I love photographs. To me they are magical. They can instantly transport you to your favorite places in time.
Well except for maybe the photo of that terrible hairstyle you just had to try out in high school or that very umm... fashionable outfit you wore in college. But even the bad ones can make you smile and some times laugh out loud.
Last year, I saved some money and finally invested in a nice camera for me (
ahem, hear that honey?). I bought a Nikon 3100D - great camera and is taking great pictures. However, I have yet to learn how to use it other than setting it on automatic and clicking away. I have been eyeing the manual it came with as well as some other books along the lines of
How to Work that Nice Camera You Bought for Dummies; but between the stack of parenting books on my nightstand, my AFFA Group Exercise textbook, and all those magazines and fun books I bought for my "spare time," I just couldn't see when I would get the opportunity to really learn about my camera.
Lucky for me, the Community Studies brochure from UVA came in the mail and this semester they are offering an eight week class called
Introduction to Creative Digital Photography. I signed up immediately. Someone else was going to teach me how to operate my camera and I was going to get an evening out of the house. It was an easy decision.
I had my first class on Monday evening and I am SO excited! Each week we will have a photography assignment and will have to send in our best photograph to critique together in class. Plus by the end of this course our instructor guaranteed that we would no longer be pointing and clicking. We would be shooting raw as they say in the photography world. Sounds so glamorous doesn't it?!
This week's assignment was to capture happiness in a photograph. So, I have been following Phinn around all week trying to get a GREAT picture. I thought it was going to be pretty easy, but turns out it is a little harder to capture a mobile, curious one-year old. Every time he sees the camera, he says "chee" and runs towards it, and if I happen to be lucky enough to snap a picture, he says "see" and wants to see it on the screen and then touch all the buttons. We are working on it though.
Here are some of the photos I've snapped so far this week. (I'll post the one I am submitting on Sunday, so check back!)
So Tuesday, I decided to take some pictures when Phinn woke up from his morning nap because he is usually so happy and cuddly when he first wakes up.
I'm sure he was super excited to be greeted first thing with the bright flash of my camera. Sorry Phinn!
But he started to get into our photo shoot a little bit. Work it baby!
But it got old pretty quickly. He's thinking that if he just ignores me that I'll stop.
Since Tuesday was obviously so successful, I decided to try again on Wednesday after his nap. This time all I got was silly faces like Popeye.
If you can't tell from the fingers in his mouth, we are working on those one-year molars!
Thought we would take our assignment outside to the park since it was so beautiful! There's my baby model!!
Future soccer player, perhaps?
On Thursday, I tried to set up a mini Valentine's Day Photo shoot. For some reason my energetic little boy did not want to pose for any of my pictures...
Instead it was more fun to play with my props.
I finally captured some good smiles by saying "boom!" every time he threw his blocks on the ground. For some reason, it was hilarious to him!
Another warm day led to another try outdoors. Well this one doesn't say happiness, it does melt my heart with how sweet and innocent he looks.
And then he announced that we were "all done!"
