Category Archives: www.bonnie-rose.co.uk

Self Portrait: ‘From the Wings’

Another weekend has begun and with it another Self Portrait Saturday. For today’s Self Portrait I share with you the self portrait entitled ‘From the Wings’. Often times it is easy to feel like I am waiting for something else or something new to begin. Being a Third Culture Kid and living in a highly nomadic world, I am use to a cycle of things ending and new things constantly on the horizon. I believe as a mum too it is easy to feel a bit lost in the shadows taking care of everyone else. It can also be a place of reflection where we seek answers from someone greater and ask for direction towards the brighter future. I love playing with different lighting situations and took this portrait looking out the window of our front door.

DO YOU LOVE SELF PORTRAITS?

I try to do one every week and post on a Saturday.

If you would like to link up with me, add this button to your blog. I would love to see your photography!

How to Take your Family Portraits

10 Replies

Family Portraits. We take them all the time to capture those we love and the memories and moments in time. Sometimes we even jump in front of the camera just in time to be in the photographs too. With families getting together for summer vacation, I have been asked to give some advice on how to take your family portraits. There are many variables to consider. The number one thing I have to stress is to have fun! Sometimes things just will not go to plan. Some of my most favourite family portraits are those unexpected moments that just happened to get captured on camera. In the image below my kids were not dressed especially for the occasion, nor were they matching. I was testing out a new lighting set up and they wanted to be included in the process. In the end this was my favourite shot from the session.

How To Take Your
F A M I L Y P O R T R A I T S

Prepare.
You can surely take an impromptu family portrait and love the results. However you could also prep for a more stylized family portrait and take them yourself. Look over this list of points to keep in mind before taking your portraits is key to satisfaction. But do not forget about your equipment. Make sure your camera batteries are charged and with you, that your memory cards have available space (and not just becoming storage to unbacked up photos) and double check your camera settings. If you shoot in lower quality for selling items on eBay, make sure to change it back to RAW or a higher res for your portraits to save from crying later.

Coordinate.

I do not suggest having everyone wear the exact same outfit. Just as I would not suggest those that travel to Hawaii to buy all matching ‘Aloha’ shirts and have their photo taken. The key is coordination and simplicity. Choose a colour palette and and let everyone dress accordingly. For balance check ahead of time what everyone has and what they are thinking of wearing. Otherwise you may have someone’s uncle showing up in blue jeans instead of the suggested khakis simply because he did not have any in his wardrobe. It will become a case of the ‘one of these things is not like the other‘. Especially if you are taking a family portrait on vacation you cannot plan on everyone having something that will match. Plan ahead of time so that you do not run into this problem.

My last family portrait was taken at Christmas time by our home here in Bath, England. I let my family know ahead of time what the colour palette was and sort of kept tabs on my mum and sister about what they would be bringing. When it came to plan out the outfits I let everyone ‘punch’ the colour of red in a different way. I wore a red cardigan, my sister wore red shoes and red accessories, my mum wore a red hat, my eldest son wore a red tie, and my youngest had red stripe detail in his dark plaid shirt. My husband did not have anything with red but matched the palette. Since we all punched red into the photo in different ways it did not matter that Ryan stayed neutral because it became a cohesive balance.

Timing.

A good rule of thumb for what time of day to shoot is the ‘Golden Hour’, which is the first and last hour of sunlight during the day since the lighting is softer. You can check online for sun calculators to determine what time you should be outside to do your photograph. I suggest working together and trying to get it done as efficiently as possible to avoid family members getting restless. I always tell my boys that if they work really hard to help us get the shot then we can move on quicker to something more fun. A little bribery never hurts.

Location.

This may be an integral part of your shot if you are on vacation in a place you would like to remember, like on Lanikai beach in Hawaii. It may be good to location scout first to make sure the place works and that it is a safe location. Simple is best and try not to have too much going on in the background. I have used brick walls, hedges, and even an open field to set the scene. Depending on your camera, the lens, and your settings you may want just the focus on the the group with a soft blurry bokeh background. I suggest keeping away from other people or anything that may clutter the shot and take away the focus. Let the outdoors be your photo studio and keep it simple so that it works with you for the shot.

