!

Kayla and Darby

2007-07-25T20:19:00.000-07:00

You can view their pictures by clicking here
Let me know what you think!

What Emerald is doing these days...

2007-07-16T19:37:00.000-07:00

I have recently joined the world of Facebook, and if you have also been sucked into this whirlpool of mindless web-surfing, and if you have become my "friend" on Facebook, you'll have noticed that for the past few days, my "status" has been "overwhelmed by the million-gazillion pictures from Kayla's wedding she now gets to edit." (That was a really long, badly constructed sentence.) Aside from my usual job working at Belle's, I've been diligently sorting and editing Kayla's wedding photos. Kayla might have asked me to put some photos on my blog, and this one will just have to do until Monday when I promised her I'd show her the pictures.

Our friend Kalyn, me and now Kayla have all worn the same necklace at our weddings...it's becoming a "Fat Tuesday" tradition. So Kayla asked me to take a portrait of her featuring this necklace. Here it is. Please click on it to view it larger, it has an artistic finish on it that you won't be able to see at the small "blog-size."

As always, let me know what you think!

Jarrod and Julia

2007-07-04T21:05:00.000-07:00

Click here to view their images
As always, Let me know what you think!

Lunch by Candlelight

2007-06-25T13:56:00.001-07:00

Feeling slightly nostalgic for my photojournalistic days, I've decided to narrate this post as if it were a photo story. From my journalism classes at ACU, I got the general impression that the best photo stories tell the story in as few pictures as possible. In fact, if you can tell an entire story with one picture, you have met your ultimate goal. This story has 21 pictures...I fail. But, I do hope you enjoy them!

Lunch by Candlelight: Kayla Anderson's Bridal Luncheon
Photos and Story by: Emerald Lemmons

Closing the door behind me, I stepped out of the sunny June day and into the cool elegance of a well decorated home. The pale yellow walls and warm-toned furniture accented the bright daisies and glowing candles placed strategically about the room with a decorator's eye. Today was a day of appreciation, of celebration and, most importantly, of food. I had just walked in to Kayla Anderson's Bridal Luncheon.

The luncheon was held in the home of and hosted by Judy, a long-time friend of the family. Although Judy was a lovely woman, she asked that I not take her picture and since she was feeding me, I acquiesced.

Each place was set with a tiny bell holding a place card and a small bag of jelly-bellies and m&m's.

In the center of the dining table and the hostess table were lovely arrangements of candles and daises--the same daises the bride carried as a bouquet in her bridal portraits.

Soon after arriving, the hostesses had us take our places and began to serve lunch.

Those in attendance were:

Kayla- the bride

Whitney- a bridesmaid

Brittany- a bridesmaid

Steph- a close friend of the bride

Erin- a close friend of the bride

Amy- a bridesmaid and the bride's cousin

Hannah- the maid of honor and the bride's sister

...and me of course. After lunch, Norma, another hostess and friend of the family, appeared with some surprise gifts for the bride. We were all charmed by her first gift--a tiny blue leather covered box of all the letters, cards, and thank-you notes Kayla had ever written to her. Imagine, keeping those mementos for so many years! (Not that I think you're old, Kayla!)

We were equally charmed when Kayla read a thank-you note that she "wrote" when she was two years old. It read something to the effect of, "Thank-you Norma for the gift. Sorry I haven't been able to write you sooner, things have been rather hectic around here. I loved your gift and have placed it on the mantle. Thanks again! Love, Kayla."

The second present was one we had all contributed to (well, except for me, but I do intend on completing my homework!). It was a recipe box filled with recipes from Norma--who is an incredible cook--and the rest of us.

After Kayla received her gifts, she gave us a few...even the photographer walked away with a really cool pair of pajama pants!

All the bridesmaids were given lovely pearl necklaces to wear with their dresses at Kayla's wedding.

After the gifts and a cup of coffee (and tying pretty blue ribbons on what felt like hundreds of programs) we all gathered up our things and left for the bachelorette party, thanking Judy and Norma for the wonderful lunch they served as we walked out the door.

As for myself, I left wishing and planning to one day be able to host a party as lovely and as tasty as Kayla's bridal luncheon!

Why my dog is just as wonderful as Gus Gensic!

2007-06-24T18:45:00.000-07:00

They may be brothers, they may be the same color, but they are not at all alike, and of the two, people generally like Gus better for his docile disposition, entertaining stupidity, passion for water, and fluffy-like-a-bear coat. However, my dog is just as wonderful as Gus--and this is why: because, even with a hurt leg and no desire to move, Indy took the time to share his food with his best friend besides me...Crab.

See? Just as wonderful!

Experiments in display

2007-06-24T18:39:00.000-07:00

You may have noticed that the locations for my last two portrait sessions were similar. That is because a) both ladies wanted downtown portraits, b) the sessions were a day apart, and c) I wanted to run some experiments in posing, lighting, editing, and creative layouts. Here are the results of one of those experiments and I'd love to hear what you think about them!!

Erin and Brenden

2007-06-24T18:33:00.000-07:00

Erin is a friend of mine from my Fat Tuesday friends. She and her fiancee Brenden are getting married in December and asked me to do some quick engagement photos so they could get their "Save-the-dates" out on time. So, we played in downtown Abilene at sunset. Here are some of my favorites:

Josh and Allie

2007-06-24T18:15:00.000-07:00

It seems like every post lately has something to do with Kalyn. Josh and Allie are friends of Kalyn and her husband and pretty soon--if not already--they will be celebrating their second wedding anniversary. They asked me to take some pictures in honor of that event. Here are some of my favorites:

A wedding I didn't HAVE to photograph...

2007-06-24T18:06:00.001-07:00

Last weekend, Kalyn's cousin Emily got married. The wedding was several hours away and Kalyn was driving by herself and knew she would be coming back at night. Now since we haven't had a road trip in a while, haven't stopped at Dairy Queen in a while, and Kalyn's still a little deer-skittish, she asked me to come along with her and crash Emily's wedding. She also told me that her uncle Ron had planted an entire field of sunflowers in honor of Emily's wedding and I should bring my camera and we could go play in the flowers. So I did. But!, we didn't end up actually getting to the entire field of sunflowers.

So I pose this question: What does a wedding photographer do at a wedding where there's already a photographer?

The answer: Try not to take pictures for the first hour and a half and then give in and bombard the people she knows with her camera. So here you have it...portraits and portraits of flowers.

Monks (the non-monastic, non-OCD kind)

2007-06-24T17:55:00.000-07:00

Monks is a coffee shop in downtown Abilene. There slogan is, "Keep Abilene boring." I like it. I also like that the periodically display local artists' work as their wall decorations. Good coffee and good art totally go hand in hand. This month, along with several others, my friend Kalyn's work is displayed. She has a wide variety of pieces ranging from modern art to roosters. You should totally go check it out! Monks is located at 233 Cypress Street.

Here are some pictures from her "gallery opening":

Considering how many times Kalyn has appeared on my blog--and the THINGS she writes on HER blog--this may be a shock, but she's actually very shy. Hence the pillow hiding whilst I try to take her picture by her artwork. ::sigh::

Orange Prom Dress steals the show...

2007-06-18T16:14:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I worked with Belle's on a private lesson to a couple just getting into the business. They had attended a group workshop Belle's had put on and wanted further experience and portfolio pieces. So, Holly and I took them on a mock senior shoot where my favorite fairy princess bride posed in her own personal BRIGHT ORANGE PROM DRESS! At first I wasn't a big fan of her rainbow colored socks, but Holly was right, they do add ambiance. ::grin:: Let me know what you think!

Good fairy, bad fairy...

2007-06-14T15:09:00.000-07:00

The day after Jarrod and Julia's wedding, I helped with Belle's Abilene workshop. Here are some of my images from that class. The model is a high school student who loves ponies and unicorns and FAIRIES! And she was so cool, she even brought wings to the shoot! So here she is...let me know what you think!

I thought she looked so overwhelmed by all the photographers. What you can't see in the following image is the other six cameras and the other six humans shooting at her from the sides.

This marks the end of my catch-up period. Hopefully, the next post will be
Jarrod and Julia's wedding!!!!

Speed Bridals...

2007-06-08T14:06:00.001-07:00

Wednesday, I did a bridal session with Belle's. While the session lasted about an hour and a half--which is normal or slightly short as far as bridals go--it felt like the absolute fastest bridal session ever! The location was a lovely Presbyterian church downtown and it really seemed like just as soon as I was set up, it was time to move to the next spot. Anyway, here are my favorites, let me know what you think!

I couldn't resist posting this one. I call this "The Perplexed Bride." This is what happens when the photographer tells the model to do something and but she doesn't make any sense whatsoever.

Pictures to send Mom...

2007-06-06T10:20:00.000-07:00

For Mother's Day, my sister-in-law Marnie had the idea that we should give my mother-in-law pictures of her kids as a gift (since some certain boys, excluding their weddings, hadn't had pictures made since they graduated from high school. Tisk, tisk!). We already had pictures of Marnie and Chris (and I might have forced Eric to go take pictures against his will), but since Kayla goes to school at Pepperdine University in California (where the "cafeteria" overlooks the PACIFIC OCEAN!!!!) taking pictures of her was a little more challenging. Getting her pictures back in time for M-day proved impossible--we ended up taking them the day before. But after giving the other three framed prints to Jan, we showed her Kayla's delinquent image on my computer screen and I think she liked it.

So now that I'm catching up on my photo-editing, here are the rest of Kayla's pictures. We chose number 3 for Jan, the rest are lagniappe. My favorite is number 2. Let me know what you think!

