Graduation Session in the Blossoms | Calgary Photographer
As soon as I saw this girl’s dress, I knew that we had to schedule the session in the spring blossoms. It suited her dress so perfectly and made for such soft and romantic photographs. She bought the dress while on holiday with her mom in Quebec if I remember correctly.
This family chose to add a quick little family mini session to the beginning of their graduation session. Almost every family chooses that, but if you are not one of those families, you can add an extra outfit or an extra location to the session. Some graduates like to be photographed in a casual outfit or a team uniform. Others choose to have two contrasting locations—perhaps the studio and then a more natural setting. Or, their childhood bedroom and a cool urban location. This is why I create a totally custom session for each graduate. I’m not interested in creating a session that is hurried and only provides a few photographs. I want to create a session that documents your graduating child in a complete way and that takes time so that it is done properly.
Branding Photography with Kourtney Branagan | Calgary Photographer
What is branding photography? Well…it’s a relatively new kind of content creation. With the rise of social media, people are now finding themselves with the need for images specifically to promote themselves and what they do. To me, it means creating images unique to YOU and your brand. You don’t want your images to look like everyone else’s in your field—you want to STAND OUT and show off who you really are…with a little planning and preparation, we can create lots of images in one session. I know a lot of ‘branding’ photographers want you to subscribe to their services and get sessions monthly, but I really don’t think you need to do that. You need to have goals for your image library and work with your photographer to meet those goals in a way that is the most economical from a time perspective.
Meet Kourtney Branagan…she is a recent branding client of mine and she is running for Calgary City Council in Ward 11!! I fully endorse her because she is organized, smart, and FUN…so full of life and ideas, but also a willing collaborator. In fact, her website is https://www.co11aborate.ca/ !! You might see her out and about on her gorgeous mint bike or at one of the many events she has planned to campaign. If you are in ward 11, I encourage you to get to know her and consider giving her your vote.
For her branding images, we wanted to try to capture the changing seasons at the well known locations around her ward. In 3 different sessions, we managed to create a large library for her to use on her website, social media and in her print materials. We took the time to change her hairstyles and outfits to help give the impression that they were taken over a greater period of time. If you are running for office or if you are just looking to improve your personal brand, I would love to work with you to create your own image library. Here is a small selection of images that I created for Kourtney!
Georgia in the Sunflowers at Paradise Hill Farms
That time Georgia came along to assist on a shoot with me and things ran late so we were able to fit in a little Georgia session. She cut her hair right after this shoot…so this is literally the only time she wore that gorgeous hair tie. Fingers crossed we make it out to the sunflower fields again this summer.
Teen portraits are definitely one of my favourite things to photograph. Just saying.
Summer Vacation 2019 | Pughville in Rome
Rome
I am not one of those photographers who has done a good job at keeping up with the editing of my personal work. I wish I had more desire to sit at the computer and edit, but…I just don’t. So, I have many, many unedited images of my family waiting for me to finish them. During the pandemic slow down, I actually took the opportunity to make my way through some of them. I even got a Blurb book made from our 2019 trip to Europe…it is 370 pages(omg…insanity I know). So, I thought I would share some of my favourite here for all of you. We split Rome into two—as we started and ended our trip there. We saved the Vatican for the final part of the trip.
I know that I usually share links to where we stayed, but—honestly, as cute as it was, it was not very clean so I wouldn’t want to recommend it to anyone. I will say this to anyone who is looking to visit Rome—the public transit is excellent(even if it is insanely HOT in all of their buses in the summer). We did rent a car in Rome, but avoided driving there as much as possible. Which is something I highly recommend—ha. We used SIXT and were completely impressed with the vehicle and the service. The truth is—we had a car accident in Croatia(we were hit by a drunk driver—omg) and I can’t get over how not a big deal it was. They were super helpful and awesome through it all…so, if you are looking to rent a car in Europe…we can’t recommend them enough!!
On with the photographs…
