B&H Photo – Portfolio Development

I was sitting in a room of over 50 photographers anxiously awaiting for my name to be called.  They were calling names in reverse alphabetical order by first name so I knew it wouldn’t be too long.

Steven

Steven

How many Stevens are there?

Finally I heard Stacey.  Wait – was that good or bad?

There up on the screen for the whole room to see were the 5 photographs I selected to be a part of the B & H Portfolio Critique.

I was squirming and sweating in my seat (normally it’s freezing in that room) as they were going though my images one by one.

The panel consisted of 2 photographers from the B&H Event Space along with 2 women from Soho Photo Gallery.  Just before my first image they were mentioning how they’re so tired of the Anthropologie look  big long leaves in the background etc.

Then like clockwork my first image appears…

Needless to say I was just a little paranoid  (I love Anthropologie but wasn’t even thinking of them when I took this!)

It was hard to choose which images to show so I just picked ones that I liked personally – most images were of my girls and then one from a client session.  Not for technical reasons but that I just liked them.   That  big leaf one I have hanging in my home so I guess it’s safe to say I like it!

The rest starting going up one by one…

The reflection one I chose because I love reflections and this is one of my favorites.  It has a ghost-like quality to it that I really like.

This one of my daughter on my mom’s walker is a moment that really defines her.  At a park for a Mother’s Day celebration while all the kids were playing she went off to be on her own to read a book.  I love  that she’s her own person and doesn’t follow a crowd.

I chose this next one because I like the grungy look to it.  She looks like  a ratty country kid!  I was debating on making this one black and white but I liked this muted color version better

This was the only one not of my girls.  I know it didn’t really go with the rest of them.  It was from a client session but I always loved it.  I feel like it’s so “me” in it’s style.

It was finally over and I survived!!  Yay!  I’m excited to be  a part of this Portfolio Development series!  I’m happy that I took that first step to go to the first critique, get out of my comfort zone and hopefully grow as a photographer.

For the next 8 months I’ll be shooting a lot, refining my work, taking required classes and blogging about my journey.  There will be a few more critique sessions to prepare for the big critique where  assuming I follow all of the rules (that’s a BIG part of the process), I’ll be able to present my work to Soho Photo Gallery for possible inclusion in a gallery show in late Spring.  Whoa! Can you imagine?  It would be so exciting to have my work appear in a NYC gallery!!

The panel thought I needed to pick a direction and these were the 2 images they liked the best.  They were my favorites as well!

 

Rather than choose one right now, I’m going to start with both and see which I end up liking the best.  One theme is going to be my daughter – exploring different ways to photograph her.  I like the grunge look but will still experiment.  For the other theme, I’m going black and white and timeless – photographing young girls with a classic, timeless, almost old fashioned look to them.  I’m really excited and I hope you follow along with me.  I’ll definitely need the support!

Have you done anything lately that took you our of your comfort zone?