Believe it or not, these two lovely ladies are twins. Who would have thunk it?

Photographer Amy

2007-06-05T23:14:00.000-07:00

After a two-week hiatus to Louisiana, I am back and catching up on my photo-editing. Meet "Photographer Amy," a young lady who is--imagine that--also a photographer and who recently got married. She traveled all the way to Abilene to have Belle's do her bridals. Here are the results, let me know what you think!

Beautiful Julia

2007-05-15T18:56:00.000-07:00

Despite monsoon season, we finally finished Julia's bridals--just in time for a heavy thunderstorm! Let me know what you think about beautiful Julia!

Closed for Business

2007-05-14T21:50:00.000-07:00

Emerald and Eric's Bed and Breakfast for stray animals is officially closed for business.

Chris caved.

Meet Emma Rose!

2007-05-14T18:20:00.000-07:00

This weekend we were blessed to have Eric's family in town for Melissa's graduation (and to steal away his freshman sister Marnie) and we very much enjoyed their visit! Our enjoyment did not stop us from being exhausted, however, and after they departed we enjoyed a four hour nap. This left our darling only-dog, Indy, to his own devices, as he was NOT exhausted. So, as we were going to bed, we decided to take Indy for his nightly wear-the-dog-out-so-we-can-go-to-bed walk.

Our routine is to walk in a several block square, just enough to make both Indy and Eric whine by the time we're back home. But on this occasion, as we were walking past the last neighbor's house something small, furry and mewing moved toward the nagging wife and the whining husband and dog. It was...

Now we saw the cat and immediately thought of Melissa, who was been wanting a pet and whose husband, Chris, doesn't like dogs. In fact, the more we looked at Emma Rose, the more we thought she'd be the perfect cat for Melissa and Chris. So, we took her into Emerald and Eric's Bed and Breakfast for Stray Animals, gave her a bowl of water and half a can of The World Famous Bean's Tuna, and waited for this afternoon when we could call Melissa and say "please come get your cat!"

However, as Valentina in Marina Lewycka's A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian would say, Melissa's "no-good meanie husband" said "no."

So, for the moment, we are stuck with a kitten, waiting for someone to convince Chris that Emma really does belong at his house. Someone???? Anyone????

Project Carolyn, Part II

2007-05-14T17:44:00.000-07:00

I've actually had this update ready to post for quite some time and just keep forgetting to upload it. Let me know what you think. I'll explain below.

Carolyn originally asked for just the DQ pictures in this project but here's my dilemma: to make a square picture, you must have even rows of pictures across the frame in both left-right and up-down. However, we were just goofing around at DQ at the end of a very long photo-shoot and you can see--especially in Kalyn's picture--that we've had enough of being models for the day. So there are only seven possible shots (six individual and one group) in that arrangement. I would have to have at least nine shots to make the image Carolyn suggested.

I half-solved it by leaving the images rectangular instead of square, allowing me to have the 3x4 arrangement of images and still use a square background. Hence the reason I added bluebonnets in.

here's to my belief in the Abilene Weathermen

2007-05-06T18:30:00.000-07:00

Today I was scheduled to take bridal portraits of my friend Julia. As you can see, this is not Julia. 1 hour before we were scheduled to go out, tornado warnings started popping across the screen of our tvs, the skies had been dark already but they got darker, and thunder boomed ominously. Considering we were shooting an $800 dress, Julia, Melissa (my sister-in-law who was doing Julia's hair for her), and I decided that since Julia's wedding is only in !TWO WEEKS!, it would be best not to shoot her bridals in a severe thunderstorm.

One hour passed, two hours passed, at 2 1/2 hours I got bored and made Eric pose for 8minute portraits at Jacob's Dream on ACU's campus, and now, at 8:40pm, not one drop of rain, not one piece of hail, not one tornado has fallen.

So to tied you over, here's my goofy husband and (hopefully) very soon, we'll have pretty pictures of Julia in her dress!

Project Carolyn (plus a scantilly clad Kayla)

2007-05-04T22:17:00.000-07:00

The other day, my friend Carolyn e-mailed and asked if I could arrange a collage of pictures of the Fat Tuesday group for her to frame and take with her to her new job in Dallas (graduation stinks...everyone starts moving!).

This is Carolyn.

And this is what I came up with so far:

Carolyn (or any of the other Fat Tuesday girls) please email or comment and tell me how I could make this closer to what you had in mind!

Also, this weekend, we all attended Kayla's Lingerie Shower!!!!! Since that's more of a private affair and posting pictures could be a little embarrassing, I've tried to post only portraits with a few of the "tasteful" present-opening-shots thrown in. Enjoy and let me know what you think!

Black Tulip of Celebration

2007-04-28T16:57:00.000-07:00

Finally, my last ACU tie has been cut--I am, officially, no longer editor of the Shinnery Review. Now let's be honest, even though we were "co-editors," Kalyn was the only real editor of the Shinnery Review, and I was the person she assigned things to when she absolutely didn't have time to do them because she knew I absolutely didn't have time to do them and wouldn't do them unless she absolutely didn't have time to do them. Which is not exactly a strong point of my character. ::thoughtful pause:: But in my defense, I am no longer a student at ACU and didn't plan on graduating a semester early when I decided to help Kalyn co-edit the magazine.

So, my harried 4:00 trips to the Ad Building every Wednesday are officially over. My hurried attempts at being an entire art/advertising department??? Finis! Au revoir to late night meetings, phone calls, and interviews with Kalyn answering questions about things I know nothing about. And so long to Abilene Christian University...as soon as they send me my blasted diploma.

Here are pictures from the Black Tulip, an annual poetry reading-- and our final event as editors!

The Shinnery Review will be on sale for $5 in the
ACU campus center during finals week

Kalyn's husband BJ, and their friend Alyson Bellisle
manning the cheesecake table while listening to poetry

Professor Al Hailey, the Shinnery Review's sponsor,
reading a little poetry of his own

Dustin Reid, an ACU student, singing his own poetry and
playing his own accompaniment...because isn't music poetry?

This year's staff of the Shinnery Review (minus a few people)
photo by: Rachel Lau

The Melissa Lemmons Photography Gallery

2007-04-23T14:15:00.000-07:00

Featured Artist: Emerald Lemmons

A few months ago, I posted my new "interior decorator line" inspired by my sister-in-law, Melissa. At that time, I told you I would update you on what she ordered. In the mean time, she went bargain hunting in thrift stores for frames, spray painted them "antiqued silver," and popped over to my house to argue over prints with me. Here's what we decided:

Over the bed 20x30 (black border represents the mat):

Poets, Witches and Pretty Pink Flowers

By itself on one wall 8x8 with 2 inch mat:

Burning Birdies

As a series along one wall facing their window:

Big Ben

Divine Light through Cologne Cathedral

Wrought-iron Wonder of Holyrood Palace

First Glimpse of London
(through Trafalgar Square Tube Station exit)

Blarney Tower

On the wall near the window 5x7:

Chris

On Chris's nightstand 5x7:

Melissa

So, basically, their bedroom turned into a private gallery for displaying my work. If anyone else is interested in modifying my interior decorator line to fit your needs--or requesting a personal themed line of your own--let me know!

Yellow Roses of Texas...in bluebonnets and DQ!

2007-04-22T18:55:00.000-07:00

I know I've posted about Fat Tuesday before, but I thought I'd explain again (since, after casually mentioning taking pictures of my Fat Tuesday Friends to my brother-in-law, he calmly told me that none of them looked fat to him...grrrrrrrr). A group of my friends take turns cooking for each other on Tuesdays. Since dessert is one of the most important parts of this meal--and we have it on Tuesday--we call it Fat Tuesday, a play on the original, which is also about gluttony. Coincidentally, this same set of friends are the ones who were wonderful enough to get me Indy for my birthday.

So last week at Fat Tuesday, we were talking about bluebonnets and decided we should all go take bluebonnet pictures as a group. Now, I'm the only one of our group who is not from Texas. I've never taken bluebonnet pictures of any kind before. In fact, I have never, before this weekend, been even six feet from a bluebonnet. Did you know bluebonnets have a smell???

Anyway, so, we set off around 2:00 down a farm road and finally decided to stop at some poor farmer's house. We drove down the mile long driveway and elected Kalyn and Kayla (who are definitely the most persuasive while still remaining cute) to knock on the door and ask if we could take pictures in the guy's front yard. He said yes.

Some of the pictures turned out looking like head-shots for the Miss Texas competition (Kalyn!!), but they all turned out pretty cute. And the girls were nice enough to wield my huge, more-buttons-than-a-Nasa-control-center camera to take a few shots of me.

Enjoy!

Carolyn

Kayla

Erin

Brittany

Kalyn

Me pretending to be Ferdinand

photo by: Kalyn

Erin using my reflector cover to keep her hair from blowing in the
silly Abilene wind!

Us pretending we're models with "attitude,"
at least from the direction of our derrières.

After the bluebonnet shoot, we decided to make a quick stop in at
Dairy Queen--the perfect end to a characteristically Texan day.

photo by: Carolyn

Surprise Bridals

2007-04-16T20:05:00.000-07:00

This weekend I helped Belle's with another workshop in Dallas. It went really well--I got to teach the participants about window light portraits--and we even had a surprise twist of events! One of the members of the church we were shooting at had planned on taking bridal portraits of his daughter that day...so, since we were monopolizing all the pretty spots in the church, we offered to use her as a model. Instead of one dad shooting his camera at her, she ended up with 26 professional photographers shooting at her. Talk about star shock!

