Following Your Passions

Following your passions in life open doors to all sorts of opportunities. It's what brings hope, strength, and renewal when you feel all is lost. Without passion, you are simply walking aimlessly in the direction that others place in front of you because you don't know where you want to go yourself. I think the first step in defeating such a lifestyle is realizing this and keeping this idea in the back of your mind and never letting yourself forget it. There are so many things I feed off of to keep me going and one of those things are good, animated movies such as Disney, Pixar movies, and the wonderful creators of Wallace 'n' Grommet who came out with a wonderful movie today called Pirates: Band of Misfits. I absolutely enjoyed myself watching it!

I've always loved claymation in particular because of the detail and thought that goes into the body of work. Not to mention, I love working with clay myself. My friends and I made an entire city dedicated to things we made of clay and certain alien figures we dubbed "Dudes" and we would spend daysssss of our summers in our pre-teens and early teens working on all the creations we could possibly come up with. I'm so sad we never got photos of what we ended up making! At one time, there was an entire mall, downtown city, theme park, and a neighborhood where we had our own yards, roads, and everything that was all miniturized and made by us and scattered across the entire plains of my parents basement. So, watching these claymation movies it brings me back to those times.

I must admit I got a glimpse at a preview for the new Pixar film coming out called Brave. I felt so powerfully connected to the main character I was actually tearing up a bit. My mom was sitting next to me and I heard her whisper to my dad "The girl in this movie reminds me Brooke so much!" That made me smile so hard.




There are only 4 more days until we hop on a plane and start our journey to England! I cannot WAIT for this vacation. I must admit I need this vacation more than I have ever needed one in my entire life before. I'm sure there will be times later down the road I need one even greater than this now, but man, talk about working my ass off. All for the good though :) and much personal growth. So, its time for some more. The picture below was one taken of me by my hubby (fiance at the time) in 2007 when we made a trip to Leeds Castle :) I can't wait for the freedom to explore around like we did then.

I'm shooting a wedding tomorrow and I'm trying to get my brain working in wedding mode. I shot a wedding last weekend as well and haven't even finished going through all the photos! It will be nice when I'm not working a full time job on top of doing photography anymore. So, thought I'd share some tips and tricks that I have learned for shooting weddings:

*Batteries. Batteries. Batteries. You can't have enough. And memory cards!

*Pay close attention at the ceremony. You CANNOT miss The Kiss shot! 

*Stay hidden and unnoticed. The more unseen you are, the more comfortable people can be to just be themselves. Nobody likes a camera from a complete stranger right in their face. Not even me! 

*When doing posed pictures, take at least 2 of every pose. That way when you get to processing them on the computer, if one turns out blurry, improperly exposed, or just off to the way it should be, you have a back up. Plus it doesn't hurt to try and capture hidden smiles and get rid of blinking! 

*Just keep having fun. People thrive off your energy level. If you can bring it to the table, it will be there for people to feed from so to speak.

Speaking of energy levels, it's nearly 2 am and I have a full day of shooting ahead of me! Time to get some sleep :) I've got an insane week of awesomeness ahead of me!

-Brooke

We're going to England!

 The Hubby & I
Photo By: Jessica Truong 2011

 

Wow, the way Blogger has changed up this site is going to take some getting used to! Not sure if I like it yet or not...

But. Big News.

The hubby and I have booked a trip to England!!!

We leave May 1st and will be gone til May 11th. It will be the first time I've left the country in 4 and a half years and I'm so excited to be returning to the very place I went last time. The place my husband grew up, Canterbury, England. We plan to do lots of things (as usual) while we are there and the funny thing is while we were trying to think of what we wanted to do. We couldn't think of anything we DIDN'T do last time! Except two things, attend an Opera show in London, and visit Paris for a day. I want him to be able to spend a lot of time with friends and family though because he hasn't seen most of them in going on 5 years. But, we plan to try and accomplish the trip to London and the trip to Paris as well!

Next year, we plan to take a back-packing trip across Europe and hopefully be able to stay in cheap places with friends/family along the way and hit as many cities in as many different countries as possible. But, plans for that one will have to come later.

The big plan for this year is to transition myself into working full time on my photography. I'm falling in love with portraiture, weddings, and documenting life and seeing how people love and react to my photos when I finally give them their images is more rewarding than I can possibly describe here. Before, I didn't like the idea of running a photography business off weddings because there is a lot of pressure when photographing them. But I'm starting to love it. And it feels like a weight OFF compared to the job I'm making myself do right now. And with the way technology seems to be going, my place of work may be going out of business in the next 2-3 years anyways just by the way things are facing. I could be wrong, but it doesn't hurt to think ahead. I want to lead a creative lifestyle and the only way of doing so is by starting to do things different.

 

Afterall, one definition of insanity is: Doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results.

If you want something to change, you need to make it happen yourself. Otherwise, you are just victim of circumstance.

Salons at Snider Crossings

 

Got my haircut today! Shorter than I ever have before :) Although, it still really isn't extremely short but my amazing stylist cut off so much hair it could have filled up a shopping bag. I feel like I lost 10 lbs. 

The salon I went to was a new place that was a little cheaper than my usual destination. I decided to give it a try and I was sooo nervous. But this little salon was so cute I want to keep going back! My stylist was an older Japanese lady (her name I later found out to be Harumi Cox) that treated my hair-cutting like she was painting a picture. She was quiet the entire time and studied every hair on my head with such meticulous movements it was astonishing. I definitely recommend her!! Her salon is located in Mason, Ohio at the Salons on Snider Crossings. Suite 5!

Lost in the Breeze

Feeling the Setting Sun

 Yesterday evening was absolutely perfect.  

As the evening sun set, we packed up our puppy and headed to our favorite Chinese restaurant in celebration of the first real spring day. Then went to a park we hadn't been to since we were first married to sit at a picnic table and watch the sunset. We played Frisbee with our puppy, took some cell phone Polaroids, talked, laughed, and ranted about our days. Then, he pointed out a plane in the sky, and we watched it practice acrobatics over a growing corn field nearby. Watching the plane dip low, around, and everywhere, it reminded me of my burning desire to learn how to fly and I thought to myself someday that will be me.

Shoes! Shoes! Shoes?

So, I'm not sure if this was a complete waste of time or not...! But it felt entirely therapeutic :) ((some of you girls may understand...))

I have a weird fascination with shoes. There are just so many neat designs, colors, styles, and so many different types for different occasions. And shoes shows the style of a person more than any other item of clothing to me. Are you stylish? Comfortable and set your day to the most conventional? Do you like to run? Hike? Walk? Bike? Go out on the town? You can tell all these things :)

That's what makes them beautiful to me.

After doing some spring cleaning, I decided to photograph all my favorite shoes and I then later decided to post some of them here. I was just gonna keep them to myself and thought eh, why not!

These are my newest pair. And I have a feeling they will be matched with many different outfits.

These are my gladiator sandals! I sometimes like to pretend I stepped into the streets of ancient Rome while wearing these beauties.

My mother-in-law bought me these when I visited England back in 2007. I wore them through many different castles, parks, and even through London a couple times.

These are my Lara Croft boots. When I feel like I need a kick-ass day, I wear these.

What kind of shoes do you like to wear? :)

When I photograph weddings, engagement shoots, kids, I always have to get a couple shoe shots! :) 

Have a wonderful day.

Brooke