Photography Lull

Over the past year I've been going through what I can only describe as a photography-lull. It seemed everything that could possibly get in the way of me being creative would get in the way - First of all my favourite lense died. Then my favourite camera started flashing the dreaded "ERROR 99" at me (that's it's way of saying - something's wrong, but I don't know what. I still don't know what over a year on even though I've tried everything). I have been stuck with my back-up camera ever since. Don't get me wrong, it's a great little camera - a Canon 450D, but there are little things that annoy me about it. Mainly cosmetic things, but reasons to be annoyed all the same. It's too light. It's too small. The electronic "PSCHHHHH" shutter noise annoys me.. to name but a few. Then our PC died. Then we spent hundreds of pounds on a new one and I treated myself to the newest version of Photoshop to get me back into the swing of things. All was well for approximately one month until my hard drive died, we moved home twice, studio once and my back up camera went in his bag and didn't come out again, and all my lovely old film cameras went to the back of the attic never to be seen again. The combination of all the above issues made me feel so.. I don't know.. 'meh', about it. Getting the camera out became more of a chore than an adventure and medium for creativity. The only time I took any photos was shooting stock for my etsy shop or embarking on a sadly very rare photoshoot with friends (which I ALWAYS have a blast at!).. 

HOWEVER - Something's happened. I don't know what it is, but I'm slowly falling back in love with my camera and rediscovering my love for photography. Finally! Perhaps it's the first signs of spring? I don't know. I don't even care right now! I'm just looking forward to getting out there with the camera again and shooting and what better way to get things going than a quick afternoon shoot over the weekend?

Back in this blog post I mentioned that Miss Miller and I would be returning to the chapel ruins to shoot. It was a bit of a last minute thing in regards to ideas, but Nat already had something in mind so we went back down at the weekend with Lizzie. I ended up with some beautiful portraits and I'm playing with a new editing style which is less contrasty than my previous work, with soft subtle colour changes and this shoot suited the new style perfectly. We put ivy and paper flowers in Lizzie's hair and Nat played artistic director photographer lady and mover-of-big-branches. The ground was a bit sludgy from rainfall earlier in the day - it must've been a miracle we missed it, it rained before and after the shoot, but remained nice and dry in the middle - perfect!

Nat being super-amazing director, setting up the previous shot.

There were some huge dead branches laying on the hillside so we used some to frame this shot.

If anyone has noticed that my pictures seem to contain some awfully strange colours recently, it's not my new editing style - it's because I've been editing on my laptop and the screen desperately needs calibrating.. unfortunately I've only recently noticed.. Big fail. 

 

You can see Nat's Photographs from the shoot here. 

In other news, I'm making another ragdoll dress! This one's burgundy, peach, cream and lacey! It's about halfway there, here's a sneaky peek of it so far. I can't wait to get it finished, these look great in photoshoots! Update soon!

♥