To further the strangeness of the situation, it turned out that she was an ACU grad and, though neither of us recognized the other at first, we had actually taken a photography class together. Talk about irony! Anyway, meet Katy Rowan and let me know what you think of my set of her bridals. I think #3 makes her look like a queen, what do you think?

Shooting through the fog

2007-04-09T19:39:00.000-07:00

Over spring break, our friends Jarrod and Julia came home with me and Eric to my parents' house for some rest and Cajun cooking. While we were there, we sneaked in some engagement pictures. Our plan was to get up and go to the beach at sunrise since we're from Abilene and there is no such thing as beach where we've chosen to reside. We did not, however, expect the unpredictable Louisiana weather...so we ended up shooting the majority of their engagement pictures in fog. Yes, you heard me, fog. Let me tell you that's interesting to say the least. But they were great sports and we all had a lot of fun. Just before sunset everything cleared up so we went out to the Sallier Oak (the oldest tree in Calcasieu Parish) and took a few more just in case I couldn't edit fog. Here are my favorites...I have about 8 gazillion more to choose from, though. Enjoy and tell me what you think!

Kayla, Kayla, Kayla!

2007-04-07T00:37:00.000-07:00

Last fall, I had the pleasure of shooting Kayla and her fiancé Darby's engagement photos. This weekend, Kayla and I went down to Waco to shoot her bridal portraits. I had a beautiful model with a beautiful dress and two WONDERFUL assistants (the mother and future mother-in-law of the bride), BUT, due to operating hours at the arboretum, we were shooting a very white dress in full high-noon sunlight. So here are the favorites. Let me know what you think and Kayla, I hope you like them!

More puppy pictures!

2007-04-07T00:33:00.000-07:00

So the other day I hauled Indy out in the yard and made Eric take pictures of us. I thought he did so good (since he had to battle my huge manual camera)! So, here we are! Isn't he cute!

The dog ate my homework (and other bad excuses for not posting)

2007-04-01T20:45:00.000-07:00

The past two months have been a strange time for me. Last semester was a blur between getting graduated and getting married and finishing my internship. This semester has just been busy. I started my job as a substitute teacher--which I absolutely love. I've been shooting stuff for Belle's Photography, which has been a blast, and doing a little babysitting while they finish up the studio (also fun!). AND Eric and I acquired the light of my life, Indiana Jones Lemmons...our dog.

Eric and I have been attending the church where my former (very texan) roommate, Kalyn's Yankee husband preaches. It's a very small country congregation and we just love it (and BJ's 10 minute sermons)! In February, one of the members found 12 Old English Sheepdog/German Shepherd mix puppies under his house. These are big puppies. Kalyn took me out "just to look." And I absolutely fell in love with Indy. So, my friends (who are wonderful!) went out and got him and food and toys and a bowl and puppy treats and a leash and his first set of shots and gave him to me for my birthday in March.

And that's when I began to have absolutely no free time.

Here are pictures of Indy the weekend we got him.

Getting Indy meant we needed to move to a place that could accommodate a big dog. So we spent the next three weeks house hunting, painting, and moving all our stuff. It may only get three lines in the blog, but I assure you it's a much bigger deal.

Throw in a week in some little kids, bunny rabbits, and a trip to Louisiana for Spring Break-- where I shot an Engagement session I still haven't finished editing--and you've got the makings for a very busy month.

Then, Belle's Photography has started doing portraiture workshops. Two weeks ago, we were in Dallas and this weekend we were in San Antonio. We hire a model (our model in Dallas was Kristen and in San Antonio we had a Russian model named Lyuba), provide the dress, and show 6 to 12 aspiring photographers (or those who are experienced and want a fresh take on the process) what we do in a typical bridal session. So far the classes have turned out really great.

Here's what I got in between helping Mike and Holly at the Dallas workshop:

Here's what I got in between helping Mike and Holly at the San Antonio workshop:

Let me know what you think!

tales from a fifth grade nothing

2007-02-05T11:57:00.000-08:00

In response to my recent graduation I have taken a most lofty position as a substitute teacher for AISD. It's kind of like being The Fugitive--every day I'm someone new, some place new, pretending to know things I don't. Really, it's a rather exotic job.

On Friday I was a fifth grade teacher. Fifth graders are interesting creatures--in one moment they look sweet and innocent and they want to know all about you (what's your first name? how old are you? are you married? what's your favorite sport? if you had a choice between a new car and $100 which one would you take?...I'm not kidding, these are all actual questions). The next moment they're calling the teacher next door a "hater,"pronounced "hate-ah," one who dislikes the actions and/or beliefs of another, example: "Mrs. X is a hater. She's always up on me like I can't do nothing right." Then they proceed to sing Eminem songs at the top of their lungs, "Will the real Slim Shady...," while their classmates attempt to clip each other with office supplies, coat their hands with Elmer's glue, just to peel it off, and EAT holes through the center of their homework. My response to this, and I quote, was, "Ewwwwwwww."

At one point I had an intriguing conversation with a young lady in my class. She came up to the desk to ask me a question and in the process said the word "ain't." To which I corrected, "isn't." To which she countered, "Mrs. Lemmons, I'm from Texas and we don't say 'isn't' here." I was forced to admit she had a valid point and proceeded to blow fish bubbles of shock as she returned to her math worksheet.

But my all-time favorite, can't imagine how another student will top this, moment goes as follows:

For our science lesson, we were to watch an extremely boring video made by National Geographic on natural disasters. About half-way through the 38minute video, the kids completely lost interest and began yelling, screaming and being generally disorderly so I stopped the video and asked them questions about what they had seen. Finally, I asked the question, "Has anyone seen or lived through a natural disaster?" A little boy in the back of the room raised his hand and began attempting to tell me about a tornado he had witnessed, but he was so excited his words jumbled in his mouth and fell in a tangled mess at his feet confusing him and us in regards to what he was trying to say.

At this point, a little girl who was very very white, had glasses and long black stringy hair, and looked like she should belong to the future psychopathic killers of America said, "It's because he's Mexican. They all talk too fast."

She said this in a class where at least 50% of the students were Mexican.

I thought I was going to have a riot. The class erupted in comments all directed at this very unwise little girl. I then steered the conversation back to natural disasters and re-started the movie.

::sigh:: Fifth graders. ::shakes head:: Will wonders never cease?

Curious Alex (and family)

2007-01-26T14:01:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I had a surreal experience...my first baby shoot. The kid was really very cute. Alex was only 12 days old and still wrinkly with a crusty belly-button, but he was very alert. If you got too close he'd just stare and stare at you. Curious would be a good description and with a head of hair befitting someone much older than 12 days. But I didn't expect how wiggly he would be...or just how loud he could scream. And once, when Holly and Mom weren't around, he started screaming so I attempted to stroke his little back like I had seen Holly do to calm him but he just screamed louder so I backed away.

Anyway, I'm happy with the results and I hope Mom and Dad are too. Enjoy!

Eric, Emerald and...pause, wait for it...

2007-01-25T17:37:00.000-08:00

THE SNOWFLAKE!

Okay, maybe that shouldn't have been so dramatic, but I found these funny pictures from when Eric and I were decorating our house for Christmas and couldn't resist.

My new interior decorator line...

2007-01-22T19:09:00.000-08:00

So recently my sister-in-law Melissa decided that she wants to redecorate her bedroom around the pretty slate blue bedspread she and Chris painstakingly decided they could both live with (I'm sure any married person remembers just how difficult those first decorating moves are before the guy finally decides he doesn't care and the girl finally gets to do what she wants).

In addition to staining the bedroom furniture just black enough to still show the wood grain, buying pretty slate blue curtains, and spraying the bed frame "black granite," Melissa requested I go through my "archives" and find "interesting pictures not of people" for fear that pictures of people might look like "those cheesy images you get in the frames when you buy them." Her only other specification? That they look good black and white.

She wasn't very specific, but here's my preliminary home decorator line. Enjoy! Images are available in any size between 5x7 and 18x20 for a meagre price--should anyone besides Melissa be interested.

Also, having been intrigued by the process, I'd love for you to post suggestions for a themed line of wall art for me to work on in my post-graduation stupor.

aN EXEMPLaRY EXHIBITION

2007-01-20T19:50:00.000-08:00

So, my friend Kalyn (the democratic, pacifistic, cat-loving texan) is steadily working hard on her senior art show at ACU. Here's the poster. Check it out, it's definately going to be cool!

Portrait Posing Workshop

2007-01-17T11:07:00.000-08:00

Holly Ward, one of my employers at Belle's Bridal and Family Photography, will be hosting the first of three Portrait Posing Workshops on February 8, from 2 to 5pm, at Willow Creek Chapel.

Each three-hour workshop will teach you how to pose brides of different body types and with different gown styles for fabulous, flattering bridal portraits. The model will be provided. The result for you will be portfolio quality images and skills that will carry over to other venues of photography. And for this first workshop, you will also have the opportunity to submit your best images for display in Willow Creek Chapel--which will look great on a resume!

The cost is $99 per person if you sign up ahead of time. At the door, the cost will be $125. ACU students will receive a $25 discount for signing up ahead of time. Class size will be limeted so sign up soon!

For more information or to sign up for this great opportunity, you can contact Holly or Mike Ward at (325) 201-7458 or info@bellesphotography.com.

PS--This workshop is geared similarly toward what Holly did with me during my internship at Belle's. To see images from that session you can visit Melissa's Bridal Portraits.