Tripod, Timer and a Remote.

The family portraits I have shown where I am in the photograph have been taken with my camera on a tripod (or another surface) and with a timer. Easier would be a remote. It is how I take my self portraits for Self Portrait Saturday. I definitely recommend looking into all three if you do not have or know how to work them yet. The photo above where I am reading with my kids was taken with the timer.

Elements. Sometimes the best made plans can be tested by the circumstances like the weather. You could have a beautiful set up on the beach, perfectly orchestrated morning to get everyone looking just perfect and have the wind mess everyone’s hair up. Two of the family portraits we have done in England have been while it is raining. Of course the rain did not happen until the camera was set up on the tripod and we were ready to start. At this point you have two options. You can reschedule or you can attempt to do the best that you can given the circumstances.

Tips: Keep it fun. As soon as someone starts getting stressed out or upset it is going to show in the face or body language. If you are dealing with the wind turn your bodies so that the wind works for you, not against you. If you are dealing with the rain my best advice is to know what shot you want to get and get it. If you are not comfortable with the lighting and cannot get a good test shot, don’t force it. Go back out when the weather is better.

Lighting. Not enough and your portraits will not turn out. Too much and you will get harsh shadows on their face. Be aware of the lighting situation. When we lived in Hawaii if I wanted to shoot in the morning I would have to shoot early because by 1000 it would be too bright. In England where we have cloudy skies often it becomes one of my favorite lighting situations as it acts like a natural light diffuser. If you are shooting outside it is good to have your subjects in the shade with the sun light in front of them. I used this method above while shooting family portraits on a bright sunny day in Arizona. I also love shooting with the sun behind my subjects for backlighting.

Tips: If you are still practicing with backlighting try shooting your subjects with trees behind them and shoot so that the sun shines through the trees. Keeping your subject far enough away from the backdrop with a low aperture, can result in a nice bokeh affect of the sunlight through the trees. If you are still learning about shooting in manual and ISO settings check out the ‘Sunny 16 rule': http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunny_16_rule for shooting in sunlight.

Kids & Animals. They infamous quote is you should never work with children or animals. However of course those will be the two categories we want to focus on in our photographs. Keep the little ones in mind when going planning each stage of your family portrait. If you know the kids will be tired during a certain hour, obviously do not plan to shoot at that time. It is better to work around the little ones and their schedule. Make sure the kids present are neither tired nor hungry when it is time to pose. Bring treats and have something for them to look forward to after the photographs have been taken.

Props. They can be fun. Especially with the right group of people a few key props can pull a theme together. Kids especially will love things they can wear or play with and will be drawn to the excitement. However make sure you get your standard portraits first. Always aim to get the shot you want in the beginning and then from there have fun. It could be the shots you do not plan that may surprise you and turn out the best in the end.

Attitudes. Sometimes it is not the right time to take photos. If anyone is uncomfortable in front of the camera it will read in the eyes. If someone is upset it will not only show in their face but will affect the other people in the photograph. I have taken family photos as a portrait photographer where the husband was in a really nasty mood. It not only affected the child but made the wife very anxious. It did not matter what I did to get the mom and the child to smile, the husband was grumpy in ever single shot. For this very reason on family vacations with my husband’s family I have second guessed my decision to take family portraits. The camera does not lie and there are some things you just cannot fix in photoshop. Bottom line, do not force a photo shoot if the situation is already stressful.

————————-

Self Portrait: ‘Scarred I’

Elopement in Honolulu, Hawaii

4 Replies

For ‘Wedding Wednesday‘ an elopement photo shoot and a special behind the scenes look at a Vintage Bridal photo shoot with Sabrina & Daniel. Take a walk with us through China Town in Honolulu, Hawaii and experience the joy through the their look of love for each other.

Did you see the Behind the Scenes video

for the Vintage Bridal Shoot?

Vintage Bridal Shoot from Bonnie Rose on Vimeo.

*Make up by Melissa Hurley and Hair & Photography by Bonnie Rose.

