One Year in Florida!

Hey everyone! As the title of this blog post says, on this day last year, I moved to Florida. Wow! Time goes by way too quickly. As I was thinking about this, I realized I never posted a blog to tell everyone that didn't already know I moved, that I moved! Let mr explain why we left Michigan, and chose Florida in the first place.

I have a lot to catch you up on! First things first, I moved out of Michigan almost a year ago. I ended up in the Florida panhandle in a city called Destin Florida, right along the gulf coast in that small part of Florida that has the different time zone. In the last year, i’ve been settling in and getting to know the area. I also bought my first car, celebrated Chris and I's 3 year anniversary, celebrated my 24th birthday, Chris’s 26th birthday, survived my very first hurricane, traveled to many cities, (Atlanta, New Orleans, Pensacola, Pittsburgh, Ripley, Van Wert, etc.) but I have also been shooting lots of new work, networking, and brainstorming. As some of you may know, I even started to better my video skills. (link to my video project blog below)

One of the most common questions we got while fulfilling our moving process, was simply why did we decide to move. Well the truth is we had many reasons why we wanted to move. Firstly, we wanted to explore a new area. The town we were living in was called Midland, Michigan. Midland is a nice area, but it was really small. I think the main reason we stayed for so long was because Chris’s college was based out of Midland, and because I was so sick the previous year. (Check out the blog post an overdue life update for more information. blog link at the bottom.). Secondly, we decided to leave to help me branch out in a new area and find an area with more fashion photography opportunities. As you can imagine, living in a small town only consisting of family run retail portrait studios was not the best job environment for me. Although I was still abled to make some pretty great connections, we felt it was time to move on. So as soon as Chris was abled to get into all online classes, we started talking about what we wanted in the next place we lived. So we made a list and as part of our criteria, we wanted warmth, fun, and job opportunities. We first decided on Tampa. So Chris moved down first in January to apartment hunt for us starting in Tampa, but we didn’t see anything we could see ourselves in. Luckily we have a friend who was looking for a new roommate in the Destin area so Chris went up to visit , and I came down in March.

I can’t wait to show you all my new work that will be coming up on the website soon. but for now, im going to show you some of my candids, personal milestones, and a few trip images that I have taken this past year to show you around my new area the only way I know how to. I hope you enjoy them!



Blog links:

http://www.elisebakerphotography.com/blog/2019/1/17/exciting-projects-in-the-work

http://www.elisebakerphotography.com/blog/2017/11/18/an-overdue-life-update

Exciting Projects in the Work / ASAD January Sneak Peak

I have quite a few new and exciting things planned for you this year!

The project I want to tell you about today is called A Second A Day. It’s a video project which is pretty self explanatory, but I am filming a second (or two) a day of my life. I decided to do this to help me get motivated to think differently on a daily basis, and not just while on set doing a photoshoot. Another reason I chose to do this project is so I can better my video editing skills. Many photographers this day and age shoot video and still photographs, as most of you know I have done a few videos here and there, but this I hope will help me really learn a lot more techniques and also to better myself in the job market.

Every few weeks (probably once a month I’ll show little sneak peaks of my project so far. These sneak peaks will be about 8-10 second videos of my favorite moments captured per month! i’m really excited to show you all and see how it turns out at the end of the year!

Don’t worry i’m still shooting and working hard to show you my next photo project, so be on the lookout for those too! without further ado, here is my some of my favorite January moments!

First Michigan Fashion Shoot

      Back in October, I had my first chance to do a fashion shoot in Michigan. This very inspirational woman has become a friend of mine these last few years and it was an honor to work with her while she has so many other projects going on as well. We are currently in the process of rebranding her, so there will be many planned shoots to come that im very excited about! Even though some of you might have already seen them on my updated website, they have yet to be blogged.

      I would also like to send out a special thank you to my boyfriend, Chris for learning how to be an assistant to the photographer by moving around the lights and equipment, and even learning how to use and set up all the equpitment to be the best help he could.     
 
     So without further ado, here are some images from our first shoot. I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed making them!

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An Overdue Life Update

      As many of you know, I moved to Michigan after I graduated from The Art Institute of Pittsburgh to be closer to my family to save up some money to travel, and move to a big city. (I always thought I would move to LA first, but lately I've been liking the idea of NYC.)  