Murder in the swamp

2007-01-06T12:14:00.000-08:00

Sorry for the long delay in posting. I've had a very busy few weeks. With finishing school and graduation--and the family that brought into town--and then the Holidays, I haven't have time to post after Marnie's roommate pictures. Not that I could post a large amount of pictures anyway as I currently have no machine to edit them on.

In October, Eric and I bought a brand new I-Mac so that A) we would no longer be fighting over what was more important: World of Warcraft or editing pictures, and B) I would have a machine capable of running all of my Photoshop programs at once and also a machine with a reliable monitor--a calibrated monitor really is the most important thing to editing and my laptop definitely didn't have it. Right after everyone went home from graduation and I finally had a little time, I no more than sat down at my wondrous computer and a grey cloud of doom rolled down from the top of the screen telling me in five different languages to "restart or else." I restarted and nothing happened. My baby has now been at the doctor two weeks with a diagnosis of rotten memory and a failed fan and I still have no reliable computer.

As of now, I'm in Westlake and though I'm busy with the usual attic cleaning and renovating, Westlake is having a crisis of its own. Our recently elected mayor, Gerald Washington, the first African American mayor in our history was found shot to death in the parking lot of the Special Education Testing Center in Mossville--a neighboring city that is considered part of Westlake. Police have ruled it suicide, but I don't know a single person here besides the cops that believes that. Hence the controversy that has sparked national news coverage.

So, in lieu of pictures from me you can check out the news articles about our murdered mayor--suicide? Racially motivated murder? Or knocked off by powerful Mafia related enemies? Let me know what you decide.

Merry Christmas from Marnie, Sarah and Brandy!

2006-12-05T15:26:00.000-08:00

I just finished my sister-in-law's "roommate pictures." When I was a freshman, Nicole and I had to do this with my 2.3mega-pixel sony cybershot and a self-timer...none of this fancy photoshop edited stuff! But this was a lot of fun and Marnie and her roommates couldn't have been more adorable if they tried. The end result of these pictures will possibly be a Christmas card.

A blind date in Dayton, TX

2006-11-20T04:52:00.000-08:00

Last weekend I drove 7 1/2 hours to shoot a wedding east of Houston. I got this wedding through my internship at Belle's and was accompanied by another member of the Belle's staff. We didn't know a lot about the wedding, other than that the photographer that the couple had hired backed out four days before the wedding without providing a replacement. So you could say it was kind of like a blind date--normally we meet with a client several times before the big day--we didn't really know what we were getting into until we got there.

From this wedding and editing the pictures I have learned one important thing: All this time I've been carefully resizing my images for my blog since they are huge files and won't upload at full resolution. My boss finally told me a secret--this is the important thing in case you didn't figure it out--Photoshop will do it for you. Now he tells me!

I also have advice for anyone who reads my blog and is planning a wedding: If you decorate your church with tall candles, on tall pillars, every other pew, down the entire aisle, your photographer will think you hate them.

Now for the pictures:

Current craziness...

2006-11-16T00:08:00.000-08:00

This week has been and still is very busy. Over the weekend, I shot a wedding in Houston with Belle's and the first image shown here is my first critiquable image from that event. Let me know what you think. I like the mystery of it but I'm also arguing with my self that it's too dark.

The second image is for the Shinnery Review's ARTiculation contest. Since Kalyn and I are co-editors this year--and since we cooked up the contest--we figured we should enter. The rules are that the finished work has to combine art and poetry (or literature of another kind) in a visual way. The artist can accomplish this by any means they choose. We decided to work together to illustrate a poem Kalyn wrote. I took and edited the pictures and made the mock up to Kalyn's specifications. Kalyn was the model and will mat the finished prints into the layout shown here. Again, let me know what you think.

you can click on either image to make them larger

Fat Tuesday....part one

2006-11-13T19:04:00.000-08:00

I've begun work on my last art photography project: the project to end all projects, the capstone piece, the grand finale. So, anyway. This project is going to highlight a weekly night close to my heart...Fat Tuesday! Fat Tuesday--name stolen from the Mardi Gras festival--is a night set aside for my friends and me to cook dinner for each other and catch up on the week's events. There are six of us on this weekly rotation, each week a different house, cook and recipe. And ALWAYS desert. So my project is not only the photography, but the display of the photography and for this subject I am making a photographic table--more details and pictures to come. Since it's such a time intensive project, it's the last thing due in the class and we've already been working on it one week. Good luck to me and my classmates!!

Here is the first installment of pictures for the table. These long images will be mixed in with images of different sizes--all about food and us! I still have mine and Kalyn's film strip image to complete but take a look at what I've got so far and, as always, please let me know what you think!

You can click on the image to make it larger

Multiplicity in intervals

2006-10-30T15:32:00.000-08:00

This semester I've been moonlighting at Hardin Simmons taking an Art Photography class (since ACU doesn't exactly have a wide variety of photography classes, although they do offer a PHOTOjournalism degree...but I'm not bitter). We've had four assignments so far, this is the fourth one. Our mission was to capture motion in three related images. Yep. That's it. So since the only readilly available models I have these days are me and my husband (sniff sniff, no more pictures of Kalyn and Tony!), poor Eric got dragged to Hardin Simmons for yet another photo shoot.

Two interesting things to know about these images:

1. They were shot using the interval timer on my Nikon D2x. The camera actually records up to 9 consecutive shots all by its little self--after you set up the shot, of course--at any interval you wish. I then picked the ones I liked and erased them into one image using Photoshop and a whole bunch of layers.

2. The other requirement for these images was the size...9x7. Which is, of course, a crazy uncommon size and I had to photoshop the borders in order to make the image 8x10 so that it would go through the Wal-mart 1 hour without a stupid crop (where they gave me a horrible printing job...that border is the exact same color in photoshop! I printed six images from Wal-mart and got six DIFFERENT colored borders!). So THAT's how you fox Walmart...if you can stomach their color correction process. Humph!

Split personality

2006-10-24T08:51:00.000-07:00

So, I have discovered--and I think this is true for most photographers--that I have a split personality. There is semi-professional Emerald, who hauls around her heavy but important looking Nikon D2x, carefully choosing each shot and looking as smooth as possible while doing it. Then there is tourist Emerald, who weilds her ancient Sony Cybershot (which still boasts a rockin' Carl Zeiss zoom lens comparable or better than personal digital cameras you can buy on the shelf today), running aimlessly like the typical annoying tourist, taking the typical posed pictures and rigging the self timer while the camera is propped on various personal items and shopping bags. The last two weeks I was tourist Emerald and it was fun.

What follows are the four decent pictures I took prior my wedding last week, and the adventures of Eric, Emerald and the self timer on our honeymoon in New Mexico.

My two new sisters Marnie and Kayla Lemmons.

Meagan, one of my best friends from high school and one of my bridesmaids, posing in an art project I made this semester (we were supposed to change the color of something with a distinct traditional color and see what effect it had)

Helena, another friend from high school and a bridesmaid, also playing dressup.

(this is actually a typical face for her to make at me)

Now starts the honeymoon. Eric's mother's family has a semi-tradition where they go to a family cabin in the mountains of Las Vegas, New Mexico for their honeymoon. It's quiet and peaceful (and exactly what we needed after this crazy semester). They have a board overlooking the living area in the cabin where they pin boutineers and corsages the bride and groom wear at the wedding...so we got to add Eric's boutineer.

The rest of our honeymoon is represented in the goofy pictures we took using the self-timer on the camera. There are some of us hiking (yes I actually hiked):

and shooting BB guns at defenseless tin cans and pine cones:

And visiting Santa Fe, where we toured the really big church,

(does anyone know who the kid in the pink dress is and why she ranks with St. Francis?)

...and gawked at the interesting sculpture outside the Native American Art Museum,

...and where we petted $4000 fur coats (but Eric said we'd get kicked out if we took a picture) and decided that the following picture will definately NOT be ME!

...and then hiked some more.

And then we left for home and took a quick picture by Hermit's Peak on the way out. Do you see the Hermit's face???

(isn't he cute????)

Good News!

2006-10-13T23:06:00.000-07:00

Some of you may have noticed in my A.W.O.L. post a few weeks ago, where I mentioned I had lost my future brother-in-law's wedding photos. I found them...on my laptop which Eric stole at the beginning of the semester and I've rarely seen since. Those fiancees! Gotta watch them!

What you see here is the random assortment of photos taken by a disoriented photographer--you'll also remember from that post that I had just stepped off a plane from a foreign country that had almost been hijacked by terrorists. I was not the official photographer at this wedding, just a semi-related snap-shooter with a really expensive camera. And in honor of the fact that it is almost my wedding (3 more days) and two months since their wedding, I decided Chris and Melissa really needed thier hapshazard assortment of family-taken wedding pictures. Enjoy!

The following two shots are my experiments with two failed and blurry pictures. I like the lighting so I turned them into watercolors in Photoshop. Let me know what you think.

Melissa throwing the bouquet...

Eric tackles his sister, Kayla, in an attempt to wrench it from her hands. I'm glad he's gonna be my husband and not my brother...I don't think I could handle that!

Chris removes the garter...

The escape...I love this shot! They look so happy...and there are bubbles.

Hearts, flowers and cowboy boots

2006-10-13T21:25:00.000-07:00

This was one of the most entertaining bridal sessions I've done with Belle's yet. Heather and her fiancee are planning a western wedding and she's got the denham in her bouquet and the cowboy boots to prove it. More than that, Heather was willing to climb fences and roll around in the grass to our hearts' content...which made for some really fun shots!

