Friday, March 23, 2012



With Summer at a close,( though I think most would ask did we have a summer this year?) I thought I would start the new blog with some of the highlights from my summer. Spending time with my wee muses. This particular shoot was inspired by a desire to go out to the jetty Sir Peter Jackson used in one of his films.
An old couch sat out on the Jetty and was the perfect seat against a beautiful Canterbury landscape, and the muses were in the mood for photography :)
My children have always been the inspiration behind my photography for so many reasons, I am constantly looking for that shot that to me says who they are, that look that melts my heart and honing my skills on them. I sometimes end up with the Mum hurry up and take the photo look, do I have to stop and be your model again (they don't seem to care how great the light is hahaha), but when they are in the mood for having their photographs taken it all seems to come together nicely and that's what it's all about I guess, getting them in that mood and enjoying the session.
I also want to demonstrate to them that you can LOVE your job and have FUN doing it, but you also have to work hard at it :)
Summer for us was spent entirely in our shakey region of Canterbury and for those of you who also live here you would well know our summer holidays were also interrupted by some rather large jolts.
But that aside we decided to spend our 'holidays'  exploring our region like going over the hill to the bays,  exploring parks we had never been too, seeing what north Canterbury had to offer.
I think we can never know too much about the place we live and for those of us in Christchurch and Canterbury it is also important to appreciate what we DO have to embrace it and enjoy it.
This year I am going to make a more conscious effort to do more exploring of my region (and hopefully find some fantastic photographic backdrops while I am at it!!!) It's hard sometimes to put in such an effort weekends or days off are so few and there's things like house work and gardening to be done, but this year I am going to breath and do it, enjoy what we have (and maybe just work harder on those tasks while the muses are at school!) we still have so much beauty around us down here and I think now more than ever the recording of such has become more important to me especially the recording of my muses, I have even been inspired over the last week or so to go through my archives of family photos and though I have adorned my house with many a large canvas I have decided it is time to print the ole 6x4's and have a hard copy of the family Album( I guess I'm the photographer version of the builder who works on everyones house but their own).
Picking only my favourites I have 388 photos in one nice we folder to print, a small portion of what exists on 3 external hard drives- back-up back-up and then back-up!!! The fun and a few happy tears I have had going through this lot, it's our life and digitally recorded (some are on film negs) there, and in plenty a little hoard that I can easily store without blocking the entrance to any fire exits!
It's family and all it's branches there for the muses to be amused... good bye summer, it's time for the leaves to turn and fall (into great photographic piles!!!) next year we hope you stay a little longer and maybe bring some more heat, but for now we bid you farewell as we do and look forward to the changes of a new season.