the Glorious Agonies of Editing Photos of Women — Seattle Nude Portraits by Chamonix Thurston-Rattue

So I just spent the last 2 hours hunched over my keyboard in the dark, furiously smoothing skin with my Intuos tablet (love that thing!) and feeling the world's heaviest dilemma bearing down on my shoulders..... which preset should I use? Dun Dun Duuuuuunnnnnn!!!! When it comes to editing pictures of families, I've got one set preset that is pretty much always my go-to and I always love it. But when it comes to editing photos of women it's different every single darn time! What's with that? The mood of the shoot, the woman's personality, the lighting, the backdrop and clothing yadda yadda — it all has a bigger impact on the editing style. So tonight, I'm sitting down to edit my first women's portrait session in like 4 or 5 months and I'm shocked at how challenging it is — I'd totally forgotten. My memory had wiped away all those hours of toiling over wrinkles, blemishes and fat rolls. Plus, in the last 6 months, I've finally started coming to terms with "who I am as an artist" (gracious I hate that expression) and really embracing / getting excited about pushing myself to try new things and accept what I like (and not what I think I should do or what other people want me to do). So finally, I'm back here behind my computer, staying up late (I haven't even eaten dinner yet - grumble grumble) and after hours spent on one flippin' picture, I'm proud to announce — I love it! (See photo below!) Hallelujah. Now on to the other 50 images from that shoot. haha Good thing I'm photographing women as a hobby at the moment or there would be a very horrific editing bill coming someone's way! Massive thank you to Taylor, our beautiful model, for waiting for me while I edit her beautiful photos. I loved working with her and it's so fun working on her images and seeing her laughing and having fun in front of the camera. I love it! Have a wonderful day of editing, my dear photography friends - you are not alone! 

~ xoxo Chamonix

the Glorious Agonies of Editing Photos of Women — Seattle Nude Portraits by Chamonix Thurston-Rattue

So I just spent the last 2 hours hunched over my keyboard in the dark, furiously smoothing skin with my Intuos tablet (love that thing!) and feeling the world's heaviest dilemma bearing down on my shoulders..... which preset should I use? Dun Dun Duuuuuunnnnnn!!!! When it comes to editing pictures of families, I've got one set preset that is pretty much always my go-to and I always love it. But when it comes to editing photos of women it's different every single darn time! What's with that? The mood of the shoot, the woman's personality, the lighting, the backdrop and clothing yadda yadda — it all has a bigger impact on the editing style. So tonight, I'm sitting down to edit my first women's portrait session in like 4 or 5 months and I'm shocked at how challenging it is — I'd totally forgotten. My memory had wiped away all those hours of toiling over wrinkles, blemishes and fat rolls. Plus, in the last 6 months, I've finally started coming to terms with "who I am as an artist" (gracious I hate that expression) and really embracing / getting excited about pushing myself to try new things and accept what I like (and not what I think I should do or what other people want me to do). So finally, I'm back here behind my computer, staying up late (I haven't even eaten dinner yet - grumble grumble) and after hours spent on one flippin' picture, I'm proud to announce — I love it! (See photo below!) Hallelujah. Now on to the other 50 images from that shoot. haha Good thing I'm photographing women as a hobby at the moment or there would be a very horrific editing bill coming someone's way! Massive thank you to Taylor, our beautiful model, for waiting for me while I edit her beautiful photos. I loved working with her and it's so fun working on her images and seeing her laughing and having fun in front of the camera. I love it! Have a wonderful day of editing, my dear photography friends - you are not alone! 

~ xoxo Chamonix

{Grateful on Sunday} Hot Tubs, Card Games and Mandalas

This week the rain came back to Seattle after many weeks of glorious sunshine. I can't lie though, I'm loving it! I love the refreshing variety and the cozy days and the log fires and hot tubs with rain drizzling on my shoulders and face (keeping me from over heating). I have had such a crazy busy two weeks full of photo shoots and a wedding and now, for the rest of June, I get to enjoy some peace and quiet. I get to take a little break from shooting, focus on the business admin, read some books, do some yoga, go to a new book-club meeting and reassess what I'm doing, how things are going and where I want things to head from here on out. So nice. So many ideas have been flying through my head and I am so grateful for this quiet time to be able to sort it all out. 

This week I am grateful for experiencing my first Persian wedding, 

a midnight dip in the hot tub after a long wedding day, 

inspiration from a photography friend, 

playing cards with grandma and Miggy, 

and WINNING! (heck yes!)

when Cara sleeps in funny positions, 

tasty Irish bread that was kind of squishy, 

the beauty of Skype, 

reading a book that takes place on my home turf so I get to relate to all the local mentions,

whoever drew this and published it on the internet, 

midnight snack with lots of honey mustard, 

one of the most beautiful peaceful early mornings, 

celebrating my grandma's 91st birthday! (and my grandma!)

injecting health into my life, 

all the lessons I'm learning from drawing mandalas, 

soaking in the hot tub for probably 2 hours this morning and feeling fantastic afterwards. 