Cruella dogsits...and likes it!

2006-10-08T17:52:00.000-07:00

Meet my fiancee Eric...and Crackers. Last week some friends were out of town, so we took care of their dog Crackers. Origanally a lap dog, Crackers spends the majority of her days now in the backyard playing with the two most adorable kids in the world. However, for a week she pretended to be our dog....and we walked her every morning and night (although we found out she's been on a leash previously maybe once in her life) and played ball with her (well...Eric kicked the ball with her...sometimes at her, but she always caught it and brought it back) and let her sleep with me in my bed (hence the red blanket over the brand new cream colored bedspread). And it was a blast! Even Eric the "I-Hate-Animals" spokesperson could be caught scratching her ears. Tee hee.

Aren't they cute playing World of Warcraft together?

Kayla! (...and Darby) part II

2006-10-08T17:18:00.000-07:00

Kayla and Darby part II: formal portraits

This was another learning adventure. We had two main differences between this shoot and the first shoot. The first one was that my assistant switched--where Brittany, Kayla's roommate and Darby's other girlfriend, helped me out the first time, my fiancee (husband in ONE WEEK!), Eric, helped on this shoot. And while he was great technically, he wasn't nearly as good as Brittany at getting them to smile and act goofy. They weren't as comfortable with Eric as the were with Brittany either. The other difference was the clothing. We wanted some of their engagement pictures to have a more formal feel, so we dressed them in more rigid clothing than we had for the first shoot. It hadn't yet occured to me that clothing could transfer to personality. I think there are some good shots, but they don't have the comfortable energy the first set did. Let me know what you think.

The Jello Jordan River and chocolate candy monuments

2006-10-01T20:37:00.000-07:00

So, my friend Jen and I are teaching a bible class at church this semester, and while we started out on a great foot with the kids, I think we may have blown it with the parents. We're studying Joshua and we got to chapters 3 and 4 where they haul the Ark of the Covenant out into the Jordan and cross on dry ground. Then they get to the other side and build a 12-stone monument out of river rocks. We built ours out of candy...and then we ate them. Oooops. We also had a 9x13 pyrex pan of "Jordan River," flavored in blue berry burst. We definately ate that...all five of us...out of the same river...at least we had seperate spoons. So our kids came running down the stairs with their chocolate monuments, really excited about it, only to show their moms, who were thrilled with the prospect of chocolate filled children (not that it has any effect whatsover!) and thier little brothers and sisters were upset that they didn't get to build one. Next week we plan to take down the Jericho wall with Kazoos...do you think we'll be fired or not?

Kayla! (...and Darby)

2006-09-26T18:17:00.000-07:00

Sunday I took one of my most enjoyable engagement sessions--but it helps when you're good friends with your subjects! Meet Kayla and Darby, engaged to be married July 07, 2007. They were absolutely adorable and this is session one of two...a few more formal pictures to come!

Photographer's note: since I didn't know what size Kayla and Darby would need or how they would be using the pictures, I didn't do any additional photoshop cropping.

So the title: when I started this blog, I was living with our friend Kalyn (don't get confused by all these K's!), who ended up being the subject for most of my posts there in the beginning. So now that we had an excuse to take pictures of Kayla, she's very excited to have an entire post dedicated to KAYLA! (....and Darby.) Now for the pics!

Quick funny story:
I needed an assistant for distraction on this shoot, so I enlisted Kayla's roommate Brittany. So to get this shot, I positioned Brittany to my right and said,
"Kayla kiss Darby, Darby look at Brittany."
To which Kayla quipped,
"That's the story of our relationship right there!"
and I laughed.

Some of these shots are my first attempts at taking shots similar to Mike and Holly, who I am interning with, and Lauren Clark. I think I still need some practice...anyone else getting married????

Bridal Portrait Problems

2006-09-24T22:15:00.000-07:00

Since so many people have been having trouble viewing the flash presentation of my bridal portraits, Mike and Holly set up a different way of viewing them.

Go to :

http://www.pictology.com/ecom/events/events.aspx?5801635673

If it asks for additional information, here are the answers:

photographer's account#:  5801635673
Event code:  emerald06
password:  bridals

My own wedding for once!

2006-09-23T16:18:00.000-07:00

I decided to make a quick post about my own wedding for once. As most of you know, Eric and I will be getting married October 16 of this year (which is, like, 3 weeks away). I learned at Chris and Melissa's wedding that a lot of the people who recieved invitations to our wedding have been clandestinely visitng my blog without my knowledge and without leaving a comment...which is good--now that I know--because I can easily give you some links.

My parents, Karla and Andy McGowan (1979) my grandparents, Kay and Lad Smith (1937), and my great-aunt and uncle, Billie and Eloise Boyd (1941) were all married on October 16th--we'd like it to remain a tradition. Since this date falls on a Monday, however, it is not very convinient for the people who are special to us to be there. Because of that, I wanted to give you these links so that even if you can't come to the wedding, you can feel like you've seen it a little bit.

The wedding will be held at 6:00pm in the courtyard at the Grace Museum. This is approximately what it will look like at the reception:

Our engagement, bridal and wedding photos were/will be taken by Mike and Holly Ward at Belle's Bridal and Wedding Photography. You can view our engagement photos and my bridal portraits at this website by either clicking the hotlinks in this sentence or by visiting the Belle's site and clicking on proofing. You can view a few tasteful pictures from my lingerie shower at my friend Kayla's blog.

And here are a few pictures from the bridal shower our church in Louisiana threw for Eric and me. The photos were taken by our friend Sheila Murry.

me and my mom, Karla

the card my parents made for the set of pots they gave us
(this is also my favorite picture of me ever!)

the cake

to the left is my friend Anna, one of the bridesmaids, and her niece Chloe.
Chloe is helping record the gifts.

me and my mom again

from left to right:
my friend Meagan, me, my friend Anna
(the only bridesmaid not pictured is my friend Helena, though I've
been tempted to photoshop her in)

me and the hostesses--all women I've grown up knowing and loving

One last thing: please RSVP if you have not already done so. Thanks and we hope to see you in a few weeks!

Emerald and Eric

Felicitaciones, le puede tener marraige feliz!

2006-09-17T23:58:00.000-07:00

(or, if like me you don't speak Spanish: Congratulations, may you have a happy marraige!)

Disaster though it may have been, I learned a few more things through my Spanish wedding adventure:

Meet with the bride before the wedding (even if you are leaving for a week at home two days after you speak with her on the phone).
When you meet with the bride, make sure she speaks the same language as you do...and that her family does as well.
Sign a contract up front--no matter how nice you think they sound--because people who know will let you know you're an idiot if you don't, regardless of how bad you feel doing it.
Don't expect everyone at weddings to LOOK happy--even the groom's parents...even the groom.
Be personable and chatter at whoever you think might understand you...otherwise you'll be completely lost in a ceremony you can't even begin to understand!

So I'm sure more people than the bride spoke English...I just didn't meet them. She was, however, very nice, just the sweetest thing ever and I am truly grateful to have been a part of her wedding. But it was not easy. There were several points where the unexplained (to us English speakers) traditions threw me off gaurd and sent me scurrying for the back of the church only to discover there would be another 30 minutes of ceremony before I would miss the kiss shot (you can look, you won't find it here). Also, because of the layout of the church and my total cluelessness as to what was going on, spurring my reluctance to move from my spot, I'm afraid I'm looking nervous in the background of their entire wedding video. Ooops. Now on to the pictures.

Elia in the florescent hall light

So who has ever seen a Catholic wedding where the bride and groom get to sit as well????

The first of the strange traditions I didn' t understand:
The groom, Gabino, was handed a vase of fresh flowers from the alter by one of the priests, which he and Elia set on a table in front of cement Mary. They then knelt down, like so, which made for a great shot but does anyone know the significance here?

Elia and Gabino have two daughters. This is daughter number one, also known as the flower girl. Daughter number two walked down the aisle with her mother. I think that's cute.

The second of the strange traditions. Any ideas?

And happilly ever after into the limo to the reception.

This really was a lot of fun, but I'm glad I'm done with the editing and can get the proofs back to her as soon as possible!...as soon as they come in. Good luck to me!

In the words of Martin Luther King:

2006-09-17T23:30:00.000-07:00

[I am now] able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro Spiritual:

Free at last! Free at Last!
Thank God Almighty, [I am] free at last!

It is 1:30 am, September 18th.
Guess who finished her Comm Law paper...

A..W.O.L.

2006-09-02T13:54:00.000-07:00

I could make a thousand excuses for why I have not blogged recently. I will list only ten:

1. My plane from Europe was almost hijacked by terrorists.

2. I attended the wedding of my future brother-in-law in TUCSON ARIZONA (translation 12 hours from Abilene) the day after my plane was almost hijacked by terrorists, met and was studied by all of my future family (hopefully I passed), and took pictures at his wedding which I now can not find. Poof! Gone.

3. I shot two more weddings, one of them with the entire ceremony in Spanish, the bride being the only person who spoke English

4. After the airconditioner in my truck went out

5. I dented the back left fender of my truck

6. Then the engine in my truck blew up

7. I spent five days with my parents cleaning out my grandmother's garage, waging war against cockroaches and dragging a 1970 Ford Custom with three locked tires out of said garage and into the driveway (the car has been in the garage at least 20 years without moving. We pulled it out and two days later a tree limb dented its perfect paint job)

8. I drove back to Abilene from Louisiana (8.5 hours) in my mother's 1990 Lincoln Town Car with a squeaky serpantine belt and all the windproofing rattling off...scissors, $2.49. Duct tape, $3.72. Stopping in Livingston to Duct tape the windproofing back onto the roof of a luxury car, priceless.

