Oh the adventures life brings...

So I have a few shoots under my belt and it seems the more I do the better I get and also the more I enjoy it. I truly found my calling, my art. I love to take pictures in various scenes and I have been having so much fun editing and getting the best I can out of a photo.

Capturing the memories that will last long after I am gone. I honestly love my life. I can't wait to go to school and learn more. I can't wait to see how amazing my work becomes and I am grateful for the few of you that are along for the ride. I promise very soon I will be keeping up with this blog more often and posting more pictures. :)

My Favorite Pictures...

These are a few I snapped in this past week... I just love them and how far my photography has come! Enjoy!

It's been almost a month...

So I haven't been on much lately. I have been doing so much. I've gotten my home studio set up and I am currently working my way through three amazing books that will help me improve the quality of my photos even more. 

I have also been potty training Ariana which has been rough but rewarding. I'm learning that patience is most definitely a virtue. I do have to say it is nice to be back to changing only one set of diapers and she has been doing well despite the fact that she has been sick these past few days.

On to more awesome news. I spoke to someone from The Art Institute Online and I will be applying to enter their Bachelors in Photography Sciences program! If accepted I will be starting this August! Already filled out my fafsa and got my SAT scores. :)

I guess you can say I found what I was meant to do with my life and I want my girls to be proud of me so going to college is important. Plus I can get a job after graduation and save money so I can achieve my goal of owning my own studio someday.

Oh and for anyone curious. The books I am using are:  

They are all great so far as I have been hopping between them and I am already seeing improvement in my photography! Just take a look!

I Swear I Gave Birth to Perfection...

So this past week I had the pleasure of taking photos of my daughters in adorable tutus and bows from Prissy Bottoms Boutique and Pageant Wear  http://www.facebook.com/pages/Prissy-Bottom-Boutique-Pageant-Wear/153310478042578 I took a chance and finally shot the pictures in raw format and did all of the post processing. It was an amazing difference in quality between raw and jpeg format. I don't think I could shoot in jpeg ever again. Here are some of my favorites of my two little models below.

Sickness from hell...

Yet again I have been sick. I spent a full week with a fever going from 101 to 103 degrees. I'm ok now thanks to my hubby. He took care of me and made sure the babies were taken care of. I am back in the swing of things once again and have gotten back into learning photoshop and messing with my camera. New pictures soon. We are expecting a possible snow storm tonight and if you know anything about southern Alabama you know that it would be a miracle for it to snow here so maybe I will have some awesome pictures of the snow.

The Learning Process...

I am now on Chapter 3 of From Snapshots to Great shots. I have learned how each setting is relative to the others... Change one change all. Also I never knew my camera required firmware updates and it was due for one but I got that taken care of along with formatting my memory card and backing up all of my pictures to the my portable hard drive.

On top of that I compiled an amazon wish list of everything I need to further my photo quality and set up a home studio and the cost of it all will be around 800 dollars. Not bad considering thats how much the camera itself cost. lol Anyone wanna make a donation to the home studio fund??? 

I'll be getting back to my book now. I look forward to sharing more of what I have learned with you all very soon.  

Stupid Weather...

     With all of these very frequent weather changes my daughters and I have caught the worst colds... Imagine a sick baby, sick toddler, and sick mommy. It has been a rough couple of days and my photography has fallen by the wayside... 
     Pretty soon I'll be getting my books so I can learn more about how to make the most out of my Canon t2i . The books I am getting are linked below. 
     Also I want to start booking shoots with anyone who wants to do one. I want to learn and grow more so I am offering a 1 hour shoot with all images on a disc and 20 edited images for 30 dollars. You will have all rights to print from the disc. :) If you are interested you can comment your email below or email me at s.sims728@gmail.com. 


 

The bluest eyes...

Today I decided to focus on the eye coloring in my photos by the settings I used. I slightly changed the iso and shutter stop settings and came out with stunning results in my first photo. On the second the photo came out dark with zero yellow in it so I had to do some editing in Photoshop CS5 but I still love the bright blue tint in the eyes after the color was corrected.

Adventures in Manual Mode

Today I took my first step into really learning how to use my camera. I switched the dial to manual mode and just messed with settings as I took pictures of my daughters. The end result is not perfect but I had so much fun and can't wait to try some more. For the first time in a long time I am learning something new and exciting and I love it!

First Photos...

 Above is my precious sleeping Lina. 

Candles are one of my obsessions... I love how the light flickers in a darkened room.

 I just thought this thing looked really awesome and it feels amazing too. 

It's so easy to be drawn into the light and forget about everything for just a moment.

My beautiful Ariana. Such a sweet little girl.

Starting a new adventure

For Christmas I received my dream gift. A canon t2i with two lenses (18-55 and 55-250). I decided once I took a few photos that this needed to be my newest hobby since I have two amazing subjects to photograph Ariana who is 17 months and Alina who is 2 months. They are my two little princesses, hence the name Double Crown Photography. Maybe someday I can turn this into a profession. For now I am just learning how to use my camera's various settings and learning on Photoshop CS5 so I can fix the photos I take. Stay tuned and watch me progress through my newest adventure.