Last night we watched "Social Network" which is the story behind Facebook. Many things surprised me about the story and it caused me to think about life before Facebook and life after. I had no idea going in what actually transpired with the birth of Facebook, but I gained a real appreciation for people with an anatyical and their creativity. Being creative is different for everyone who is creative. I had no idea that someone so left brained could be creative but Mark Zuckerberg was just that, according to the movie he had some inspiration and didn't solely dream up the idea of Facebook but he did have the ability to see a blank space and create something using coding. He was depicted in the movie as someone without alot of social skills, which if true probably helped him find a way to be social from behind the computer. I did not know there were so many people involved and that one of them was Sean Parker founder of Napster. I remember when Napster came into being, I was one of the users of his site, being a photographer I hate to admit that, but I was new to the computer, home with babies, and just killing time. I tried to remember when I first knew about Facebook, I know I had a MySpace at the time which I didn't love using. I know that Facebook had an ease of use I really liked. Its taken time to learn all the uses and misuses of Facebook, as it is an ever changing anomaly, once you get used to using it, it get changed. In our business we spend alot of time learning how it can help our business and I am always amazed at the amount of people in my life, past and present I've reconnected with through Facebook. How could I ever know what my best friend in Boston's dog ate this morning for breakfast if not for Facebook....lol?

Here's a little trivia for you to think about and ask yourself it applies to you, the average person logs on Facebook 4 times a day and is on for an average of 55 minutes a day. Are you one of them?

Valentine's Day and Winter Be Gone!

Finally we are through January, thank you! How I wanted to see January come in December when we were in the middle of the stress and the parties and the present shopping, cooking, eating, drinking, excess, excess...January looked so lovely sitting on the horizon with its quiet nothingness. We all rest, hungover by December, breathe and then wait. Wait for life to start up again, for us all to recover and then February arises out of the smoke and arrives and we see red and love and roses and see that Spring will come again.

I have come to love Valentine's Day...not for the gifts of chocolate and flowers as much as for the promise of the newness that is coming after VDay. January is gone, February the short month is here and life is back to what we know it to be with its routines and schedules and sameness. I will be happy for that sameness for now.

Valentine's Day!

We are really excited to let you guys know about our Valentine's Day special for kids and pets! These portraits make great gifts for Dad's, grandparents and kids will love handing out Valentine's Day cards featuring their faces at school! These special edition sessions are limited and fill up very quickly. Reserve your space now for a time and date that works for you!

Sessions start at $39.95 and includes 2 5x7's and 8 mini Valentine cards! Call 248-6146 to book!

A new year committment again.........

I am pretty sure that I've committed to better blogging in past years but this time I mean it!!!

I will blog more. I promise. If anyone cares.

Its been a wonderful 1/2 year in the new studio and lots of "gonna do this, changed to that" we have had alot of adjusting to do. This was our first year here in the South with a high school contract for seniors that had a required number of portraits that needed to be done by the end of summer. Lots of fun was had here with the teenagers, we loved making the girls feel like models and the boys who came in expecting to hate every minute of the process ended up having fun too.

We also found some really cool outdoor locations along the way.

From there we went into a fundraiser for JL Mann's track team something we fell on completely by accident, which led us to get to know our neighbors here on Feaster, Carolina Zoom, at the helm is Mario de Carvalho and Jane Robelot. As it turns out Mario is famous as a camera man for network news and Jane was the anchor for many years on Channel 6 news. Both Emmy award winners with much insight. We heard many stories and learned alot about video from them. They created a video for the kids at JL Mann to help raise awareness for their need of a track. This program led us into a Fall of family portraits. Here we discovered the beauty of families in Rock Quarry Garden. We created a whole host of images that carried our families into the Christmas season and

then there was Santa..........

Santa, came to us again by fate he arrived at the studio on one Saturday in November to delight our children and he not only did that but touched our hearts too. He was everything Santa should be and more and we can't wait to have him back here again next year and hope we can create a much larger event for children. It was a wonderful start to our holiday season.

So now Winter is officially here and 2011 has begun, we will soon be working on Valentine's Day images, hope to master the art of the silhouette, bring in Easter and before long be celebrating our one year anniversary. Look for more posts this year, I promise....follow me here it might help motivate me! :) Happy New Year to all !

Happy 2011!

We've been making family portraits outside lately!

Family Portraits

We all want that family portrait of our smiling childrens faces, the one that shows how happy we are deep inside to have our children, but we don't always get it. Even as photographers, with children like mine who have been photographed extremely regularly (and I mean to the extreme) aren't guaranteed that. This image for me, is about something more, its about freezing time....not happy faces, but where they are right now in their lives. You don't have to think about it much to see what their faces might look like, its almost like you don't need it.

Upstate Women's Show - 3 Days of Excitement!

This past weekend was the Upstate Women's Show and it was an awesome experience for us! Three days of all things women, talking with other vendors, shopping and sharing our business with all the people out there who don't know we exist was both exhausting and exciting. It was great to hear the feedback from people who had never seen us before and were excited about the "different" style of our photography. Many things we brought with us generated attention and the two sweeties above did a great job talking with people and bringing people into the booth to visit.
Enjoy the images and make sure that next year you attend - it really is alot of fun!!!

Jewelry, Purses and Shoes!

I have always wanted to add jewelry to the products we carry at the studio. I think I may have finally found something I think fits the bill. I am a sterling silver lover and so the idea of putting my images on something I can wear really thrills me. This is not going to be a huge money maker this is more like a passion. The passion of merging my love of jewelry with my love of photography. Up next some new purses! Its time to put some of the beautiful images of your babies and children on bags we can carry, while our children will still allow it (well mine won't be I might torture them anyway) Jewelry, shoes and purses make me giddy with excitement! The shoes I will just indulge in on my own, pretty sure you can't get an image on a strappy sandal
yet. I won't drag the whole world through it.