9. Since I can't pay the credit card bill I racked up in Oxford, I'm working 15 to 20 hours per week in the library, ignoring my Comm Law paper that is due in one week.

10. School started on Monday.

Will post again after the paper's completed...until then, I remain A.W.O.L.

Comm Law strikes again!

2006-08-01T05:33:00.000-07:00

So now we're back in Oxford, back to studying for Comm Law. The temperatures are beautiful--70's or below, thank goodness! I took this shot of Amanda Walker out our kitchen window. Don't be mislead, however, this study session soon turned into a nap.

sleeping between two giggling boys...

2006-07-31T10:54:00.000-07:00

I forget where I left off, so I'll recap: Our entire class (consisting of 17 students, 2 house parents, 2 professors, 2 spouses, and 7 munchkins) traveled from Oxford to Stanstead, Stanstead to Berlin, Berlin to Whittenburg, and Whittenburg to Leipzig...in 2 1/2 days. We then broke off into personal travel groups.

Brian Schmidt, Jeremy Ponds and I planned a short stay in Germany--with a little help from Rick Steeves of course. Our goal was to get to Baccarach, a small town in south central Germany situated on the Rhine River. Rick suggested a River Cruise from Cologne, so we booked a sleeper train from Berlin to Cologne and hoped to get on the boat there. We missed that boat, so we took a train from Cologne to Koblenz, then hopped the boat to Baccarach--which actually worked out a lot better than Rick's suggestion anyway! I've included a map so you can see what kind of ground we covered in three days. Baccarach is not on this map, but you can find its approximate location just north of Mainz.

So the sleeper train was definately my favorite part of my entire stay in Germany. The sleeper car is a space about 5ft by 7ft. The left side of the car sports a sliding ladder and a closet washstand (its double doors open to reveal a mirror and an ity bity sink, towels and soap). There is then a 1ft space for you to walk into the car in and 3ft-4ft of beds. There are three beds and they stack on top of each other with about 2ft in between. I begged Brian to take a picture of this arrangement, but he said not even his best wide angle could get far enough away to capture this car. Think TINY. So Brian was on the bottom, Jeremy was on the top, and I slept in between two giggling boys. It was a pretty commical situation...especially was the fatigue set in and they started giggling for no apparent reason!

We arrived at Cologne around six in the morning and, after a brief Starbucks stop for Jeremy--that kid lives on shots of expresso!--explored Cologne's cathedral. The cathedral is located immediately outside the train station and, finished in the 1880's, is the largest cathedral in Germany and the largest church facade in the world. It was also the tallest building in the world until the Washington monument was completed. For a nominal fee, you can climb the 509 steps to the top of the spires--Brian and Jeremy did, I happilly watched the bags and took these pictures.

This is Baccarach from the boat. All the little towns along the Rhine look like this: lush greenery and vineyards scaling the steep slopes, a single castle (of the robber-baron style, according to Rick) overlooking the town, and then the small, sleepy town nestled along the bank of the Rhine. Undeniably beautiful, undoubtedly picturesque, and the best part--quiet. Very few munckins visit small out of the way towns. Absolute heaven. Castle Stahleck, which you can see in the first and second pictures has been turned into a youth hostel. We almost stayed there, but it was booked.

This was our hotel, The Rhine Hotel, a very clean, nice place to stay including air conditioning! We were also given breakfast in a diningroom overlooking the Rhine. ::sigh:: I could get used to that! The river was truly beautiful, especially in the early morning sunlight--even if Brian and Jeremy were mad at me for waking them up in time for breakfast! Also note the vineyards in the background--these are reasonable! Some of the vineyards we saw were almost vertically planted on the sides of the mountain. Amazing!

And last but not least, the scary train advertisement I saw in Berlin. Who wouldn't be frightened of this??

Lamposts and doors

2006-07-30T16:22:00.000-07:00

I have finally returned from Germany and am greatful to be back on English soil. I really liked Germany--the small towns, at least--but it's no England. Now for the pictures! This post will cover just the Berlin/Whittenburg trip.

The thing I regret most when I return from a place is how few pictures I take of people. Evidently, I have a thing for lamposts and doors...that seems to be the only image that intrigues me enough to capture it while on vacation. So this time, I threw in a naked lady for your viewing pleasure...sort of.

We started our stay in Berlin with a guided tour of downtown. I felt really sorry for the guide because our professors kept loosing their munchkins and leaving the group to chase them. She was constantly waiting on them--surrounded by the obediant students, of course!

This building, located just minutes from the Berlin train station, is the reason Hitler gained power. Apparently, someone (not neccesarilly the Nazis, though that's what a British tourist told me) set fire to it. Hitler claimed it was the "undesirables" and began his fight to eradicate them...and WWII.

This building is the Hotel Adlon famous, or shall I say infamous, for the video coverage of Michael Jackson dangling his baby from one of its balconies. Is it sad I was more interested in this building than the first?

This is Berlin's Holocaust memorial. The architect designed it so that when you're inside it all you can see is the uneven and sometimes tilted concrete blocks--it's supposedly very unnerving and disorienting. Unfortunately, do to munchkin chasing, I didn't have the opportunity to test this supposition.

Now, off to Whittenburg! Home to Martin Luther and his 95 thesis!

So after tossing our luggage at the hotel--which was really very nice, by the way--we traipsed down to the cathedral Luther nailed his 95 theses to. And of course, we took a cheesy group photo in front of those famous doors. This is Rachel Lau posing in front of the cathedral.

And these are the famous doors...and a lampost. I really do love lamposts!

So who would have thought there'd be a naked lady statue in the backyard of the cathedral??? This is Spencer Jackson utilizing her pedistal after a long day of meandering after munchkins. For other people's photographs, he had been scratching his head with an intriguing part of her anatomy. I leave that to your imagination.

This lamp hangs from the entrance to Luther's house...now technically, the whole deal wasn't originally his house. He only had ROOMS in it...but then he got famous or something and they turned the whole building into a museum about him.

And this is Kendra in front of doors at Luther's house. They were nice doors. And they also had this convienient sitting area. I like to sit. And so does Kendra.

And this is the end of the class trip pictures. Berlin was really big...and dirty...and smelly...and big city-ish. I wasn't a fan. I'll just have to add it to my list of cities I don't like (Houston, Rome, London, Paris, Dublin, etc.). The food was pretty good, but, alas, it's no On the Hoof. I liked the smaller cities like Whittenburg and Baccarach far better--they're quieter and much more charming...and I don't feel like I have to run everywhere! One intriguing thing about Berlin though: I found thier expensive designer section. I spent an afternoon goggling at Prada, Ives Saint Lauren, Gucci, etc., followed by a trip through the Audi showroom. The one that I wanted cost 46,000 Euro. Needless to say, no sportscar for me! Nor will I get the Gucci dress, Prada pumps, Chanel sunglasses, and Coach purse to wear in it!

My one true love...

2006-07-30T16:18:00.000-07:00

I have recently met the best thing that has ever happened to me--a BBC (bacon, brie and chicken) on panini with cranberry sauce from On the Hoof. Who knew you could add the cranberries?

On the Hoof is a sandwich stop a block from our house and it has been the reason I am still alive on this trip--great food, good prices! Yum.

Guttenburg, Luther and the Rhine

2006-07-23T14:16:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow I leave for five days in Germany. I will return late Saturday night, submit to classes all day Sunday and probably have time to post pictures on Monday--no promises on the posting! But! I do promise to take a few pictures--they will either be of the Rhine River Cruise Brian, Jeremy and I plan to take OR of the disaster that ensues as we attempt to get there. Good luck to us!

Rainy days and Mondays

2006-07-22T11:54:00.000-07:00

I gotta tell ya, not having Comm Law for a few days makes me really happy! And to top it off, today it rained. Now if you've spent very much time around me, you know I LOVE rainy weather--one of the many reasons why I consider England the actual Garden of Eden. Give me humidity, grey skies, thunder, lightning, and sheets of huge soft raindrops any day! So I spent the morning--after playing on the porch with my camera--sitting in the below pictured chair reading a British Cosmopolitan and enjoying the rain through the below pictured window.

A sidenote: to all my recently married or about-to-be-married friends--forget the kama sutra books! You can learn all you want to know and then some from one issue of the British version of Cosmo. I kid you not! I learned all kinds of things this morning I could have had a happier life not knowing.

I spent my afternoon, playing tech support to a 5-year-old. It belongs to Steven and Jennifer, our house parents, and it's the middle of three very animated girls. Today they all went to have tea--but this one had hot chocolate, because she doesn't like tea. And Jam. She definately had jam...strawberry...and something she ate at tea was still stuck to her face, but I thought it was cute so I didn't bother telling her. She told me I should definately go to have tea where she had tea, but she couldn't remember how to get there or what its name was, so I am supposed to go "down that road and ask the first hotel you see if they serve tea and if they don't, well, they'll tell you the one that does." Yep. She's cute.

My job today--yes Team 55 is paying me to do this, amazing--was to help her print color sheets of JoJo the circus clown off Disney's website. I will say, and Kenny (the only other ACU student in the house today) agrees with me, that I have heard enough of JoJo's theme music to last a lifetime! You can click here to print a color sheet of JoJo. And here to hear a sample of the music. I love my job.

Around and about and IN FRONT of the camera?????

