my oldest, kate, started kindergarten today. i didn't think i'd be emotional, and i wasn't - until the bus doors closed and drove away with my baby girl inside.
i'm fine now. jack doesn't start preschool for another couple of weeks so the house isn't empty yet. i think i'm going to be teary when she gets off the bus at 4pm today - she has this huge new world that i'm not a part of and i'm going to hear all about it when she gets home.
ok, so these aren't exactly tear sheets, but they ARE proof that i did my first real commercial photo shoot. my husband called me from work a few weeks ago (he is in advertising) and asked me if i could take some photos of some wine bottles for a non-profit client of his. i laughed and said, "um, yeah i think i can manage that'. he warned me that he's worked with wine before and that bottles are tricky to light. i laughed him off, telling him he had no faith in me.
so it turns out he was right. wine bottles are really hard to light (or maybe they're just hard if you're used to taking photos of people). the glass reflects everything so you have to position your flash so it doesn't reflect on the bottle. it took me a while to configure the lights in the studio and even now, as i look at the photos, i keep thinking about how i could have done it better.
but the client liked them and i have a product photography session under my belt. i definitely like people better.
(btw - if you live in the area and are interested in attending the fundraiser, check out the ulman cancer fund's website.)
i headed over to the palting family's home yesterday to do a family session. i met luisa through another client of mine (hi sharon) and will actually be working on a project with her this year (more on that to come later).
luisa had told me that her son and daughter did modeling and commercials and once i met them it was easy to see why. they're great looking kids but they're also two of the nicest kids i've met. i came home from the session hoping that when kate and jack are their ages that they're as nice to each other. a mother can hope.
a couple of weeks ago i had a phone consultation with a photographer in california who is really well known in photography - particularly in wedding photography. even though i don't do weddings, i thought it would be great to talk to him to get some feedback on my branding and marketing and pricing. this guy is a whiz at marketing and it was incredibly helpful to have an outside, objective opinion about my work.
one of the things he asked me about was why my business name was anna elliott when that wasn't my name. i told him i get asked that all the time and explained to him that i chose my kids' middle names when i first started out because a) i wasn't confident enough to use my own name and b) i wasn't overly fond of my name and thought it sounded kind of clunky.
he told me i could go either way in terms of the name - it wouldn't hurt to change it to my name but it also isn't the end of the world if i don't, especially considering i've aleady got time and money invested in the anna elliott name.
but it got me thinking. maybe i will change my business name. i'm confident in my abilities and proud of the work i produce and at the end of the day, the only difference between me and all the other photographers around here are the things that make me uniquely me - my personality, the energy and the vision i bring to my sessions. people hire me because i'm easy to work with, i make their sessions fun and i produce great photos of their families. why wouldn't i want my name attached to that?
i'm curious what you think. if you're so inclined, take my poll (it's anonymous) and let me know.
a photojournalist spent years documenting a working farm and then returned to photograph the families who moved into the new suburb that was built on the farm years later. i'm awed not just by the photographer's photos, but the way he was able to edit them to show how much the two cultures have in common. very powerful - check it out.
jeff and i used to live in seattle (we met there) and haven't been back since we left in 2001. we've talked and talked about going back but the kids were too young to take on a cross-country trip. we finally bit the bullet a few months ago and booked a trip to come out, figuring at ages 4 and almost 6, the kids were old enough to roll with both the long flight and the time change. we might have been a bit presumptuous.
(kate, after she got wet - unexpectedly - at the fountain in seattle center)
and jack, crying that he didn't want to walk down the hill to the pike place market because his legs hurt (which is what he always says when he doesn't want to walk. which is all the time)
cranky kids aside, i had a great time walking around and remembering being a young 20-something living in the city.
the pike place market:
one of the fish stalls in the market (jeff and i got these huge scampi here, once, and when we saw them today, jeff insisted i get a picture of them)
overlooking the viaduct and elliott bay beyond it: (interesting tidbit: jack's middle name is elliott - as in anna elliott - and we chose that name because we both loved elliott bay so much)
i have a bunch of photos from our trip to lake gaston last week; it's
probably not too interesting to anyone who wasn't there but feel free
to peruse photos of the laciano/goldscher family playing baseball,
boating, fishing and doing yoga. forgive the many photos of my nephew,
seth. he was just too yummy for my camera to ignore.