Self Portrait: ‘Grounded’

7 Replies

When you have always moved ever few months or couple of years, you live a life where people are always coming and going. If you are lucky the better ones come back through your life again. In this nomadic world you are constantly the ‘new girl’, introducing yourself all over again, and answering the dreaded question from where you come. From growing up as a third culture kid as a military child overseas it prepared me for the role of a military wife living the island life in the Pacific. Through out it all I have felt like a gypsy being blown by the wind. Being called to far off places and locations I have never been. While yearning for all the places, all the countries, and all the cultures I have taken as my own. It became the fire that fueled our path to move overseas as expats. Somehow on this new path I have reached the realisation that I finally have an anchor. A person who can be my strength when I feel weak. My comfort when I feel lost in the unknown. My support when I lack the confidence. My guard to block out the negative and censor the unwanted cruel words of others. When I can get lost in my head of self doubt and he brings me back and keeps me grounded. When he is with me I do not need to worry about what has been or what could be for we live in the present. Which means so much when you are a girl with many dreams in both the day and the night. Yet he keeps me close. Grounded in reality.

DO YOU LOVE SELF PORTRAITS?

I try to do one every week and post on a Saturday.

If you would like to link up with me, add this button to your blog. I would love to see your photography!

*Image original to A Compass Rose blog by Bonnie Rose Photography

Photography: And the Lies I Believed

8 Replies

“I T I S A L L A B O U T T H E M E G A P I X E L S”

It seems like I have always had a camera in my hand. I started with film and then as the digital came about kept upgrading as newer generations of cameras came on the market. My dad purchased a nicer digital camera after the birth of my first son in 2005. This sparked a new journey for me with photography. It looked like a DSLR but had a fixed zoom lens with 8-megapixels. Eight years ago 8mpx was really awesome and I thought thats how you choose a camera. It was a great camera for the year and half we lived in California.

The Truth: Of course cameras have advanced much in the last eight years. However you really should not get a camera solely on how many megapixels it has whether it is 2005 or 2013. Are you blowing up your photographs to a large size to produce wall art for your home? Or are you just sharing things on facebook and making small prints for family? Do you even print your photographs?

“I H A V E T O H A V E A F A N C Y C A M E R A”

I was in photography mode again with the birth of my second son in 2007. I met up with other military wives for photography outings and they had with them pricey DLSR cameras, interchangeable lenses, and light reflectors. I remember being in awe as I watched them photograph and listened as they talked about only shooting in manual. We would return from our photography outings and everyone would share the photos we took that day. I felt gutted seeing the amazing photographs the other military wives took of my own kids with their cameras. I was sold into the fact I had to have their camera to get photographs like that.

The Truth: You can put any camera in the hands of a photography pro and they will me probably produce amazing images or pieces of art. You can put the same cameras in the hand of an extreme novice who knows nothing of manual settings, lighting, or composition and you will probably have nothing but rubbish photos with no eye appeal, bad exposures, horrible white balance and subjects that are blurry.

“I H A V E T O H A V E A C A N O N”

When my husband and I started looking at DSLRs I was adamant about getting a Canon. Why? I was in love with the photography of a young fashion photographer from England and she used a Canon. In fact almost every photographer who shot fashion photography that I knew used Canon. There seemed no question in my mind. My husband however loved Nikon and had read up on how well they made their lenses. Our first DSLR was a D70. To be followed by the D200 and then the D700.

The Truth: A camera is a camera. It seems like the biggest competitors are Canon and Nikon, but you can buy a different model and still be a photographer. To me I equate it to whether you use a PC or a Mac. You can use both, switching between the two can be a bit challenging at first, and neither is really better than the other. I have a friend that shoots with her Pentax and loves it. It comes down to preference. After years of being a Nikon user I love the way it feels in my hands and the sound of the shutter. When I hold a friend’s Canon it feels so light like I’m holding a toy. I’m not saying I could not switch to Canon down the road. I am just not going to throw a fit about not owning a Canon like I would have back in 2007. I know better.

