Pre-Wed shoot - Should I?

I offer a complimentary pre-wedding shoot with my photography package and often get asked:

A) What is it?

B) Do we need it?

So to answer these questions I thought I'd share some photos and answers with you!

So your pre-wedding shoot is not only a chance to have some fun and take some photos its also a chance for us to meet, often my couples book without meeting if they've found me online so it's a good chance for us to have a good chat about your day, usually tea and cake is involved which is also a bonus! When I did Emily & Rich's shoot we combined it with a venue visit before so they could walk me around and I could get an idea of lighting conditions and group shot locations!

It gives me a chance to get to know you as a couple, your quirks, your personalities. Lots of couples are nervous about having their photos taken so it's a good way to understand my style and how I work and shake off those nerves so on the day you'll be super comfortable. It's also fun, Its totally your choice where we go and what we do for your shoot!

Collab 01 - Home

The Photography community is an awesome thing. I've met so many inspiring people that I can call friends! I recently posted in a Facebook group how I was feeling un-inspired and a bunch of people commented with different suggestions. I found Jasmine through that post and we decided as we lived a little too far to meet and collab we should pick a theme each week and both fulfil a brief. Lucie (who actually lives super near me and we met on a shoot she organised) wanted to take part so over the weeks we're all going to pick themes and post our interpretations on our blogs.

The first theme was 'home' and we wanted to include self portraiture. Below is my interpretation.
To me home is my room, somewhere I can be myself, by myself. I can be super silly, but i can also take time out. I suffer with depression and anxiety, so my moods can often be pretty up and down. I'm the best i've been in a long time though, more good days than bad! But I wanted to reflect those changing moods, so I opted for a 'photobooth' style photo.

You can check out Jasmine & Lucies over on there blogs:
Jas: http://jaspooleblog.com/
Lucie: hhttp://www.luciewatsonphotography.com

A Beginners guide to Photography: Part One.

So one of my hobbies is scrapbooking, being a photographer I love making memories, I'm obsessed with stationary so Scrapbooking is my favourite way to combine my favourite loves! I'm on a Facebook group for scrapaholics and a lovely lady called Amber was asking for some photography blogs to follow to help people who want to get to know their cameras a little better. I've been wanting to do some posts like this for a while so what better way to get started!

My first piece of advice is to move away from the auto button! I know, I know it's pretty easy to switch to that and let it do all the work, but trust me, cameras can be lazy little things when they want and if you want to improve your photos you need to put a little hard work in!

First off you need to know your camera, get that manual out and start reading! You also need to understand light, as essentially photography is all about drawing with and controlling light. 

Theres 3 things you can do to manage the light. Aperture, shutter speed and ISO.

Aperture is the 'F' stop on your camera. The higher the number eg F16 the less light your camera will allow in, the lower the number ie 2.8 the more light can actually pass through the lens (as the diaphragm is open more).

Shutter speed is pretty much as it reads - How long the shutter stays open for! This is measured in seconds so when your camera displays 1/200 that means the shutter is open one two hundredth of a second. If your camera display reads 0.4 this means your shutter will stay open for 0.4 of a second (which is a LOT longer than you think in shutter speed terms!). I would always recommend sticking to the general rule of never going lower than 1/60 as you will start to see blurry photos appearing! If you're wanting to capture action then I suggest shooting at around 1/500th of a second. 

And lastly ISO, in essence this is how sensitive your image sensor is to light (its traditionally used to grade how sensitive a film was to the light). The higher your ISO, eg 800 the more sensitive to light it will be, the lower the number eg 100 the less. So if you're in a field on a bright sunny day then 100 is the way to go, however if you're in an indoor hall with only a small amount of light you're gonna be looking at getting that number pretty high. The only issue you will find is the higher the number the more grainy your images can look. ISO is probably the hardest of the 3 to understand as a newbie but once you nail it and get the combination of the 3 there'll be no stopping you!

As this is a pretty long post and requires some taking in I'm gonna leave it at that for now. If you really want to get your head around it though you need to practice, practice and practice some more! Set up an object on your desk and get used to how altering these settings can make an impact. 

Try putting your Aperture at f5.6, your shutter speed at 1/125 and your ISO at 400 and take a photo. 

Now keep those setting and change your ISO to 800... Can you see the difference?

Now put your iso back to 400 and change your shutter speed to 1/500.

The more you play around with changing each of these and seeing the difference it makes the more you will understand the light. Also keep an eye out for the exposure indicator on your screen, if you get that on the 0 all being good you should have a pretty good exposed image!

I hope this helps at least 1 person. Please leave comments of any questions you have and I'll try answer them! Also some questions for future blog posts would be ace!

Bluebird Tearooms - Clacton

It's currently pouring, like really pouring down with rain outside on a Monday afternoon and I'm desperately wishing I was on holiday again with Johnny! We spent the week at my family caravan in West Mersea adventuring around various parts of Essex! I will without doubt be sharing more of our adventures in posts to come (we went to Colchester zoo and had a picnic on the beach!). But I wanted to share a little gem we found in Clacton!

