Words in Sparklers

I've spent the evening outside in the garden with my brilliant family who were willing to stand in the freezing cold for half an hour with me, making shapes and letters with sparklers for my text and image project.

I tried a few different things, some things worked really well whereas some things didn't work as much.

Here a few of my favourites :)

My Mum got confused on this one and spelt the 'S' the wrong way round!!!

I recently shot a wedding with a professional photographer and we tried out this technique on the day, check out the photographs here - https://www.facebook.com/BarefootPhotog/posts/845165362195113

Portfolio Decisions

As Christmas is fast approaching, it's not just the lists of presents that I have left to buy that is on my mind, it's also the fact that My End of Year Show is going to be here before I know it in May next year and I have to get a portfolio together.

I have a old portfolio from my A level photography course but the photographs are old and no where near a good enough standard for a portfolio. 

The hardest part about it is deciding on just what images that I want to include. Also then comes what I want to present it in (book/folder/digital) and what sizes, but I pretty much already know that I want to present at A3 size because they are big and bold enough to stand out.

Here are some of my photographs that I consider my best and the ones that will be definite candidates for my portfolio.

Monochrome V Colour

I love editing my photos after a shoot, its nearly as good as taking the photos in the first place, however sometimes I get myself into a predicament on whether or not to keep a certain image in colour or black and white.

Colour can be amazing to show detail and give the image a particular kind of tone but on the other hand, black and white can be amazing for contrast and dramatic effect.
I have got a selection of photographs in colour and black & white so that I can show you just how hard it is to decide sometimes.

These are two of my favourite images from my last photo shoot:
two in colour and two in black & white.

Colour or monochrome, which one do you prefer? I will let you decide for yourself :) 

Woolacoombe Bay

After weeks of planning and rearranging dates to go to Woolacoombe for two days for a photo shoot - we managed to get there this week & it was amazing! We were so lucky with the weather and the photos are insane, I'm so pleased.

It's just a shame that before leaving, I managed to somehow lock my car keys in the boot and have to pay for a lock smith to come out & get me into my car!! Complete nightmare but never mind, these things are sent to try us & the images are brilliant which makes me feel better.

So here are the best images from the shoot! :)

Don't forget to check out talented Emily's Blog & Facebook Page and give her a like :)

http://emilycuttsmakeupartist.blogspot.co.uk

And Emma, our beautiful model, is a Bow Tie designer so check her out too! Her designs are incredible :)

https://www.facebook.com/emmierosemakesbowties

Photo Phobia Throwback

On Friday, I checked my Timehop App as I do everyday and was so surprised to see it was exactly a year ago from when I photographed my brother and my little cousin, Ella, for my Halloween/Phobia/Horror photo themed shoot. The theme for the project was 'Photo Phobia' and my idea for it was 'child nightmares.' I decided to create a dream-like photograph with my smoke machine and make a nightmare come to life in the studio.

I used the storyline of Little Red Riding Hood and had both models dress up so it looked realistic. We had such good fun in the studio while creating this look and I'd really like to try something like this again very soon but perhaps on location. Hope you enjoy the photos as much as I do! :)

NYC To Do List..

Last week I paid my deposit to go to New York with my college in February and I am honestly soo soo excited!! It's gonna be amazing, so I'm writing my blog post this week on my top to do's while I am there, there will be loads more things that I want to do but I'm just going to narrow my list down for the purpose of this blog post.

By the way these are not in any sort of order! Just an order of what I could think of first in my head :)

10. Staten Island Ferry

9. Statue of Liberty

8. Empire State Building 

7. Rockerfella Centre

6. Central Park

5. Brooklyn Bridge

4. Maceys

3. Times Square

2. Grand Central Station

1. Ground Zero

There is the main list of the things I'd like to do in New York City, after I start researching and reading travel blogs I will add things to the list and probably have about 50 things to do on it! Think I'm going to need to stay there for 5 weeks not just 5 days! If anyone has any ideas of things to do while I'm over there I'd love to know :) 

Website Building

This week at uni, we had a group discussion in one of our lectures on website building for our own business. I found it really useful and have started to build my own - however it is an on going process and I'm taking my time to make sure that I do it properly.