What are you grateful for today?

xoxo

Chamonix

Creating Bad Work on Purpose to Strengthen your Creativity

What the heck was I doing? This was a terrible idea. The sun was too bright across half of her face, the background looked hella weird and I'm pretty sure I took 200 pictures of the same pose. This was a bad idea and I can't believe I ever thought it would work.

I haven't seen the pictures from this morning's photo shoot yet but there's no way I could describe them as amazing. And yet, I'm so happy. I had an idea and I brought it to life. I hauled a table into the forest with my bare hands. I spend $10 on a kind-of -ugly kind-of-awesome bedsheet. I got a freshly cleaned pair of jean shorts covered in dirt. I'll probably wake up tomorrow with bug bites. So worth it.  

The beauty of the experiment is that it gives your imagination a chance to come to life. Daydreams and visions leave your mind and materialize into the world before you. Sometimes they look exactly how you envisioned. Sometimes they are the next best #pinterestfail - Either way, you are liberating your ideas and strengthening your creativity. One experiment at a time you are becoming better at your craft. An artist. An expert. (This is what I'm telling myself, anyway. lol)

This is the "behind the scenes" before photo.
I can't wait to dive into the edit of the actual photo shoot and see if there's anything good in there. ha!
Have a wonderful day experimenting :D
xoxo
Chamonix

The Purple Dress and Why Do I Want to Take Nude Portraits of Women

There is was... the most beautiful purple ball gown with sparkles I've ever seen. I paid $30 and took it home to my studio, hoping that one day I'd find the Cinderella who would actually fit into this tiny garment. Last summer, I photographed my friend Alena in this beautiful dress and I was amazed at how beautiful she looked. That bone structure is killer and just wearing the dress seemed to bring out a new side to her personality.

As much as I love beautiful dresses and all the wonderful things they do for the female figure (and confidence), I think that sometimes clothes get in the way of us actually seeing the woman inside them. We love dressing up but when the camera joins the party, dressing up seems to turn into a fashion photo shoot — women cross their fingers and hope they'll at least resemble the women in magazines, in the fancy clothes, in the broken doll poses. Frankly, I'm sick of the fashion. Our world has gone a bit overboard with how much importance we place on clothing.

Clothes say so much about who we are and what we like. That said, I also like that without clothes we are all on an equal playing field. I like the idea that when you see a photo of a naked woman, you can't make the same judgements about her that you could if she were wearing clothes. You don't know if she's preppy or grungy or hipster or retro. She's just naked. All you can look at is her face and the shape of her body and the texture of her skin. It's extremely vulnerable and I love that.

Most women aren't comfortable being seen naked, let alone being photographed that way.  I'm in that camp too. The idea of having my nude portrait taken makes me feel so shy and embarrassed. I think this is probably because I don't like how I look when I see myself naked in the mirror. I know I'm not alone with this. I also know that being photographed nude is a great way to overcome this fear and take one step closer to embracing your own body however it looks. So maybe one day soon I'll challenge myself to this experience.

What I can do right now though is offer my photography skills to other women who are ready to be photographed nude. I want to take photos that show a woman looking her most beautiful without the distraction of clothing. Photos that can't be dated by clothing. Photos that aren't all about the awesome dress. I want to take photos that are so simple and focused on a woman's body, her face and how she feels about herself. I want my photos to be honest. I want them to embrace the reality of how women look and what makes women beautiful (and the answer to that questions is not clothing).

Having said all of that, I do think that these photos of Alena in this purple dress are an incredible example of clothing at its best. Both Alena and the dress look gorgeous and Iw on't lie — I'm so proud of these photos. I feel like they may be my best work. Thank you beautiful purple dress for adding a little sparkle to this shoot. (So maybe sometimes I'll use clothing haha)

xoxo

Chamonix

When Pricing Your Photography Don't Forget About the Hidden Costs

Our jaws probably dropped to the floor. Cheryl and I looked at each other, shook our heads and then looked at Cindy and said, "We can help you." haha

This morning, I went to coffee (which always means Zen Green Tea) with Cheryl (my best photography buddy) & Cindy (a photographer we've been mentoring together for a couple years). Our conversation wiggled its way to the all encumbering topic of PRICING. Cindy shocked us when she told us how many (too many) hours she's been spending editing her photos. Just the costs of her time & labor would force her prices up through the roof.