     Anyway, I kept this pretty quiet last year, the ones closest to me knew about it but that's about it. Last year I got pretty sick a lot of chain reaction things that left me ill and un-able to function in a productive manner for about a year. In fact the entire reason I am making this post is because I saw one of those Facebook memories from last year when I was a walking EKG and one of the only images that I publicly shared from that year in which you could actually see the heart monitor attached to me. Those constant set of issues set me back on my plans for moving on with my life quite a bit. I'd like to say a special thank you to my boyfriend, family and friends who stood by me and helped me by keeping all my nerves away. They all helped me by listening to my complaints and spent their entire year putting my health and well-being before their own. 

     I am FINALLY starting to photograph again which is an amazing feeling. I have also gone through and re-edited my entire portfolio and website just to give me that fresh "new start" feeling. Over the next few months I plan on getting my blog schedule especially back on an every other week basis. I'd also like to extend another thank you to my boyfriend, as well as all my friends and family that helped me get back on my feet. They really help push me back to work even when I'm scared of failure and full of self-doubt. This thank you also includes my great uncle Fred who passed this week, because without you I would not have seen my cousins this weekend who have given me that extra boost of confidence to continue on with my dreams. So, thank you for everything you all have done for me. 

     I would also like to extend a large thank you to the people that regularly follow this blog and didn't give up on me even though I took such a long time off from blogging. I was touched to see how many people missed reading what I shared.  Your loyalty means so much to me! 

    Also, because this is a photography blog, and I did mention one image in particular, I will share some of the moments from last year that either I or my boyfriend captured of me (on the good days) while I was ill. The first image with the little kitten from last Thanksgiving at my grandparents is the one that was previously mentioned.  

July Fourth Weekend

Over the July fourth weekend I experimented with slow motion video. Since I don’t usually shoot slow motion, I thought it might be a good exercise for me. I used my iPhone, as well as my DSLR (Nikon D810) to capture video, and slow motion videos. I experimented with colored smoke bombs among other fireworks to study the patterns of smoke for a future project in the works! I took the videos into a few apps and sped the videos up and down until I thought they were perfect for looking at patterns. Below are some of my favorite images, and videos from the night. Hope you enjoy! 

Memorial Day Weekend

     This Memorial Day weekend I got a chance to visit my grandparents in the middle of nowhere. Also known as Van Wert Ohio. I used this opportunity to photograph the area around me. Coming from living in downtown Pittsburgh, to the suburbs of Michigan has been a little bit of adjustment scenery wise, but with my head still used to downtown living, the country was a huge change. These are few photos that I took on my phone while taking walks along the cornfields, with my boyfriend and family, as well as a few personal usage images from my weekend.  Hope you enjoy! 
 

Print Portfolio

Many of you know, I graduated from The Art Institute of Pittsburgh at the end of March. In order to graduate, we had a few requirements. One of those was a print portfolio to show the faculty, future employers, friends, and family at the portfolio show (see my last blog to learn about the process and requirements titled “I Graduated”). My portfolio contains my best work created up until graduation and an artist statement.  I worked very hard to try to find cases and designs that I felt best suited my style and aesthetic. Each of these decisions such as what color to make my case, design aesthetics, plastic sleeves or no plastic sleeves, what type of paper would look best, choosing the images that I think best fit my personal brand and style, the layout of the images on the pages, the image pairings and orders, and many other technical issues that happen behind the scenes. Although the prep work is behind the scenes, some people might not realize exactly how much time and thought goes into it.

After a lot of research, I chose to go with KLO Portfolios and use plastic sleeves to protect my print from fingerprints or other potential accidents. My portfolio is 11x14 because I couldn’t imagine people looking through an 11x17 portrait sized book. Unfortunately that meant not all of my images could be as full bleed as I wanted them to be since I cropped the book smaller, but I still went for full bleed and gave the other images dark borders behind. To push my portfolio even further, I added two pictures on every page, but in three different instances, I used one image on a page as a page break, and transition.  The average number of pages you should have in a portfolio book is 15-20 that display your best technical and creative skills in a constant manner that reflects you’re branding and aesthetic. Before all the images, I have a cover page with my logo and contact information, then an artist statement. The artist statement describes my work and how I became the photographer I am.(all in the same dark blue color as my logo “B”)  My portfolio book itself, is white, and has my logo in the middle.

