When people ask me how I get started doing photography, I always give credit to my lovely sister who so lovingly forced me to take profile pictures of her for her Facebook. HAHA (if you’re reading this, love youuu). As the younger sister, I sometimes held the role as “minion” and though I had my defiant moments of wanting RESPECT and thus, refusing to take pictures (which didn’t work btw), for the most part I enjoyed these photoshoots I had with my sister. 

 We would often go in the backyard, dress up and I would then try to elicit natural emotion from my sister. Or sometimes, we would just do the pursed lips, look to the side or directly at the camera look. My sister always knew exactly what she wanted, and that pushed me to improve and keep practicing. 

Naturally, I loved experimenting with cameras, often taking our family point and shoot cameras. That good ole white one with pink polka dots or the blue one that survived many family trips.

My parents had an old film camera, which I also picked up and would excitedly wait for the film to be developed. When I got the images back, I remember being so proud that I managed to get a hummingbird in a shot. I was also frequently envisioning creative scenes. I remember being a “model” for a photoshoot and was constantly on the lookout for spots that I thought would be great as a background. All this led up to when I started shooting with my sister’s DSLR for those backyard photoshoots. Eventually, I learned how to shoot in manual mode and over time taught myself how to edit beyond using the basic brightness and contrast tools on my laptop. I also learned about and invested in different equipment and softwares.

During my freshman year of college, I developed my sense of art direction more through an introductory visual arts course. I easily dedicated 10+ hours a week to that class, going to lectures, discussions, reading, shooting, editing and printing. I had an ultra-cool TA who was pretty blunt about what she liked and didn’t. I remember her looking through a series of photos I had taken and saying that she loved the composition and repetition in the photos but didn’t like that there were people in the photos. LOL which is really ironic because now I pretty much only shoot people. But I think she was really just blasé about photos of people and found objects much more interesting.  

For my final project, I did this series focused simply on a circle (which you can read about here), and after that experience, I pretty much started seeing circles everywhere. I felt really inspired by the art expression in photography, how much meaning a photo can contain, and the visual experience of photography in general. When we put up our selections for our final project, I was really encouraged by my TA who was genuinely fascinated by the photos and what they meant, as well as my classmates who told me to continue pursuing photography.

Throughout college, I started doing a variety of paid shoots for individuals, couples, and companies, and took photos extensively during my travels in a variety of countries. I would edit photos on my 6 year old broken PC and because the coloration on the screen was so bad, check the edits on my iPhone and painstakingly reedit them one by one if needed. HAHA. Thankfully, I finally got a new computer.

It wasn’t until my senior year of college that I more seriously considered doing photography as a career, shifting my focus primarily to weddings and couples. I am beyond grateful for all that I have learned along the way, the people I have met and the stories I have been able to capture. My 12 year old self would never have expected the journey that I would take and I am ever on the quest to learn more and be open to the possibilities photography may afford. 

If you would like to book a shoot or collaboration, I’d love to chat! You can reach me through my contact page.