We grabbed a pen and paper and hashed out the finances of one photo shoot:

Cost of Goods:
Welcome Packet — $8
Shipping Cost for Welcome Packet — $5
Branded USB Flash Drive (for delivering images) — $10
Shipping for USB Flash Drive — $5

Cost of Services:
Hair & Makeup — $140
Photographer's Time — $50 / hr (2hrs)
Photo Editing Time — $50 / hr (2hrs)
or Outsourcing Photo Shoot — $20
Office Stuff (Sending Emailing, Phone Calls, Consultations, Uploading Images to Gallery etc..) — $50 /hr (2hrs)

Total Cost of Goods: $28
Total Cost of Labor: $460
Total Cost: $488

*And this is not even considering the overhead of just running the business. This is just specifically for one shoot — not thinking about more general expenses like paying for your editing software, camera equipment, online gallery subscription etc... We're just trying to keep it simple here. 

So anyway, we realized that we have to be charging about $500 minimum just to cover the costs of doing a photo shoot. We haven't even discussed charging for images/prints yet, which is where many photographers make their profit. If you sell images separately, and you charged $30 / digital image and you sold 30 digital images, now you're making an additional $900 for your shoot. That can pretty much be a large chunk of gross profit. Hooray!

If Cindy felt it was too expensive to charge $500 for a photo shoot and then an additional (up to) $99 for photos afterwards. She could fudge the numbers a little and take a risk. If she charges less for her photo shoot, say $200, then she needs to make sure she makes up the difference ($288) with print sales in order to cover the costs ($488) of producing that shoot.

However she breaks down the price, she has to be aware of the hidden costs that come with time & labor spent on a project. If she spent 30 hours working on a photo shoot, even if she charged $488 for the shoot and sold $900 worth of prints, she would still be in the red, not making enough money to cover her labor costs.

It's easy to brush aside labor costs when you're getting started and I'm actually really comfortable doing it myself. I don't think people should worry about it too much when you're just desperately trying to get experience and build a portfolio. At that beginning stage of your photography career, I think the best action you can take is to work as much as possible (even for free). Work and work and work some more!!! And while you're doing all this working, start getting into efficient habits. If you practice spending no more than 2hrs of editing right from the beginning, then once you graduate to the next levels of business and you really start to value the cost of your own time, you'll already be accustomed to working quickly to preserve your hard-earned money, not letting labor costs suck it away into the black hole that is Lightroom/Photoshop. haha

Set those timers on your phones, start working faster, and stop forgetting that your time is part of the cost of your product. Good luck my friends. :)
xoxo
Chamonix

Almost Ready to Rent a Photography Studio .... but Not

The brick walls and the wood floors are where it's at. I need a big window with lots of beautiful light and it certainly wouldn't hurt to have a lovely view. I'm keepin' my eyes peeled for a studio space to run my photography business(es) and grrr what a challenge. Every other night I lie in bed for 30 minutes scrolling through Craigslist and Loopnet — seein' what's out there. With the right budget, I could have my pick but my budget is incy-wincy. To be in the city or not to be in the city — what a frustrating question!! Shall I have a small space that is only for meeting clients or a space that has room for shooting women too? Shall I sign a contract or go month to month? Will I make enough money to pay for the studio AND the bills? Will it pay for itself or ruin me? I can find spots that are the right price but they definitely don't have the right vibe. I've discovered a couple sweet places I'd love and their pricing is tempting but a little uncomfortable — eeek.  So many factors. I guess I'm not really ready yet, then huh? Sort out your life, Chamonix! Get it together. lol That's what I'm saying to myself tonight as I lie on the couch in my parent's living room, feet propped up on a soft blanket, aching after a long day at a wedding, my hairs up in a towel and I'm in my PJs, wondering when the time will come that I shall find and adopt a beautiful little studio of my own. One day......

Thank you Pinterest for my day dreaming inspiration:

xoxo

Chamonix

Green with Envy — Comparing Yourself to Other Photographers

I love the TV Show "ONCE Upon a Time". Recently, the Wicked Witch of the West has joined the show and we find out how she turned green. It's envy. Every time she was jealous of someone, a little patch of her skin turned green. Patch by patch, her whole body became covered in green. In the show, the first time we see this green creeping envy, it starts on the side of her neck.

I spent my first year as a photographer, sitting behind my computer (even at 3am) surfing through other photographer's websites. I was desperate to learn more and get inspiration from their amazing photos. At first it was an innocent hunt for inspiration but then it became obsession, a sick addiction that made me compare myself to photographers who had been practicing for decades longer than I'd even been alive. It made me feel bad about myself. I stared at the screen wishing I could take pictures like that and write interesting blog posts like they did and even dress as stylishly as all of them seemed to do so naturally.

