Time for change

The past few weeks have brought some changes to my photography and I feel everything new I'm trying and applying will make me a much better photographer.

I've started to shoot RAW to start creating catalogs and working on my photos in Lightroom 5, I took a workshop on creating layer masks, I've signed up for two additional workshops (one for portraits in the park the second for landscapes).

Today I photographed a youth horse show which was my first and all if the things I've been working on helped me capture my best photos yet

I think the best thing a photographer can do is practice. Each practice session helps you grow into a more experienced artist!

Excited

Tomorrow brings new excitement my way as a photographer; I will working on portraits in a public place for a young 15 year old young lady.  It makes you happy to know someone is paying you with their hard earned money to capture those special photos that stops the hands of time. I look forward to posting a few on my photo page:  Jo H Photography

Afterwards we are headed down to Ennis Texas to find the perfect spot to photograph bluebonnets. Every year people go in droves to Ennis to capture the most amazing photos. I always say I'm going to go and never make the 1.5 hour drive down. I just never wanted to give up that time, but as you grow older you look for places that will bring an inner peace to you and a smile on your face and I just can't seem to wait to go on a short road trip to be like the many others who have already made the journey

Check out my photos www.JoHPhotography.smugmug.com. Or my Facebook page Jo H Photography. I would appreciate you likening my page and I'm always open to feedback

Back to photography

I've been spending a lot of time dabbling in photoshop and I've seem to of gotten away from photography. When I started to work on my interest of photography a few years ago, I told myself I just wanted to be good at it and for people to enjoy my photos. There's nothing wrong with photoshop
( I think I'm more of an elements person though) but with the time I've spent in front of the camera I could of been practicing taking photos and learning more looking thru my camera

I told myself 2014 was going to be a learning year and I have learned a lot. But I've spent most of it on the computer learning software. I think I will learn to shoot in RAW but learn my camera like the back of my hand to produce the best photos I can

Ÿour never too old to learn

The past few weeks I've decided I need to learn post processing. I tend to spend most of my time in photoshop Elements 11 versus Lightoom 4. I do plan to spend a week shooting RAW, creating presets in Lightroom and download and edit my photos before playing around with them in Elements

It's pretty funny that I was so scared of photoshop I have had the software about 8 months and I finally set my mind to trying a few things. I'm glad I finally jumped in with both feet because I've had the best time working with my photos.

But, back to work- the next 2 days I have big barrel races to photograph and I want my photos to stand out which means working on my camera settings and capturing the best action this side of the Red River

Those special moments

Yesterday I photographed a barrel race in Coleman Oklahoma at the U Cross arena. I've never been ther and was kind of curious about how the turnout would be.

Since the arena was a good distance you worry about all the new runners you've never photographed before, how the lighting in the arena is, will they be supportive etc.

It was a rainy dreary day but their  ended up being 153 in the open which was a decent turnout with $1,500 added money.

As a photographer I want to cover my expenses (I have a day job) and what's left over buys new or more equipment. But... I am always looking for the ultimate shot- the one that everyone's going to look at.

Yesterday I had the pleasure of photographing the great granddaughter of the great Dale Youree and it was her first race on her big horse. I've never received so many likes on a photo before and I realized how special that one photo was to so many family and friends of this little girl. You just cannot put a price on something like that.

Pee Wee Sports

Today I had the pleasure of photographing Pee Wee or more like Junior Volleyball. I experienced the beginning of an athletes travel into a lifetime of sports. I can just imagine In a few years how well these young athletes will transform and turn into the future champions for state and Olympic gold.

I was able to get some good photos, even with the lack of lighting, from the gym. The referees won't allow flash for volleyball due to the distraction when they are serving.

I like being able to work on my photography with sports, pretty much any sport in hopes that one day a newspaper will offer me a position on their staff as the sports photographer

Learning New Things

The topic of photo editing came up yesterday with a few members of the camera club I belong to. It seems your a natural at it, or you struggle like I do.

I decided I was going to commit 15-30 minutes three or four times a week working on basic editing in Photoshop Elements 11.  I'm really happy I did because I turned an OK photo into something with a little pop and all I did was mix the photo from all color to add some Black and White.

I made one mom very happy when she saw her daughters end result which in turn makes me happy.

So this weekend watch out; I'm going to leant something new!