“A L L P H O T O G R A P H Y E Q U I P M E N T I S E X P E N S I VE ”
When we looked into getting a brand new camera I was scared. Scared by the dollar sign and the numbers following it when looking at camera bodies and lenses. I worked with other photographers as a hair and make up artist and I saw the types of equipment they used. Expensive lighting set ups, complex backdrops, and so many gadgets that the numbers just kept adding up in my mind until it got overwhelming. I would see the photographs these photographers were producing and compare it with ones photographers who had less were producing and to be honest they looked the same. Or the photographers who had less expensive equipment were producing better images.

The Truth: I hate to say it but photography is an expensive hobby. If you think otherwise you are sadly mistaken. However there are many tricks of the trade that you can pick up instead of cashing in for the next latest and greatest piece of equipment. We have bought all our cameras from other photographers off of Craiglist in Hawaii. When it comes other equipment you do have choices. You could buy a really large light reflector from a well known company and cut off your arm in the process. Or you could find a cheaper model on amazon or ebay for a much more affordable option. Or you can get creative and find other ways to bounce light on your subject. While I own three large reflectors (with multi sides of white, black, gold, and silver) I have used other things as well. Mirrors on the beach with the sunrise, windshield sun shades from my car, white poster board, and even natural light reflectors. What is a natural light reflector? Shoot your subjecting near a white surface like white stone steps or the white pillar of a building.

“P H O T O S H O P C A N F I X A N Y T H I N G ”

You get home and upload your photographs to your computer and realise that one shot you really wanted is over exposed. So you play around with it and eventually resort to putting it in black and white and still try to tweak the photograph. What is photoshop for if you cannot fix your wrongly executed photograph? Likewise that model that you did not meet before hand has shown up and bless her heart, but her skin is horrible. You shrug it off and assume that you can do what you can with lighting and then photoshop her skin in post processing.

The Truth: Photoshop is awesome. As is Lightroom. Actually if you are a photographer I recommend you use Lightroom before you put a photo in photoshop. While photoshop is more geared towards graphic design artists Light room is for photographers. Post processing has been around before the digital age and is the digital version of a photographer’s darkroom. In post processing you can take a great photograph and make it look amazing. You can take an SOOC (Straight Out Of the Camera) photograph that looks perfect and in post processing make it stellar! However you can take a bad photo and it will still look rubbish, or rubbish in a fancy dress, after post processing. There is a thing of being ‘too photoshopped’ and photoshop cannot fix everything. You want to aim to get the photo right in the camera. But do not dismiss post processing as a fad. It is an amazing tool in the hands of those who know what they are doing or have the time to play around with it to figure it out.

“I N E E D A N E X P E N S I V E D E G R E E”

Upon high school graduation I went off to a private Christian University to get a bachelor’s degree because is that not what everyone does? My passions? Theatre and moving abroad. So I majored in Theatre and minored in Missions. I remember hearing about the awesome photography course complete with use of the darkroom, but it was rumored to have filled up before the class began registration. I wish I had tried harder to smooze my way into that course because maybe my career in photography would have started sooner. But I assumed I needed a degree to become an adult.

The Truth: There are many photographers out there that do go to school and get degrees in photography. However thats not the only way to go about becoming a professional photographer. It was not until our third upgrade of DSLR and three years into my career that I took my first photography course focused on different types of lighting. I am self taught. That means I bought books, I looked online, and I picked the brains of all the photographers I knew or came into contact with while working as a hair and make up artist. Most importantly I took photographs. There is no better way to get better at something without practice. You do not even need someone else to photograph to get better. When I want to work on portraits I do self portrait photography. Otherwise I work on landscape and stock photography. If you are passionate about something and have something you want to do in your horizon do not not wait for it. Run toward your dreams and take photographs all the way there!