A couple years into the biz, and I realized something had to change. I was in this nasty cycle of feeling so proud of my own work and then hating on myself because someone else took a pretty picture too. Jealous much? So I cut myself off completely. In early 2013, I stopped following other photographers on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, blogs, etc... I still don't have any idea what they're doing — even my best photography friends. How mysterious my world is now, haha.

It's so refreshing to be floating through life without that nasty comparison breathing down my neck every day. But of course, sometimes it sneaks up on me. I'll accidentally see something that someone else is doing. I'll overhear someone praising another photographer. Whatever it is, sometimes I feel this little fire in my chest and I wouldn't be surprised if green patches were breaking out on my neck. And then the little Tinkerbell on my shoulder gives me a pep talk and calms me down, reminding me to focus on my own thing and be happy for other photographers who are creating beautiful work. use that energy to fuel my own pursuit of artistic greatness rather than letting it suck me into a muddy ditch of jealousy induced creativity death. (I guess I'm feelin' poetic this mornin' lol)

Anywhosie, my encouragement for you today:
stop comparing yourself to others or you'll turn green. ;)

xoxo,
Chamonix

{Grateful on Sunday} BackUp your iPhone and iPhoto Photos

What!? An error message from iPhoto — the most simple reliable little Mac program. I've never had trouble with it and then this morning as I cozied up on the couch to write my 'Grateful on Sunday' post (which requires importing photos from my iPhone via iPhoto) it crashed. Eventually, I figured out how to rebuild the whole library BUT all my photos from this past week were lost and I hadn't saved them to my computer yet. Originally, I thought ALL the photos were lost. So only loosing 1 week really ain't so bad.

Even though I lost 1 week of photos, when that error message popped up, I wasn't sweatin' and you know why? Because every Saturday, I upload my iPhone photos to iPhoto and then I drag the photos from iPhoto into an "iPhotos" folder that I have on my desktop. I have a different iPhotos folder for every month. So it looks like this:

Desktop
     iPhotos
          iPhotos 2014
               iPhotos January 2014
               iPhotos February 2014 
               etc....

I back this folder up onto my other hard drives every month. My next project is to upload my iPhone photos to my cloud storage. After that, I'm going to get them printed into cute little albums. So, as you can see, backing up photos regularly on different devices and getting them printed means that when that pesky error message pops up, your heart doesn't panic. In fact, your heart can rejoice and celebrate because you've got your own back!

This Sunday I have no photos to show but I am so grateful for my backup system!

Have a wonderful weekend!
xoxo,
Chamonix

{Grateful On Sunday} Joyrides, Turquoise and Selfies

Today, I went to the river with my friends Hanna and Cheryl. We took photos of each other (we all needed new headshots). When we were at the river, this little rubber boat with three young guys floated on by us. Of course, the boys shouted out and asked us to join them — ha! An hour or so later, we were sitting 10 miles away at a riverside Mexican restaurant having dinner. I looked out at the view and low and behold, a little rubber boat with three boys was floating by. Oh, and did I mention that while we were walking at the river, we passed by a couple who were getting their portraits taken? Because while we were eating dinner, they also walked by the building we were in. Crazy coincidence? Sometimes the world is a funny place. Thank you so much Cheryl & Hanna for all your funny stories and words of wisdom. I love you girls and I am grateful for you both.

Today I am also grateful for my parent's new hot tub,

 joyrides with Miggy,

 a BBQ with Hanna & Cheryl's families + amazing fried onions (thank you Cheryl),

my funny little cat,

my attempt at food photography that I'm still pretty chuffed about,

 the ability to take selfies,

 my turquoise jewelry collection,

 all the pretty little buttercups outside,

 spending hours at a bookstore,

 books with beautiful covers,

 all the beautiful turquoise jewelry at World Market (I just wish I wore necklaces)

 all the turquoise earrings at World Market (now we're talkin' — come to mamma!)

 celebrating my 1/2 birthday! I'm 25.5 now!

sunset joyrides with Miggy,

 the beautiful views of the Cascade Mountains from the Snoqualmie Valley,

recording inspiring interviews for thePhotoChicks podcast,

my car rolled down a hill (accidentally) and didn't hit anything AND stopped before the trees! hallelujah!

 all the beautiful peonies,

 adorable packaging,

blue skies,

 photo shoots on sunny days with friends,

 when the city spends money on beautiful flowers,

 this view from a special little place in the valley,

 and the fact Miggy stopped the car so I could take that picture,

 oh and did I mention joyrides through the forest with Miggy,

 and the view when I look up from our convertible (I love being under trees!) 

all the old barns we pass,

and feeling happy when I look at all these pictures. :D

What are you grateful for today?

xoxo

Chamonix