Archive for the ‘Events’ Category

On Friday night Heather Wilson and I set up a booth at the Valentine’s Day Pamper Yourself Party at Inspirations in Rockford. Inspirations is a new designer-inspired handbag and accessories store. There were a handful of vendors at the party and everything centered around pampering. We put up a display of our favorite photos, a slideshow, and a fun photo booth for our guests. Then we walked around and snapped some shots of the event while indulging in a little pampering of our own.

Dove Chocolate was passing out yummy samples. I got to try out a facial peel from L’Bri on the back of my hand and now my other hand is super jealous. Our friend Tara was there (Three Little Bows) with her adorable creations. The Scentsy booth made the whole place smell amazing, seriously. Inspirations had their whole stock on sale. Avon was there – you should see these cute body markers they have for little kids in the bath tub, what a clever idea! On top of all that, there were door prizes and refreshments. We’re already talking about when we can do another show like this because we had so much fun!

Last weekend I did something a little out of the ordinary; I photographed a concert in Beloit at The People’s Church. The ApologetiX is a Christian parody band and they are very entertaining! They take hit songs from pop culture and sing them with a twist; they swap out the lyrics to sing about the gospel instead. They are exceptional musicians and they really put on a great show for everyone.

Concert photography definitely presents new challenges. The main difficulty was working with the constantly changing light. Not only was the light always moving and changing, but the color of the light was constantly changing as well. What I ended up doing was setting up a shot, pulling my eye from the viewfinder and following the spot lights, trying to time my shutter with the moment when the singer would actually be illuminated!

To shoot the concert I used my AF-S 50mm f/1.4G lens. I ramped up the ISO on my camera and worked with the existing stage lighting rather than adding a flash, that way I maintained the atmosphere of the concert in my shots. Fortunately, those spot lights are pretty bright, it’s just tricky snapping the shot at just the right moment.