I have been getting quite a few requests to see my printed portfolio from people that could not make it to my graduation.  I thought this would be a good way to show it, in order. Although I realize seeing a digital image and seeing a print are very different in all aspects, I tried my best to show you the flow, sequencing, and the images themselves.  So here it is everyone from beginning to end. I hope you enjoy it.

I Graduated

     The moment I have been waiting for the last (almost) 4 years has came and gone. Let me start from the beginning. I started college at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh in August of 2012. In that time I worked my butt off to get as much information, work, and experience that I could get. I was even the President of the Circular Photo Club in my school. Then all of a sudden, I was graduating. March 25, 2016. I want to say this came out of nowhere, but Id be lying. It came up too quickly is more of an appropriate phrasing. I graduated with my Bachelors of Science in Photography.

     The week of March 20-26th was one of the busiest weeks of my life.  Many people know that my boyfriend lived in West Virginia. So I would go see him every weekend. In the beginning of the week I was in West Virginia helping him pack since he moved up to Michigan with me. When my portfolio show came around, the next day, it was one of the most stressful days of my life, and the very next day at 6:30 am,. my boyfriend and family were packing up my apartment, and I moved to Michigan.  That was just a little bit of a life update for you all on where I am. Now I’ll tell you more about graduation!  

      At the Art Institute, we have these quarterly portfolio shows where all the graduates present their best work. These get show to our professors, employers, friends, family, and the general public.  In order to graduate, not only must you participate in the show, you need to put together a print portfolio, web portfolio, resume, show you have social media platforms, promotional pieces, and a display.  For your displays, you can do just about anything you want as long as it fits your brand. I have seen some amazing and creative displays.  Being the perfectionist I am, I spent many hours and days stressing over every detail. 

     I started with drawing out ideas for my display.  I had a lot of help on my display.  I could not have done it without them actually.  the four wonderful people that helped me were  Mel, who got was able to help show us what we needed to make this happen, and also was able to borrow a truck and bring all the materials to the school. The other three fantastic people that helped me out were Paige Piotti, Jackie Pickens, and Jackie’s dad who came in super early and put my board together. Shelves, legs and all.  They were also both graduating that day which makes them even more amazing. The most nerve wracking part of it did not know until the morning of portfolio show if my display would actually stand because the ceilings were too low to bring it in finished and had to be put together on site. I decided to keep my design simple. The board was painted dark blue, to match the dark blue in my logo, and I had my logo with pictures on all sides to draw you in to my table.

     My promotional pieces were a lot of fun. I made two variations of chopstick labels, both blue raspberry flavor to match the color of my logo.  One was a clear tube; the other had a white tube.  I also had stickers on my table of my images, and my logo. I also had goodie bags.  Blue drawstring bags each filled with 4 blueberry hard candies, a candy bracelet, my business card, and one of each tube of chopstick.  They were a hit. I made 50 and had 1 left at the end.

     On my display I had two PGH You magazines that are student published magazines that I had work in, as well as my iPad with my website up I also had my business cards, and resumes.. My business cards and resumes are all he same fonts and colors as my logo. I also had a contest drawing where people put their name and number on a slip of paper, and you could win a print of your choice. (Winner revealed soon!)

     Finally, the biggest part of the entire display, my print portfolio. I chose to work with KLO Portfolios based out of Vancouver. I just love how it came out and would recommend using them for your portfolio case. I went with white acrylic case with my logo both in the middle. The “b” was surface printed, and the “e” and “photography” were both engraved and color filled around with the same colors as my logo as well.  Inside. Along with my cover and artist statement are full bleed fashion and advertising images.

     With all the running around of the day, I completely forgot to take a lot of pictures. I only got a few of me and my display by myself unfortunately. But here is the final display, which so much work went into, and so many people helped me make this happen. I would like to thank everyone that came to support me and everyone who pushed me through as well as making this possible.

