film friday: "gold" behind the scenes

+ behind the scenes photos

"Gold" behind the scenes video from Lauren Parker on Vimeo.

For this installment of film friday, I'm showing not only a behind the scenes video for one of my recent photos, but I also have some behind the scenes, before and afters and other fun photos from this shoot to share with you!




For "Gold" I shot in my bathroom, which is really quite nifty when I'm trying to get paint on and off my face (I took a shower immediately after the photo to get the paint off, which is why my hair is wet in that picture). You don't have to have a fancy studio or fancy lighting equipment to produce great images. I've been tempted recently to purchase lighting to practice with, but until I save up money and convince myself the purchase is justified, I'll continue improvise with what I have.



Here was the setup. I had my tripod standing right outside the bathtub facing me (as I was standing in front of the wall). I actually held a reflector in one hand and my remote which triggered the shutter button in the other. The available lighting was my ceiling light, so I used the reflector to bring some brightness into my face.



You can see the difference between using and not using a reflector really well here. For the longest time I didn't own one because I didn't see the point (that is, until I saw with my own eyes what a difference it made when I had to hold one for photos), but manipulating light to your advantage will greatly add to the quality of your photos.

Another thing I do for all of my creative or client photos is that I shoot in RAW. I didn't understand the importance of this until I did a lot of research and messed around with it a lot. Long story short, when you shoot a photo in RAW, you're saving all the information. So when I go to process it, I can change the white balance, color saturation, sharpness, practically anything, and I don't lose any of the photo information. If I shoot in only JPEG, it doesn't save all the information that was there at the time of shooting, only the information I had my settings on. In RAW, it saves all the settings (in a nutshell). This is a good, quick overview of the difference, and this shows you side-by-side photo comparisons.

Here is the example of an outtake between unprocessed RAW, and processed RAW:



Like I said before, for my creative and client shots (or even if I'm going on a trip), I always shoot in RAW because those photos have the potential to be printed or bought by stock agencies, so I need them to have the highest quality as possible. For any photo I put on Introvert's Introduction or the rest of the internet, I shoot in JPEG (or save a copy of a RAW file as a JPEG) because 1. I don't want high resolution images to be floating around for people to steal, and 2. There's really no need to create a photo that requires a lot of flexibility (or takes up a lot of space). When I'm out taking outfit photos, I have the time to make sure everything looks perfect, so I don't need to have the option to change white balance in a RAW format when I go back later to process the photos. I've already taken the time to do it with JPEG. If you have any questions or comments or further insight about this or anything else, please don't hesitate to leave a comment or contact me via email. I'd love to help you in any way I can!

And here is the final image!



I hope you have a great weekend!

christmas in july

shirt: topshop // skirt/shoes: thrifted






I've had my eye on this crop top for months, and figured with the price it was only a dream for me to actually own it. I spent a good few weeks after I found it trying to convince myself that it was worth the price and talking about it constantly (and giving people hints to buy it for me, which obviously didn't work, haha). But then one day my friend Kailey noticed that it went on sale for half off, quickly notified me, and I never moved so fast for my debit card in all my life. And it finally came in the mail! Getting packages is so much fun, it's like receiving a present!

That paragraph totally sounds like I'm a shopaholic, but keep in mind this only the second piece of clothing I've bought myself all summer, and I didn't even have to go real life shopping to do it. Online shopping really is my favorite. You can actually see all the clothes and not miss any options, and then you get to be surprised by the mailman. Of course, if something doesn't fit, you have to go through the hassle of returning it, or, if you're like me, you're too scared to go to the post office alone so you just alter the piece to fit you. (I'm kidding about the post office ... kind of. I'm an adult herp derp.) Online shopping = Christmas every day, if you ask me.





Hope you have a great rest of the week!

the benders of light

7/30

My friends Heather and Kristi are starting a photo series surrounding different colors. I had the pleasure of meeting Heather as she lives in the same state as me during college, and Kristi was one of my first flickr friends, so I am so excited we are finally doing this! Today is is yellow and I love seeing how we each interpret the color differently. We each have a unique style, so I'm excited to see what we come up with in the images that follow!

You can see Heather's photo here and Kristi's photo here!

alaskan adventures // fishing in prince william sound

This past weekend I got to go with my parents, my brother, and my dad's friend (who owned the boat) to go fishing out of Prince William Sound. As someone who doesn't particularly like standing in a river waiting for hours for a fish, but loves spending time on a boat and actually catching fish, I was excited to spend an entire day on the ocean. Don't be fooled by the awesome weather in these photos! Usually it's pretty miserable weather, but I seem to always go on the one sunny day of the year. That's a good curse to have though, so I'm not complaining!





We woke up early and donned our warmest gear (though we shedded all but the minimum as the day progressed), prepared for intrepid winds and harsh seas. The extra water, Dramamine, and camera batteries were packed, and we began our trek in a camo-lined truck pulling a 25 foot boat down the highway.






Upon arriving and stowing our belongings and ourselves onto the boat, my brother William and I immediately fell asleep. Strangely though, it wasn't from taking any medicine to help with motion sickness, it was just because the waves were lulling us to sleep. I was actually surprised that I didn't need to take any drugs, considering driving for any amount of time in Oregon makes me carsick. But turbulent sea waves in Alaska? My tummy was in heaven, apparently.







We sailed out to one of the many lagoons in the area simply to explore, and came upon a school of fish jumping out of the water. So the anchor went down and our fishing poles went up, and we floating on the water's surface while a fresh breeze blew in and the sun shined overhead. It was in that moment I discovered what being an old man feels like, and let me tell you, it is a great feeling.

Over the course of the day, I caught only one fish, a Silver, but it was still quite exciting. My dad thought I had gotten stuck on a rock since I never felt the fish bite and it seems like he was swimming with us, but when we reeled it in, there was a fish on the end of the line! He put up quite a fight, but in the end I won and booped him on the head and soon I shall eat him. And he shall be delicious.






We also caught some shrimp (those were consumed very quickly) and an octopus, although he was returned to the sea. You can see a few more photos plus the fish I caught on instagram under the tag #hardcoreparkours2013 (and other family summer adventures as well).