Progress, Folks!

I wanted to share a photo from a wedding I shot last weekend. The setup was the idea of the bride and her maid-of-honor and at first I thought, "Whoa, holy cheese city." But the photo turned out pretty damn cute. But most importantly, I took this photo in a bar bathroom, with no light, with a flash and it actually looks good! A year ago, there's no way I could have pulled that off!

The Pioneer Woman...

...knows I exist in this world.

More or less.

I submitted this photo to one of her challenges and it got posted this morning right here.



My list of accomplishments in life is now as follows:

1. Marry a loving, talented, adorable man who thinks I'm the best and lets me shop without question.
2. Start myself on a path to self-employment.
3. Get posted on Pioneer Woman's blog.
4. That's pretty much it.

Fuji Instax

I've been seeing the Fuji Instax camera everywhere the last couple of weeks. It's definitely a trend that I needed to get in on.

I think it's such a fun little gadget in today's overly teched out world. People get such a kick out of it too. I took it out last weekend and laughed every time I took a picture. I was also wasted though... so that might explain the giddiness.

I like that it's a one time little piece of art. You can't reproduce it 1000 times. You only get one. Ever. It also makes me stop and think about what I'm actually photographing. Instead of being able to take 8G of photos in one evening, I can take maybe 5. Plus, I'm a little impatient so the instant aspect of it is ridiculously satisfying to me.

I have some ideas to incorporate the camera into my wedding photography... I have a little plan that I think would be really fun. I'm waiting to find an awesome bride to try it out on.

These are of Omaha band Rock, Paper, Dynamite playing at the fall Omaha Entertainment Awards showcase... or something or other.

Fall Photos

Lots of fall goodies happening over on my photo blog.



I'm also really excited to put up some Halloween decorations. I'm going out this week to buy a few new things. The foam headstones I bought last year didn't hold up. Hopefully, I fine some plastic ones that will last a couple years. I'm also going to run to Walgreens and pick up some severed arms and legs, on sale for 2/$10. That is soooo not a joke. Also on the agenda, making ghosts out of some old muslin fabric I have at home.

Story about the muslin... a number of years ago I bought a crap ton of cheap muslin for a photo project. I wanted to drape an entire room in fabric and photograph it. My ambition quickly faded (I was 18, what can I say) and I never went through with it. I have since seen someone else do something very similar so there's no point now in saving 10+ yards of muslin. Might as well make some ghosts out of it...

The Power of Social Networking

Can I update you on my little business that I'm running? (Jen and Cat, you're my only readers and you already know all this, so just go along with it mkay?)

I've had a surge in photography clients the last few weeks. It blows me away every time I think about it. I'm humbled that people actually pay me want me to take their photos. I have a ton of stuff booked for the fall, and last week something strange happened... My friend posted a response to a girl on The Knot, recommending me as an affordable wedding photographer. Evidentially, other brides saw it and starting emailing me for prices and availability all the way out until October 2010! Good lawd! I am now officially a bona fide wedding photographer... who is still terrified of the mountable flash, but I'm working on it. (One word: Fong.)

I'm learning the awesome power of word-of-mouth quickly around these parts. "These parts" being Omaha of course. My first bride alone has generated five bookings for me by simply showing people my blog. I did her son's one year shoot, her brother's family, her co-worker's maternity pictures, future booking for the co-worker's newborn baby, and a future booking for a second co-worker. I need to start paying the girl commission! It also proves how important blogging is these days for upstart businesses. I edit a handful of pictures, send the client a link, and within 24 hours I usually have 30 hits to my blog. I sent out a link this morning and had three new bookings before noon! God bless the holiday season and everyone scrambling to get their Christmas card pictures taken before Thanksgiving...

I'm really having fun with this. I'm still so grateful for finding a job that makes me happy. This morning, I had the mom from my maternity shoot email me and say that the pictures I took of her son made her cry. Ya, ya, pregnancy hormones. Whatever. The point is that a picture I took elicited such a strong reaction from a parent. That is exactly why I love doing this.

Jojo's 2nd Birthday

On Sunday, we had a family get-together in honor of a couple birthdays and some family being in town. That in turn became an unofficial second birthday shoot of Jojo. She was eating a chocolate cupcake (I'm the childless idiot who gave a two year old chocolate frosting) and she looked so cute, so precious that I couldn't resist.