2006-07-22T11:00:00.000-07:00

So, about a week or so ago, Holly emailed me and yelled at me for not putting up anything cool and Europe-like on my blog. This trip I really haven't seen anything new...with Comm law I dash to On the Hoof for a sandwhich and get back to class (or the procrastinating avoidance thereof)--whether that's pretending to read my textbook, pretending to do my homework or, my particular favorite, pretending to be awake in class because I was attempting to read Comm Law late into the night and then get up at 7am. So here are a few quick shots and adventures within walking distance of home.

The bell-tower of the church across the street.
(Yes, there's an ancient stone church across the street from our house. It also has a lovely seating area on the opposite side of the street from us where you can eat lunch, study Comm Law (ha!) or various other activities to numerous and scandalous to mention.)

The gate to said lovely sitting area.

A stream behind University Park adjacent to yet another lovely sitting area perfect for the afore-mentioned activities

A very unflattering picture of Shaley and her temporary pillow, Kendra. Kendra is the girl who sleeps in the bed next to me and this is our room. Notice tight crop to avoid A) an even more unflattering view of Shaley and B) our extremely cluttered floor.

Now here's a little somthing you don't experience every day:
So one day, we're having class in University Park and a reporter and photographer from the Oxford Mail come up and start talking to us. Europe is currently experiencing record heat waves, and these two gents were doing a story on all the people who were too hot to stay indoors and do thier various normal activities. Most UK homes and businesses do not own airconditioners--all the chocolate at the 9to9 had melted into a gooey mess! In any case, places were canceling work, school, you name it. So the Brit reporters were shocked to hear that their "heat-wave" (high 80's, low 90's--in direct sunlight, mind you!) is almost cold weather to us.
And it really was kind of chilly, sitting in the shade with the breeze blowing. Tiffany Gaunt had the towel she was sitting on wrapped over her legs, Kendra was trying to tough it out and not move into the sunlight, and I had my standard worn-out green jacket on. So the reporter gets into a conversation with Mr. Pybus about media ethics and the photographer does a doubletake when he sees me in my jacket. Before I know it, he's talked me into going out in the sunlight so he can take a picture of the crazy American who wears a jacket in 90degree weather...and the next day, we bought our copy. I made page 4.

click any image to make it larger

my one complaint with the whole affair--they called me a Texan!

Can you find the mistakes? Leave a post if you find one!

Photoshop is my friend

2006-07-21T12:54:00.000-07:00

Yet another post delayed by wedding planning and Comm Law--thankfully, this post catches me up for my internship posts! Europe pictures on the way (just as soon as I take them ::grin::).

You might recognize Tia from our Paramount Shoot earlier this summer. We did that shoot to send pictures of her to her husband who is in Iraq. This shoot is to send pictures of his dog, Radar. Radar is a German Sheppard trained by the police accademy (it's kind of weird, taking pictures of a dog while it's owner is commanding it in German) and is only about two years old. Radar was also just diagnosed with cancer and probably will not live to see his master come home from Iraq. Hence the pictures. But the question you might ask is: why spend the money to hire a professional (meaning Mike) to photograph a dying dog??? The answer: because a professional (or his intern) can photoshop fur.

This is a close-up of the above picture BEFORE I edited it. The dog had just had a biopsy and, though he didn't appear to be in pain, looked like, well, you can see for yourself.

And a cute shot of Trace just cuz I liked the funny lighting.

Playing Ketchup (or Catch Up, whichever you like)

2006-07-21T10:51:00.000-07:00

So, I'm still in Oxford and Comm Law has been royally kicking my butt! However, this weekend is a travel weekend (and since I'm getting married in October and have absolutely no money, I'm taking it easy in Oxford, enjoying the empty house and the quiet) so I have time to catch up on my blogging and picture editing.

This post is an engagement session I double shot with Mike and Holly right before I left for England. The couple both have Airforce backgrounds--believe it or not, she's a jet engine mechanic studying to be a paralegal--and the baby, Chandler, is the absolute cutest baby I have ever met. He was quiet, agreable, responsive and he doesn't like grass, which made him have the cutest unhappy expressions I've ever seen. Really. If I were going to have a munchkin, I'd want it to act like this one.

I discovered three things during this shoot:

I love red and green together, the color combination really makes me happy!
Shooting in RAW is AWESOME! It really gave me control of the colors and let me bring out my reds and greens.
If I'm going to continue in this business--which I intend on doing--I definately need to quit talking to dogs and babies the same way.

Now the pictures!

Let me know what you think!

Melissa's Bridal Portraits

2006-07-20T17:23:00.000-07:00

Here is Melissa's very public proofing session. On July 5, I took her bridal portraits (with the help and direction of Holly) and, regrettably, am just getting them back to her. The session was a lot of fun. We shot the first half at the Windsor Ballroom and the second half at Erinshire Gardens, both in Abilene TX. It was a tough decision narrowing down the 300+ images to a mere 29. Let me know what your favorites are!

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my day

2006-07-10T10:59:00.000-07:00

My day actually started at 6:00am Sunday. I took a quick nap through church, ate a quick lunch at IHOP with my mom and our friend Renee, then submitted to a quick search of my belongings before boarding a plane for England. There I sat for a very long 8.5 hours, passed up the complimentary wine (don't be too proud, my professor was sitting next to me), and slept a maximum of 1 restless hour. I then parted company with the plane and made friends with a charter bus--the two of us were quite cozy for 2 hours, both completely awake--before getting off the bus at my house for the next month, discovering I'm sharing my room with four other girls and then dismanteling and reassembling 11 computers (one of them twice because I couldn't get it back together properly). I then "took" a tour of Oxford, though it ended up being more like "gave" a tour, and headed home to re-image two computers, only to discover that the internet would no longer work on the computers I had re-imaged. It has been a busy day, and continues to be so--class is at 8:30 tomorrow morning and I present my homework. Why did I decide to do this??????

Just one more...

2006-06-21T22:53:00.000-07:00

Just one more shot. I tried to add it last night , but blogger was being stupid. Still , I couldn't resist doing some creative coloring with photoshop and this shot worked great for that.

Little Country Wedding

2006-06-20T20:43:00.000-07:00

On June 10, I shot my second wedding ever. The wedding was in a small Texas town called McCaulley, and was definately an interesting little wedding. My job was to follow the bride--since I'm convieniently a girl and therefore allowed more places than Mike would be--and Holly kept an eye on me, suggesting poses and angles for the shots. It was a lot of difficult as the bride moved quite a bit and didn't start getting ready until 10 minutes before the wedding. She managed to get dressed in record time and the wedding went off pretty much without a hitch...well, they did get hitched...okay, I'm going to stop being corny now. Here are the pictures:

The bride helping decorate and setting up the unity candles

the bride and groom visiting with the groom's grandmother

the mother of the groom with the bride's granddaughter, Torrie

Torrie's twin brother TJ

I love this shot! TJ's father dressed him for the wedding without his socks and this is TJ's mom correcting her husband's handiwork. You can see what TJ thinks about all this!

The bride getting a final check from her daughter and son

One last little bit of make-up...

...and she's ready for some quick bridal portraits before she starts down the aisle.

The bride with her uncle who will give her away

I think this is my favorite kissy shot yet...mostly because they aren't actually kissing!

And ending on a wet, slobbery kiss from the grandkid.

Overall, this wedding was great experience in posing, bad lighting and dealing with the family of the couple getting married. I think the bridal portraits turned out really great with the window light--in fact, Mike put the one I have up here in the Belle's portfolio! Talk about excited! The bad lighting was two awful rows of florescent lights hanging in the sanctuary...not to mention the brown carpet and yellow brick that just reflected the bad light. Because it's my blog and I can do whatever I want since I'm not selling anything, I simplified this problem by posting mostly in black and white. And as for dealing with family, well, let's just say that for my own wedding--which, thankfully, Mike and Holly will be shooting!--there will be a very strict schedule of exactly what's going to happen when, down to the order the pictures are taken in. And EVERYONE involved will have it ahead of time to get used to the order of business!

Starlit Tia

2006-06-15T14:23:00.000-07:00

My first photo assignment for my internship was a portrait shoot in the Paramount in downtown Abilene. My job was to mirror Mike and try to get some different shots. Shooting in the Paramount was not as difficult as I had anticipated, it just took a little creativity with the settings and with photoshop. The subject's name is Tia, and she was having portraits of herself made for her husband who is stationed in Iraq. We were trying to go for modestly sexy and glamourous.

This last picture I couldn't decide whether I liked it best in color or in black and white so I put both. I like the creamy skin tones and pretty greens that complement Tia's skin and clothes, but I like how the black and white takes the pink distractions out and directs your focus to her face and eyes. Let me know what you think!

Stage one of dresser detox!

2006-06-02T23:25:00.000-07:00

This chest of drawers (dresser) has been my project for the past couple of days. The chest of drawers (dresser) was my father's growing up. Eric and I stole it to put his clothes in when he moves into my apartment.

Stage one of dresser detox was painting it with Kils (3 coats ::sigh::) and installing shiny satin finished metal knobs (which I adore, but cost more that that blasted piece of furniture is worth). Stage two will be deoderizing the inside with Ivory Snow to remove the smell of 30 years of no use.

Good luck to me!

Weddings, weddings everywhere!

2006-05-30T23:28:00.000-07:00

Since I last updated anyone on my life, a very shiny set of rocks set in white gold has taken up residence on the third finger of my left hand. Two weeks ago yesterday, Eric proposed to me.

