Day 35 - Lego

Not my normal type of photo today but I quite like it!

My sister, Fiona, called me today to say that she was looking for a photo of lego and was wondering if I'd be able to help! Fiona's company were doing an advert and were looking for an image of a piece of lego to use on the design. The problem they were having was that the photographers they were asking for this image were charging a ridiculous price so Fiona thought of me! She said, "if you can get a piece of lego, photograph it on a white background the job is yours!" I couldn't say no so went in the hunt of lego! I was doing a day's teaching so there had to be some lego in school somewhere...surely! My mission was successful when I found that the physics department had lego...don't ask me why..so the task of photographing lego was on!
I set up the lighting and spent a good 45 mins photographing one piece of lego, then a further hour and a bit on the computer and this was my result. I had been sent a photo of angle to take the lego from and had also been asked to do it with and with a shadow..talk about specific!! Anyway I sent it off and it's being used by the company so I'm hoping this may lead to them using me for more things in the future!
Who would have thought I'd be leaving teaching and photographing lego? I'm loving it!!

Day 34 - Serendipity Flyers

With my launch quickly approaching I knew that I needed to get some form of publicity to let people take away with them and had no idea where to start! Fortunately my lovely sister works in events and is regularly putting together flyers for businesses so she was an absolute star and put together a template for me. I played around with the template and then Fiona tweaked it and came up with my flyer design! I sent it off last Wednesday and 3 boxes full of 5000 flyers arrived on Friday but I've not had time to stop and look through them properly so I did that today! They are printed on good quality card but aren't as glossy as I'd hoped. They still look good though and it's a really lovely feeling to have something to hand out to people with my business name on it. It's all coming together.

Thank you Fiona for being my "events' advisor" and Ben for my great website! x x

Day 33 - Chinese New Year Celebrations

In Sheffield today there was a procession to celebrate the Chinese New Year so I went down to get some photos...along with all the other photographers in Sheffield! It started with a display in front of the town hall and then the procession went down The Moor and stopped at various Chinese Restaurants where they had to feed the dragon. The food (lettuce) was hanging from the doorway and the dragon danced its way round it, grabbed the lettuce and then ate it. All the time the drum was beating and the dragons were dancing. It was great to watch and really interesting to see this celebration first hand. It was so colourful and fun and I got some great shots..it was actually quite difficult to choose which photo to have for my one a day! I loved this one because of the piercing eyes of the dragon and the feel of the procession with the crowd.

I'm going out on Thursday to a Chinese New Year meal so I'm looking forward to getting more photos then!

Day 32 - 1st February - Sesame Photo Shoot.

My friend Kim runs her own Vegetarian and Vegan Catering Company.

www.sesamesheffield.co.uk

It was her drive and success with her business which inspired me to give it a go myself with Serendipity. I have known Kim since we were at Uni and it is great to have her and other friends around in Sheffield (and in other parts of the country) who can support me and encourage me in these early stages with Serendipity.

Today Kim had arranged with her neighbour, Carl, to go to his photography studio to photograph some of her food to update her website and I tagged along! Carl is a very good photographer who focuses on product photography so has his own studio and I was really keen to go along to see a studio in action and develop my knowledge of studio lighting.

Kim had prepared some lovely dishes and had also brought along a few wedding cakes and some gorgeous table arrangements made by her neighbout Ann to be photographed to show that they also provide these different services. It was a very long day but we got some amazing shots and they will look amazing on Kim's website. I felt quite overwhelmed by the whole studio set up and have so much still to learn but I'm hoping to arrange a time for me to go back to the studio to be shown the ropes on studio lighting.

January Mosaic - 31 photos so far!

31 days down-335 to go! Here is a quick glance at the photos I've taken for this month. It feels quite an achievement to have them like this!

Day 31 - Bingo!

I had a girls' night out today...to BINGO!! I have never been to bingo but it's something I thought would be fun to go along to so with 4 of my girlfriends we decided to have a night out with the blue rinse brigade at the local Bingo! It was a giggle but also SO much harder than I thought! The Bingo caller reads out the numbers so quickly that you have to be really quick at stamping each number. You're looking at a whole page of numbers and I'm sure I could have won on a couple of occasions if I'd be quick enough!! I came close to winning £300, I only had 1 number left but someone else got there first..grrr!! Kim did really well and went away with £75..not bad for a night's work!

I did think about taking a photo of us in action..but it took all my concentration to play that there was no way I could take a photo at the same time!! I ended up composing this shot during a break!

Day 30 - "I'm watching you Aunty Katy"

I had a busy but good day today. As with every Wednesday it started very early with the BNI breakfast meeting but I really enjoy it so the 6:45am start is acceptable...particuarly as I now don't need to get up ridiculously early every morning so once a week is acceptable!

After the BNI meeting I went for a swim and then popped along to get some of my photos printed onto canvas for my launch..all very exciting but my credit card is getting a lot of use at the moment!

This afternoon I went round to my friend Lucy's for a cup of tea. We'd also planned that I'd go round in time to go and pick Amy up from school to surprise her. Amy is 4 1/2 and started school in January so she's growing up and I'm feeling old! When we got to school I tried looking around for Amy amongst all the parents and other children but she saw me first and came running over and gave me the biggest hug...she always has a nack of making me cry! A child's unconditional love is the most special gift anyone could ask for! She then proudly told her teacher, "This is my godmother, Aunty Katy". I really wanted to get a photo of Amy at school in her shool uniform but you have to be so careful photographing children so I took one of her when we got home. I was trying to catch her whilst she wasn't looking but she was too quick for me and caught me out! She's used to me photographing her now! I love this shot of her, her expression is great!