And she's incredibly patient with me when I stick a camera in her face so there's that too.



See what she's holding in her hand there? It's a chocolate covered camera. She probably liked it because it's pink, but I choose to think that she liked it because she has so much admiration for her dear aunty who is always bugging the crap out of her with a lens six inches from her face.



I cannot get over her eyes in this picture. They're usually a greenish color, but they ended up bright blue in this shot. I have no idea how or why but I'll take it. I let out an audible, "Awwwwww!" Every time I look at it.



My heart melts for this kid. She's the sweetest little girl in the world. I told her parents I want to have ten babies just like her some day.



But for now I'll settle for just being her aunt.

Inspirational Images

I keep a little folder on my desktop full of amazing things I find on the internet. Only it's not just one little folder due to my inability to not organize things. There's a photo for food, paper goods, design, home decorating (divided up further by room), style/clothes and photography. See, completely anal.

Here's a couple of my favorite ones from the photography folder. The first one I've already posted, but I thought it deserved to be revisited. These images make my heart drop. They're so incredible.


By Toni Frissell


By Rodney Smith


By Gary Winogrand

I Need Time Off From Work to Catch Up On Work

I'm so far behind in photos... shocking, I know.



I'm working on getting through about 10 sessions that are sitting on my computer at home. I feel like I need to take a vacation from work so I can stay home and work! It's fantastic though. I've had to start turning down website jobs because there's just not enough time for me to get everything done. I already work two or three hours when I come home every evening.

I'm at the point right now where I want to concentrate on my own business and my own career, and not worry about other people's for once. Aside from photo editing I have a bizzilion other things I should be doing. Create print materials, updating my website, fixing up my business' Facebook page all nice like, networking like hell...

Maybe I'll call in sick tomorrow.

The Wedding: A Day of Terror

My photography blog is where I appear to be a professional person who knows what they're doing.

This blog is where I tell the truth.

I photographed an entire wedding on Saturday and I left the reception feeling like a complete failure. It was a day so terrifying and exhausting I fear having to do it again. Seriously, I'm afraid to photograph another one after the first one. I know the first time doing anything is hard and sometimes shitty, so I'm just trying to keep reminding myself that it can only get better from here.

I learned that I seriously need to learn to use my flash. Who in their right minds photographs a reception without knowing how to use a flash??? This girl apparently. I thought I could get by with the available light in the hall, but then they turned off the available light and I was left with lighting from a string of Christmas lights and a window.

It was bad.

I got by for the most part using my 50mm 1.4 lens and my ISO cranked about as high as possible, which is so very unkosher. I didn't know what else to do though. I used the flash on some shots and they were freaking horrible. I stuck to the low-light lens and prayed that I got some in focus. It worked for the most part but there are some that are really grainy due to the ISO. It was certainly a learning experience.

Barbie's Senior Pictures

Barbie's Senior Pictures!

These were insane... So much fun! More at my photo blog.

Maddex

Maddex's six month pictures! More at my photography blog.

Grayson's Photos

I'm starting to make my way through some of last weekend's photos. It's strange to have a real work-load for once!

Check out a few more on my photography blog!

Grant's Five Month Pics

Every month it gets harder and harder to take his pictures because I'm too preoccupied with playing with him to really concentrate. The kid is an absolute doll.

More pictures on my photography blog!

Moses Prey

Friday night my husband's band, Moses Prey, had a show at Barley Street Tavern in Benson. I'd never been there before but the bar was pretty cool. My one complaint though: the Boulevard wasn't cold enough.

Fake Wedding Portraits!

So what exactly are you supposed to do when you want to start photographing weddings but have no portfolio work available to ensure brides that you won't eff up their wedding?

You get some recently married friends to put their wedding clothes back on and you take them out to a park on a Monday night. Instant fake wedding portraits! See more at my photography blog.

My First Circus

As the title might imply, I went to my very first circus this weekend. Is that kind of pathetic? My parents never took my sister and me as kids. Then by the time I got old enough to realize how creepy they really were I lost interest in ever going. A family friend bought us tickets though, so I kind of had to go.

