“The RoseBouquet”

When you want some nice photos you go to a studio, right? Well, frugal people with good friends like I have, don’t do that.

I’ve been wanting to update my photo on my web sites for over a year. Last July, for my birthday, my friend Kathy gave me a special film, and promised to come over some time to do another photo shoot with me, like we did a few years ago, out of which came the photo I currently use on my sites. Kathy has done wedding photos for friends, and usually has great success with her photos. However, we were both busy about that time, so we put it off. Then other things came up, when either I or she were too busy. We had to put it off some more. Months passed.

Recently Kathy had some job changes that suddenly freed up more hours for her. She called last week and asked if we could make a new appointment for a photo shoot, for my updated “author photo.” That day was yesterday morning.

Remembering the different things we tried out that didn’t work well the previous time, I got myself organized. I picked four tops or jackets that I thought would look best, and found three places in the house where the lighting seemed reasonably good. Some diffused daylight from a window nearby, and another two lights or lamps to clean up shadows on the face. And of course, against a soft-coloured wall with distractions moved out of the way. The first two were in the guest rooms, and the third in the dining room against the newly painted wall of two weeks ago.

When Kathy arrived she told me that she had only one hour to spare. So we got to work. I was already wearing the first outfit, so she shot two pictures at each location. I changed quickly, and we shot two more at each location. One floral blouse looked like it might stand alone nicely without the jacket, so we squeezed in just one shot of me in it at each location. We were at the second spot in my last outfit, when the film was full!

We did it in one hour. This afternoon I’ll take the film into the city to have them developed. If I have a hard time deciding which one to use, you might be roped into helping. Is that okay?