I hadn't been to Clacton in a long, long time and I must admit driving into the town I was a little worried. You see I had been after a proper afternoon tea for sometime and after some Google-ing I came across The Bluebird Tearooms and Convinced J that we had to go. So I was a little worried I had made the wrong decision. However the term 'Never judge a book by it's cover' definitely comes into play. It was a beautiful tearoom and definitely worth the visit! I had the afternoon tea for 1 which I believe was about £11, and J had a Jacket potato which he informs me was the best he'd had in a long time! 

As for my afternoon tea it was served on the most delightful vintage crockery, something that I believe is a must for afternoon tea! There were 1940 esq songs playing in the background and the setting was just perfect. The food itself was delicious and so filling I had to take the chocolate cake home! If  you ever find yourself in Clacton I declare it is an absolute must you visit The Bluebird Tearooms!

Chloe x

2013-2015

Rather than really backlogging and posting huge galleries of weddings/couple shoots i've not blogged I'll do a little one image summary from each!

Hello!

Soooo... This blog has been abandoned for a LONG long time!! This isn't to say I've not been busy though, I just seem to have lost my love for social media a bit BUT I'm back and I'm intending on keeping up with this blog. I have some new plans for it. I want to make it a general lifestyle blog as well as a place to share and showcase my photography work.

So I'll be posting a some images with work I've done in the 2 years (eek!) since I last updated this and then I'm hoping to post photos at least once a fortnight (I don't want to set myself up to fail) of adventures and things I've found interesting!!

Chloe x

Steph & Sams Bournemouth Engagement shoot

With graduating university and concentrating on photographing weddings, moving home and assisting some other photographers I have unfortunately neglected this little blog!
I promise I'll keep it updated from now on though!

A few months ago I had the pleasure of travelling to Bournemouth on the hottest bank holiday Monday I can remember for quite some time to photograph the first of Steph & Sams engagement shoots! Steph had so many ideas it made my job so much easier!
I had so much fun on this shoot and I think the photos show how much fun they did too!

Picking yourself up.

So I've put off writing this for a while now, I didn't know if it was a suitable post for my photography blog, but I came to the conclusion it's pushed me further with my photography and therefore sort of justifiable.

Basically the end of 2012/beginning of 2013 started off on a rather low and sour note. I broke up with my boyfriend of 3 years just before my birthday and it left me in a pretty bad place. My confidence was stupidly low, my anxiety was silly high and my depression was creeping its way back in. I had to move out of our flat, try and finish my dissertation and go to work, all whilst battling these demons. I didn't know how to adjust or cope with things so for a long time I built myself a duvet cave and I stayed in there for weeks. I didn't want to go out or see anyone, I didn't want to eat and I didn't even want to take photos anymore. My heart just wasn't in anything.

It got to mid February and I decided I had to do something otherwise I was just going to pull myself further into the hole that I was already struggling to get out of. Luckily I have an amazingly supportive family, some awesome friends that helped me with work and showed me how to have a good time again and some awesome friends online that have been really supportive.

Slowly I've been picking myself back up again and pushing myself to do things I probably wouldn't have done before. Anyone that struggles with anxiety and depression will know what it's like when you just don't want to leave the house, at all, and if it wasn't for my family and friends I probably wouldn't have for quite a long time!

I ventured into university for tutorials and a presentations that went way better than I ever imagined. I went to see Russell Kane with one of my best friends and had the best time. I hung out with my blogger friends in Cornwall, Bristol and Bath and didn't stop smiling for days. I spent time with my family getting stuck in giant puddles.

I had two shoots this week and I think I've taken some of the best images I ever have done. I have another next week with Megan which is going to be insanely fun and I'm sure those photos are going to be amazing (if I do say so myself)

Basically what I'm getting to is I've realised life throws some rubbish at you when you're not expecting it and forces you to change your way of thinking and doing. It's okay to mope for a bit at first, everyone has to have a duvet day every once in awhile right? But it's important to surround yourself with people that will help pick you up and keep your spirits high. Sometimes you have to just say yes, even if you don't want to. Don't get me wrong I still have low days but they've been few and far between now and I've tried my very best to list at least one positive everyday.

So heres to picking yourself up again and enjoying life. My confidence is coming back and this year is looking like it's going to be a pretty exciting one!

Stay sweet,

Chloe x

A chilly walk...

So a few weeks ago, just after the rain and snow, I went for a little walk at a local(ish) park whilst I was visiting my parents. I had to go photograph some little wooden dens that I knew where there but I've had a lot of stuff on my mind lately so it was nice to get some fresh air and clear my head a bit... I definitely had a much needed laugh! 

Before we left my mum & dad put their boots on, but I didn't really think much of it until we got there and walked across the fields, I say walked, what I really mean is they walked off in front while I had to literally tiptoe through thick boggy grass trying A) not to get water in my shoes, and B) not to get stuck, fall over and throw my camera into a puddle! At one point my dad led us across a 'dryish' piece of grass, which was infact the boggiest bit there and I was standing on a twig laughing and trying not to fall over, it literally took us half an hour to navigate around and under a tree and to a drier piece of ground, it's a good thing I'm pretty short as I managed to crawl through the trees pretty easily whilst they stood and laughed at me, mean parents!

Anyway, I posted a few of the photos above, and you can sort of see how muddy my feet were beginning to get and how inappropriate my shoes/lack of socks were!

Chloe x

Ps; couldn't not include this photo of my dad pulling his 'model' pose!