Was the circus creepy? Yes, yes it was. The acrobatics were like watching a low-rent, heartless Cirque De Soleil show.



Some of the performers weren't very good, and they were all a little dead behind the eyes. Can I blame them though? They work in a traveling circus. That's got to be one of the strangest professions in the world. I also really, really hated watching the tigers. I feel so bad for those poor animals. They spend their lives stuck in cages, (alternating between the back of a truck and an arena) being yelled at by some Russian dude. I'm pretty sure that isn't exactly what nature had planned for them.

I also felt bad for the elephants, but I enjoyed watching them. Mostly because they loved taking dumps while they should be acting majestically.



You know who else loved watching the elephants poop? Harry.



It was great seeing my niece and nephew have so much fun (and sugar). Glad I'm not the one who had to take them home... Before the show Harry kept saying he wanted to go to the "kirkus" to see the "elements." He saw those elements alright...

And then here's this last picture because I thought it was cool. I was looking at it and it reminded me of an old school photo of the circus, so I photoshopped it til its last breathe.

In Hindsight

It's done! Finally, done.

www.christinemcguigan.com

It's not even that the site took a lot of work, because it certainly didn't. I bought that website. I didn't make it. Which is sort of dumb since I currently design websites for a living. But hey, whatever.

It feels so good to cross that off my list. I feel like I'm moving forward and making real progress. I've said it before, but I can't believe I've found something to do with my life that makes me so happy. I've never had passion about my work before. I feel sort of lame for not recognizing this passion earlier. When I was graduating high school I wanted to go to an art college in Chicago and study photography. I obviously didn't end up doing it, but I really wish I would have now. Looking back on the situation, it would have made so much freaking sense. I was just too young and ambivalent to commit to something like that. I didn't know what I really wanted in life - duh, I was 17. I suppose that's why hindsight is such a bitch. It all makes sense eight years later but there's not a whole lot you can do about it.

Of course the counterargument to my wallowing "why didn't I follow my heart" complaint is that it took me getting married to really drive home the idea that this is what I needed to do with my life. I wouldn't have gotten married if I hadn't met Matt. I wouldn't have met Matt if I hadn't been designing websites. I wouldn't have been designing websites if I hadn't gone to school here in Omaha... and so on.

It all comes down to the theory that no matter which path you take, eventually you're going to make it to the point where all the paths intersect and you're going to end up where you're supposed to be.

A Few of Last Weekend's Pics

Sarah's Senior Pictures

I'll post more after I get everything edited and send the disc off to her.

Family Time Pics

I hung out with the family today and took some fun, Spring time pictures. It's funny how the girls are soooo much easier to take picture of than the boys. The girls just sit there and smile and stare into the camera. The boys run and move and will not look at me under any circumstances.

Running Your Own Race

Here it is. Month three already. Can you believe it?

I certainly can't.

You know what else I can't believe? How great that 50mm lens is. It's changed my life. My photos have improved tremendously without me actually learning anything new. I'm impressed...







I'm finally getting to the point where I like my shots straight out of the camera, and I don't feel the need to bury them in wild Photoshop actions. I definitely love me some actions. I do. But I use them as a crutch most of the time to hide the fact that my photos are sometimes flat. With this last batch though, I didn't even touch half of them. I'm so happy that I'm seeing improvement in my work. The learning curve is the hardest part of any process and it's easy to get frustrated with it. I love looking at other portrait photographers' work and I have a hard time not comparing myself to them. There are so many amazing photographers out there and it makes me feel like I have such a long ways to go.

That reminds me of something I read during marathon training a few years ago: Everyone has to run their own race. That's become my mantra in life. You can't compare yourself to everyone on the track. There's always going to be someone faster and in better shape than you are. You'll never make it to the finish line if you spend the entire race focusing on everyone else. You have to focus on yourself, your own training and your own motivations. Crossing the finish line is the ultimate goal. It doesn't matter how long it takes you to get there.

That thought definitely applies to everyday life. Let's all try to remember that. Let's also remember that if you don't keep up with your cardio, those awesome calf muscles you built during marathon training will disappear about three months after you stop running, leaving you once again with chicken legs.