Here are a few pointers and tips that I learnt from the session..

Pages on a website:

• Home page with the business name, logo, a collage/strong image, a mini bio.
• Gallery - Slideshow/Square images with some information. (Caption/Location & Credits.)
• Blog page - Direct link to blog so clients can read a bit about what you do from week to week.
• About page - Bio on who you are and what you do. 
• Contact - Email/Business phone number/Social media.
• Price List & Shop page.

Other important tips..

• All photographs should be watermarked with a logo. 
• A resolution of 100 dpi is perfect for MAC and PC viewers (also good because it means no one can print them from your website because the quality is rubbish for printing!)
• Mobile compatibility - so that clients can view the website on their smart phones.
• Large font, plain background and consistent colour theme/style.

A website is almost your personal spot on the internet to show off your work and what you do! You want people to remember your website & photographs so that they book you!

Most importantly it needs to be easy to navigate and not take too long to load up - otherwise unfortunately people will go somewhere else. 

As I said, I am currently working on my own website. I am using www.one.com and I am getting there :)

I will keep my blog up to date with how I am getting on with it & hopefully it will be up soon so watch this space xxxxx

To be beside the seaside

Now the cold weather is coming, I took the time to reminisce on some Summer shoots that I did this year.

Reflecting back to a shoot I did down at Bournemouth Beach, I decided to blog about it because I hadn't posted any of the photos on my blog at all. The theme for the shoot was a fashion summer shoot, I wanted to focus on posing and the styling - the weather and amazing location was just a bonus! We ended up timing it perfectly because we had a beautiful sunny day whilst we were there.

Here are some of my favourites from the shoot :) I am planning to go to Woolacoombe Beach with a model and make up artist in two weeks and stay over night. The theme for this shoot is more of a mysterious, dramatic shoot because 1. the weather is going to be grey and miserable and 2. I have experimented with a fun, fashion shoot and would like to try something different. Keep posted for the photographs soon! :)

Youtube Inspiration

When I am racking my brains for ideas and inspiration for new photo shoots and looks, I love to look around at all sorts of research. Pinterest, magazines, twitter etc. are all good sources and you can find some amazing stuff! However, over the last few months I have started to become obsessed with Youtube and have subscribed to lots of make up artists - who show all their tips and tricks for different looks. I also have subscribed to an amazing worldwide wedding photographer who also posts tips and tutorials on photography styles and more.

Here are a list of my top three vloggers!

1) Jasmine Star -  https://www.youtube.comofficialjasminestar



Jasmine is a worldwide famous wedding photographer who shares all her tips and tricks for the best photography and best way to run a business online for you to view as many times as you like. I have learnt so much from watching her videos, I would really advise everyone to take a look at her stuff :)

2) Zoella - https://www.youtube.com/user/zoella280390

Zoella is one of the most famous Youtubers around at the moment! She posts all sorts of stuff - sometimes just day in the life videos, some fashion, some make up and hair. I like to see the different ideas for fashion & make up and hair for various photo shoots of my own.






3) Nicole Guerriero -  https://www.youtube.com/user/nguerriero19

Nicole is my all time favourite vlogger! I have watched her videos for so long now and all her videos are mainly make up, hair and fashion ( my favourite! )
Her looks are really creative - especially at Halloween time and I have had so much inspiration from her tutorials for my own shoots. Even for Halloween this year, I loved her Evil clown couple make up so much that I made my boyfriend & I dress up this year as them (mwahaha.) If you haven't seen the photos, then go to my twitter page to view them :) https://twitter.com/danniellehphoto



Just a short post sharing my favourite vloggers with you :) I hope you like their work too and I will post some new work from photo shoots very soon! Keep up to date with me on twitter - @danniellehphoto or my Facebook page - www.facebook.com/danniellehuntphotography