“I N E E D A N E X P E N S I V E C A M E R A”

We started off small and as we could we sold back our camera to other photographers and upgraded again. We have never bought a brand new camera which has saved us money. When I made the jump from the Nikon D200 to the Nikon D700 I could not figure out how I got by in photography before. I could shoot in bad lighting situations and still be able to produce quality images. As I held my D700 I heard about the next series of cameras in the line of Nikon, ones that were ‘better‘ and more expensive. I wondered if my need for the next best camera would ever dissipate

The Truth: You do need an expensive camera. Yes the cameras get better the more expensive they are but its not just about what camera body is in your hands. It is about the glass (the lens) and the quality of it. You could have a great camera and crap lens and not be any better off than someone with an okay camera and a really high quality lens. Lenses are not all made equal and they do not all do the same job. I use my 85mm for different shots than I would use my 50mm lens. Also a 50mm 2.8 differs from a 50mm 1.8 and 50mm 1.4. Do not believe me? Get all three 50mm lenses and test them out on the same shot to compare the differences. Or google it for a quicker answer. Expat life can be expensive when you start out and I sadly parted with my D700 to help us in our endeavors Going back to my D200 I felt very depressed about photography as a whole. It was hard for me personally to do something that felt like ‘taking a step back’. However it has helped me realise this is just another lie I have been lead to believe. Although my photographer eye can see a difference, it has pushed me as an artist to really work on my skills. These are not simple point and shoot cameras and I have been learning how to get the image I want from the D200 with the lenses I own. Which is the point. You can capture amazing images and create breath taking art with what you have. You just need to continue practicing and understand your camera like it is your best friend.

Behind the Scenes on a shoot with Bonnie Rose in Mililani, Hawaii

Y O U A S K & I A N S W E R

with Bonnie Rose on ‘Photography’

Q: Hello Bonnie! Do you have any recommendations for online photography courses or helpful websites for beginners? Thanks!

Yes! Hands down my favourite online resource is CreativeLive out of Seattle, WA. They offer free courses online with amazing photographers and its Live. Since the person who asked this lives in England, we are in the best timezone for watching these live photography courses. I could watch the repeat showing in morning before work or watch it live as it began after work. I recommend following CreativeLive on Twitter so you are always up to date with the new courses coming your way. I have been blessed to have watched a few of my favourite photographers that I have followed for years on Creative Live. They made that possible. I just wish I had known about them sooner.

More about Creative Live: http://www.creativelive.com/

Q: I need help picking a wide angle lens!

It really depends on what you want to use it for and your budget. For me I love prime lenses the best. The two I own are used way more often than any of my zoom lenses. I have the 50mm 1.8 and 85mm 1.4 for Nikon. As I shoot a lot of portraiture those two lenses have been my best friends. When I upgrade further I will get the 50mm 1.4 lens. However when we are traveling or sightseeing I find that those do not always cut it and I need a wide angle lens. I’ve been toying with whether I should get a 24mm or the 35mm. To be fair so far I have borrowed a zoom lens 17mm-35mm 2.8 and it has been my absolute favourite. I even loved the distortion it would cause to tall buildings before me when shooting at 17mm. It is really weighs a lot on preference as well. I recommend borrowing lenses (from friends or you can borrow lenses and cameras online) and testing them out for a day. Photography is not a cheap hobby or business and knowing for sure which lens you want to buy before you make the purchase is ideal.

***

I hope you have enjoyed this next installment of my Photography series.

If you have any questions make sure to comment!

Summer Fete in Batheaston

12 Replies

Yesterday we attended our second fete for the Summer season and it will not be our last. Though we almost feared the weather would have ruined this gem of summers in Great Britain. It was set to begin at noon but we did arrive until three because of the pouring rain. Miraculously the rain stopped and we were able to spend the last hour of it partaking in all our favourite fete activities. There was drinking of Pims, letting the boys spend pocket money on activities, checking out the goods for sale, and the eating of cakes and ice cream. The only thing we missed out was on a delicious bowl of strawberries and cream. However in its place we got to watch a Maypole dance with local school children. If that was not enough dancing for my boys, they also got to partake in dancing to Gangnam Style. I left with a happy family, a full belly, and a camera filled with documented memories and a nearly dead battery. All in all it was a lovely village fete and I look forward to our next one in two weeks time. If the photos below are not enough to get you to a summer fete this year, I took two videos posted to Instagram as well. To which I have to say is a new feature I highly love. However since they do not allow embedding of videos yet, insert shameless plug to follow me on Instagram here.

*Images original to A Compass Rose blog by Bonnie Rose Photography

SPONSORED: How to Quickly Catalog, Cull, and Edit Photos using Lightroom