2018 Has Been A Great Year for my Photography Obsession!

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The year 2018 was a great year for me. I did a lot of learning In order to grow my business. In January, my husband and I attended Imaging USA in Nashville. This is the big conference for Professional Photographers of America, of which I am a member.  It is held in a different city every year. We have gone for the last 3 years.

 I always enjoy the speakers. Here are two of my favorites, Lindsay Adler, and Peter Hurley.

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In February, the learning continued. I attended, Evolve, the convention for Professional Photographers of Massachusetts. It was held in Plymouth.  Another great photography educator, Joe Edelman, presented here. I was very inspired to try some new things after hearing his talk.

My friend and fellow photographer, Diane Brophy, an I, got together and did some experimenting with using color gels inspired by  the presentation by Joe and another presentation we attended later on in the year by Lindsay Adler, also sponsored by PPMA. This was one of the resulting images of beautiful Emily Pemberton, a client I met my first year in business.

Photographer, Ben Shirk was also at Evolve. I never even thought about trying compositing, which he is a master at, until I heard his talk. I was only going to stay for a little bit of his presentation, but I was mesmerized. I experimented with the technique. Here are a few of my attempts.

I still need a lot of practice, but I enjoy trying.

The variety of work I had this year was wonderful.  I did some theater photography,

quite a few weddings and

lots of headshots.

This one I particularly liked because the client needed it to try out for a role as an extra on a movie. He had to look like a tough guy. I loved the challenge. He got a call back based on the image.

Real estate photography is another type of photography I love. Above are examples of two different homes I did this year.

Senior portraits are always so much fun. It was great spending time with many seniors this year.

Families and children were a big part of my sessions this year.

I photographed Veronika and Greg's wedding, their first child's infant images and now the addition of their new daughter. I love their family.

This is another image from a different family that I have been photographing for several years now. I love this image. It is so him. He hates having his picture taken , so I just run around with him and get what I get. No posing.

Here is his sister. She is the complete opposite. She loved the camera and the camera loved her.

Event photography is my chance to go into Boston and meet lots people. I have regularly photographed the Harvard School of Dentistry events. This year I photographed an event for both the Harvard Dental School and The Medical School. 

I was lucky enough to do many other events in Boston this year. One of which lead me to be hired to work for Dunkin Brands. I wrote about this in my previous blog.

At another event, I ended up meeting speaker and author David Horsager.

Which lead to me taking his new headshot.

........and then a conversation I had with him lead to him to inviting my husband and I out to his conference in Minnesota. I photographed the event and my husband attended. We both loved it. That was in November.

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The year ended with another exciting opportunity. I spent a morning in December photographing Patriots wide receiver, Chris Hogan and his family. I also wrote another blog about this.

I remember sitting at my computer in January being discouraged about my lack of bookings. I never thought that the year would go as well as it did. God had other plans for me.  Sitting around being discouraged was not one of them. I thank him for all the opportunities he brings me. I can't wait to see what else this year will bring.

My personal life was filled with blessings, too. My mom and dad moved back to Maine from Florida. We now see each other more often. 

My daughter, Maddie and son-in-law, Chris, blessed us with our first grandchild, Johnny.

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Our oldest daughter, Emily, got engaged to her wonderful boyfriend, Corey.

Our youngest daughter, Sarah, is still crushing it as youth pastor in Hawaii. We are very proud of how she has embraced the culture there. 

My awesome husband was Promoted to Chief of Police in Sharon. I am so proud of his accomplishments.

In December, my son-in-law graduated from The Randolph Police Academy and is a member of the Sharon Police Force.