While this isn't surprising news for most of you, I do feel a little sorry for Eric's parents. Thier other son, Chris, proposed to his fiance, Melissa, about a month ago. So the Lemmons family graduated two twin daughters from high school in May, will marry off thier firstborn son on August 12, settle their daughters into ACU and Peperdine, respectively, the following weekend, and marry off thier second born son to me on October 16th. Though I've been assured they are gaining two daughters and not loosing anyone, it's still going to be a busy and emotional year for them.

Which leads me to today's pictures...engagement photos for Chris and Melissa.

This one I messed up the lighting on (as usual), but I kind of like the effect the washed out colors give the image. It seems more like a private moment in this light, instead of a photographer rudely taking a pictures of two people kissing (even if they did pose for me).

In this one, Chris, it appears I have found the cure for leprosy.

Overall, I think the pictures are okay. I hope they'll accomplish everything that Chris and Melissa need, I just think I could have done a better job somehow. Something a little more creative and a little less repetitive. Also, I think I could have done a better job watching for sunlight spots and akward body positions. Let me know what you think!

Who's on first...

2006-05-27T14:05:00.000-07:00

Every year, ACU's yearbook, the Prickly Pear, includes a section of the top students from the graduating class. Each student has an individual portrait and information about their stay at ACU and what they intend to do after graduation. These students are all heavilly involved in some campus activity, have excellent GPAs and are nominated for this honor by professors. About 100 students are chosen, though not all of them choose to be featured in this section.

The funny thing about this year is I'm starting to know the people who are graduating. The first portrait is of my friend Kayla Anderson. The picture was taken at Starbucks and I like it because it's the one shot we took of her holding that blasted book that looks natural, like she really was reading and just looked up at me and smiled.

The second portrait is of another friend, Patrick Leech. Now this is regretably, not the shot we'll be using in the yearbook, but it is by far my favorite shot that I took.

and now, what you've all been waiting for...

2006-05-03T11:35:00.000-07:00

This was probably my hardest post yet because of the sheer volume of pictures--from 4:00pm to 10:00pm I took about 600 pictures. It's so hard to narrow 600 pictures down to a blog-sized assortment. The wedding was held at Lytle Bend Ranch (?) and the lighting varried throughout the night. The beginning few hours were good, but later on in the night they moved into a barn area for dancing and the lighting was horrible (okay, not horrible, but definately challenging). The people were great though, all very helpful and willing to have their pictures taken.

This is Shelly getting ready before the ceremony. Her bridesmaids were CONSTANTLY messing with her dress, arranging, pinning and snapping. I really like the composition of this shot and how you can see all the faces.

I felt SO sorry for the flower-girl, Kylan (sp?). She was the groom's daughter and was in almost every group picture taken. Even by the ceremony she was barely managing a grimace for a smile. I chose this shot because of its clean background and because it was the best action shot I had of her dropping the rose petals.

This is the Shelly and her father walking down the aisle during the ceremony. I messed this shot up terribly. Before I edited the levels in Photoshop, the father was so dark you couldn't see his face. But the expressions in the shot were exactly what I was looking for...and since I was so focused on the expressions, I didn't notice how grainy Dad's suit was getting. I think it needs a little more work--back to the drawing board!

This is one of my favorit shots, I love the expression on Chuck's face and how intent he is on saying his vows to Shelly...how much he loves her, it's all there in his expression. The background is soft and compliments the couple, and I like the composition even though you can't see Shelly's face.

I also chose this shot for composition--I liked Chuck's cuffs and the buttons on his tux...also I really think I had the perfect angle for this shot, a little of the pastor's bible and a lot of their hands. I like the gentle way he's holding her hand and juxtipositon between his hands and hers--both skin tone and size. The lighting up to this point has really been gorgeous.

Chuck and Shelly's first dance. Here is where the lighting got pretty bad...up to this point in the barn the lights were on, but when they started dancing the lights got lower, and when they opened it up to everyone to dance the light go lower still. This shot was taken at 500 ISO on auto settings with a bounced flash (the ceiling was aluminum, so that got some interesting effects). I love the soft white lights in the background and the light illuminating Chuck's head. Also, their body language is priceless...I really like that the way they move says love and not lust. They really seem like a beautiful couple and I felt honored to help take thier wedding pictures.

I had a lot of other interesting shots, but these were my favorites and also the ones that seemed most important for the blog. Please let me know what you think about the shots!

"You may now kiss the bride!"

2006-05-02T15:13:00.000-07:00

On Saturday, I helped a friend shoot a wedding. It was fabulous experience for me, and took a little of the pressure off him. The couple's names were Chuck and Shelly--apart, they didn't really look like they belonged together, but you'll see in some of my later pictures that they are a truly beautiful couple...and (sighs the hopeless romantic somewhere deep inside cynical Emerald) very much in love.

But first, the cute kids.

Cutie #1's name started with a T and ended up sulking down the aisle--it seems all he really wanted to was play with the decorations (aka a ton of balloons) and smile for my camera. Little kids seem to like cameras.

Cutie #2 was playing with a friend after the ceremony. Friend was standing where the pastor had stood, holding her hands out as if supporting a bible, and repeating verbatim the ceremony. I crept up just as she was saying, "you may now kiss the bride." Cutie turns and puckers up for the imaginary groom and I, as you can see, snapped her picture.

and Cutie#3--I really just love this shot. I think its so sweet, a little father daughter conversation, both so intent on the other and dancing while they're at it.

More about the wedding to come...

a little bit of flare

2006-04-26T11:41:00.000-07:00

On Saturday, Smith Adams residence hall held an annual "backyard bash" for its residence. I was there taking pictures when a friend of mine from study abroad decided she wanted to sing (they had a stage and sound equipment set up and an audience of college students in lawn chairs). So I took a lot of pictures of her because a) she's really photogenic, and b) I was intrigued by the light. She was fairly backlit through a group of trees (yes, there are trees in Abilene) and the situation was reaking havoc with all of the auto functions on my camera. So I was just playing around, trying to master the situation (ha!) and I noticed the lens flares...and I liked them.

Emily Hobbs

Tell me what you think!

SURPRISE! a sport I like to shoot

2006-04-26T11:13:00.000-07:00

So last week I shot softball practice for the first time and I surprised myself--I actually liked it. Looking back on it now, I think it might just have been because of the informal atomosphere of it. I was allowed to go anywhere the ball wouldn't hit me in the head, the action was repetitive so I couldn't miss anything important changing angles or positions, and the lady wildcats really didn't care that I was out there, they were just having fun doing something they love. Practice is definately better than a real game, I think. And once, I thought I heard the 8-year-old tomboy in me craning her neck to reach my ear and whispering, "see! girls can too play baseball...just not you."

I really liked this angle, the ball in action about to be caught, but the background could have been cleaner.

This girl undoubtedly hates me, as this was the picture that ran in the Optimist and her facial expression isn't the most flattering. Alas, I seem to be following in the footsteps of our photo-editor, attempting to catch the most embarrassing facial expressions...lets face, they're a lot more fun.

The obvious critisism: another inch on the right side of the ball would have been nice.

In this one, I really like the way her body is positioned...kind of like a goalie blocking the ball/puck/whatever. In the three last pictures I really like the clean backgrounds and the ration of dirt to grass. It seems kind of soothing to me...until you look at their faces.

One last thing: these photos were shot entirely on manual settings...manual settings that I set. And it really was easier to have a consistant setting than to battle the automatic systems.

Finger-licking good

2006-04-19T11:48:00.000-07:00

Today I shot pictures at the Barett Hall cookout. The dorm and RA's paid for and/or cooked burgers for all the residents who wanted free lunch. It smelled INCREDIBLE and believe me, I was wishing that I lived in Barett.

Alexandra Miles

I really liked her expression and action but the framing wasn't wonderful. I cropped a little, but it still doesn't feel like an overly strong picture.

Liz Whitley and Katherine Leigh Young

These ladies were wonderful for letting me shoot them eating. In this shot and the next shot, I was trying to portray as accurately as possible the scene and how many people were there. This shot portrays what they were doing and the next portrays how many people were there, it just could have been taken anywhere. I wish there was some way to combine them.

Liz Whitley, Cassie Watson, and Katherine Leigh Young

Life is like a box of chocolates...

2006-04-10T11:57:00.000-07:00

When Trish Tobin woke up on Saturday morning, her only plan for the day was to pack up the baby and head to the mall for the second-ever Abilene Philharmonic Orchestra Chocolate Festival Fund-raiser (that's a mouthful!). After attending last year, Trish wanted a return trip to discover if the chocolate samples tasted just as good as they did when she was pregnant. They did. Little did she know, that I'd be there to catch her in her moment of discovery.

My next stop was the puddin' eatin' contest. The young gentleman to the left is Mason Caraway, age 5, and he's wearing that victorious expression because he has just completed his bowl of pudding in the fastest time. You'll notice Kaitlyn Hathorn, age 5, and Zeke Mendoza, age 4 and the most proper eater, checking out Mason's empty bowl. At the end is my favorite, the oblivious messiest eater, Antonio Guerrero, age 4, still plugging away at his bowl of pudding.

My last stop was the Godiva Chocolate station outside of and sponsored by Dillards. I wanted to get more of an interaction shot, they were passing out chocolate and giving free samples of lotion that smelled like chocolate (I passed on both for fear of addiction), but I got distracted by Cameron McCay, a Dillards Employee. I really liked the way the blue drop cloth brought out her blond hair and skin tone. Also, I liked the way she was moving and the composition of her body with the trays with the background sign. So far as a journalistic shot, it's not so great, but for publicity or as a portrait it's maybe not bad. Tell me what you think.