     Although I did not take any other pictures myself, there was a student photographer going around. These are some of my favorites as well as my fellow friends and photography graduates. I want to give them special thanks for all of your advice and options. I’ve spent a lot of time with great friends and great artists. Which helped make this an awesome presentation? This blog post is dedicated to everyone that turned this into a reality! Thank you so so much for all your hard work and stress relieving tactics!

     in the above images are some great friends and fellow photographers/graduates. you can see some of their websites below:
Jeanette Shustack:  http://www.shustackphotography.com/
Amanda Vinecourt: http://www.amandavinecourt.com/
Mackenzie Cowan: https://www.facebook.com/Mackenzie-Lynn-Photography-640012992722983/?pnref=lhc
Tyshane: n/a

     Just For fun, here are a few behind the scenes images from my social media platforms about graduation.

Seconds Project

     Last quarter a group of girls and I did a project for our time based media final. we all got together and added different ideas for it to try to come up with a great project incorporating the things you do through out the day with out realizing. Most of it is shot in first person, as if it was your eyes witnessing the day, like when the dog jumps, or looking up at the buildings and sky around you, watching children running through the city, But it is always brought back by the sound of a ticking clock, as well as the image of clocks that are strung through out the video.

     I hope you enjoy the video below! Dont forget to check out the links to the websites of the girls that helped make it happen!

Daisy Blocksidge:
https://www.instagram.com/thefinereyephotography/

Emily Montgomery:
https://www.facebook.com/Emily-Montgomery-Photography-869779103080740/?fref=ts

Zoo Weekend Fun

      We all know how nice the weather was last weekend. 70s in the middle of November?! That caused for a celebration. Last weekend my boyfriend, Chris and I went to the Pittsburgh Zoo to enjoy the sunny weather before it disappears. We had a great time and spent nearly 5 hours there just goofing around and taking pictures. This was truly my favorite weekend in November so far! We had a few unfortunate incidents happen along the way, like a broken phone, and a cold, but we ended up having a great time. 

     The two of us managed to see every animal accept for the polar bears and crocodiles, which was really exciting for me because its rare to go to a zoo and see every animal they have. Some of my favorite exhibits were the aquarium, where I touched a sting ray for the first time, and the gorillas who had a baby that just would not stop pestering the parents. Chris and I probably stayed and watched the gorillas for a good 20 minutes before we continued on.  All in all, I would consider this to be a successful day filled with laughter and fun. 

     Below I have a few of my favorite images from this weekend. enjoy!:)

Assisting in a wedding

    A  few months ago, I was given the opportunity to assist my friend and fellow photographer Anne,  shoot a wedding. This was a great experience for me since I have never shot a wedding before! I learned a lot from the experience! I went into this knowing how stressful weddings are for everyone involved which is not limited to the wedding party, but also the photographer.  As a photographer, you always have to be prepared for any lighting situation. you never know how dark the area is going to be for the ceremony and reception! The other huge reminder for the future is  to always bring extra equipment since one of our elbow mounts broke, we had to come up with a new solution.

     I got to meet some really great people, as well as a couple who are extremely cute together! Congrats again to the bride and groom, Maranda and Dave Ruhl! 

     Below will be a link to my friend and fellow photographers' website! and some of my favorite images from the wedding! Enjoy!
 

Anne Troxel: 
http://www.a-marie-photography.com/

Hope Grows Victorian Tea Party

     A few weeks ago a few fellow photographers and I got the chance to help out another non- profit organization called Hope Grows. Hope Grows's mission statement is " to restore the lives of those impacted by the role of caregiver and to inspire wellness of mind, body, and spirit through the use of counseling, education, overnight retreats, supportive services, and healing and restorative gardens." For this event, they had a Victorian Tea Party, and had some people come in to talk about yoga, and yoga poses to help relax the body. Another cool aspect of this event was that for each person in the room, they made a place card with your name, what it meant, and what flower corresponded with it. (See mine below). If you want to donate or learn more about this organization the links will be below!

     I had a great time helping out Hope Grows, so I hope you like the images! 
 

Hope Grows: http://www.hopegrows.net/

Family Portraits

     About a month a go, I photographed a fellow photographer, and my friend Nicole with her fiancé and his brother for a surprise present to make and give to the mother of the boys on a mug. this was such a fun (and muddy) time! We had to coral the boys a few times while we hiked to the perfect place which just happened to have been on top of a really steep, muddy, big hill. while Nicole and i took out time, the boys both made their way up by running up. needless to say these country boys got a little bit muddy even before the shoot began! Boys will be boys... :]

Please enjoy these images of wonderful people in some candid and precious moments from our day!

Nicole's photography website: www.nicdreamcatcher.com