Photo Series-Find Your Passion

Hi, my name is Michele, I am a professional photographer and have been creating memories for my clients professionally now for five years and I love it more each day! My business name is michele kats photography and I have worked with Jen for the past three years, after some yummy lunches and many long conversations we thought it would be super fun to start a photo series where we offer tips and tricks for the beginning photographer.

We are calling this…Photo Series 101.

Once a month I’m going to pop on over and offer some tips and tricks for all of you!! Whether you are just looking for advice on how to capture better images of your family or if you’re a blogger looking to improve your photography skills we will have something for everyone!! I am super excited for this series and I hope you are too!!

Jen asked me to share a little about myself, well to start I am a mother. I have three amazingly beautiful children that light up my world and are my why for everything I do. But there is also a part of me that I knew I needed to fill. If there was one word that describes me that would probably be creative. Oh wait maybe, intuitive, authentic, compassionate…ooh or funny.

I guess truth be told there’s a lot of words that could describe me. Just as there are a lot of words that can try to teach you something in a manual. But if you are anything like me you might think they stink. Manuals are good as long as they have pictures, if they don’t I’m lost. So I figure it out on my own, hands on, sweat and tears, that’s how I do it. My photography is no exception. Five years ago I decided to follow my arrow and it pointed to photography. I’m self taught and in the beginning I was not good, at all. It took practice and a lot of it. I have been given many incredible opportunities along this crazy journey but none of that would have mattered if I didn’t follow my passion. And thanks to Jen I’m here to share some of what I know. I will never forget the first time I shot her family, at the end of the session she said…”Thank you Michele, you just gave us the most beautiful memories!”. And that is why I do what I do.

I will be writing posts here and sharing some technical skills, if there is something you’d like to learn more about please comment below and we will put it in a future post.

Here is the first tip of this series – Find Your Passion

You know that thing that makes your heart swell, makes you smile bigger and you can’t get enough of it? I don’t care if it’s your pets, your children, your childhood doll collection or butterflies. Whatever it is, photograph it. Take out your camera and start shooting, see how you feel, pay attention to the feeling, because you can’t get a good photograph without feeling. Feel it, feel the joy, feel the feeling. That is what is most important to me when I shoot. I shoot what I feel. So take your camera with you, sometimes the moments you don’t think are so important are the ones that have the most impact on you, trust me in this.

Passion, that’s first.

The technical stuff, that comes next …

Here are some images from a few of my sessions….

 

 

 

I also simply adore what I call my “Middle School Moody Sessions”. Middle school is that where kids are caught somewhere between being a young adult and still having the feelings of a child and most are pretty insecure & floundering. I know I was during those years and I want to tell them…

YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL. YOU ARE AMAZING. And that you are so much more than you think you are right now and if you don’t feel it, well I will show you.

Through my lens I bring out their soul. Their beautiful amazing magnificent soul!!!!

 

My favorite quote of all time is…

I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.

~Maya Angelou

So grab your camera, go feel the moment, be present and start shooting!! I promise you its worth it and when you need a little help, check back here for our tips and tricks in the coming months.

I have one more thing to share with you!! I am heading out to Southern California next month for some photography magic!!

So if you are from that area or know someone who is please reach out. We will also be having another one in the New York area once the weather warms up a bit! I will be blogging about that as well and sharing some lighting tips from those sessions too!!

If you would like to see more of my work you can visit us at michele kats photography !

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Thank you Michele! Many of our lunches over the last year have been me begging her for photography advice and so I thought, wouldn’t it be great if she could share that same advice here, with all of you. I hope you are as excited as I am about this!! Honestly, I need to take Michele’s advice & bring my actual camera out with me more, those moments only happen once, ya know :).

Have a beautiful day friends!!!!