Photography | Ryan T. Collier Photography

June 13, 2008

Lots of Wedding Photography!

Ooooooo, Friday the 13th!

I decided to spend some time at Starbucks just down the road to work on some school things and to just change my scenery for a few hours. I spent about 2 hours there transcribing journal entries and just clearing my mind of the chatter from the past week.

I’m not sure what the meditation process is, though I’m excited to learn about it in forth coming chapters from my stress class. I wonder if writing can be a form of meditation, specifically free-form writing where one just writes his or her thoughts down as they flow from his or her mind through the veins, reaching the fingertips as they strike the keys on a keyboard.

I do find that leading up to writing, if it’s something that’s been assigned to me, I am hesitant, I feel pressured much I am at work to produce creative works. I’m much more relaxed writing at my own pace, when I am not congested with racing thoughts or consumed by deadlines. I’m also much more productive as well.

This weekend, I need to work on a wedding photography proposal for a high school friend of mine who sent me an inquiry about shooting her wedding photos in 2010! I also talked to the ex-husband of an old acquaintance of mine; he is getting married in August and is looking for a wedding photographer. I offered him my card and drafted a few different wedding photography package options. I’m also getting ready to sign a contract to do some family portraits in July 5 – it’s gearing up to be a busy but productive summer! 🙂

I’ve also recently implemented my strategy for accepting credit cards and I’m excited to start offering that service to customers! 🙂

June 12, 2008

Relaxing Lunch Retreat.

Seeing as how I had hot dogs for lunch on Tuesday, ham on Wednesday, and today an offering of pork, I was a little bit cashed out on swine. So, I did what most would do if they found themselves in a position similar to mine – leave for lunch. 🙂

My good friend Craig and I decided to go to Wegmans for a very relaxing lunch retreat. The Wegmans in Penfield has picnic tables along the right side of the store, a fact that is very unknown to most – including myself until today. We ate our lunch in the bright sun and afterward laid on the tables while discussing how to solve the world’s problems. I took a picture of myself laying on the table with my iPhone and sent it to my wife so she could partake in my joy too! 🙂

Afterward, I went back to finishing up the web site for Lindsay. The site had been a very slow work in progress for about 2 or 3 months so finishing it felt extremely satisfying; however, it will always be a work in progress as we unveil new upcoming events and list progress reports.

~~Check it out! http://www.LindsayGraygoEmpowermentScholarship.org~~

Afterward, I finished up some lingering yard work left over from the past weekend, including repairing some lattice work and priming it before I get a chance to stain it THIS weekend – sometime after working on my mini-paper for my Stress Management class. 😉

I also spent some time in the evening retouching some wedding photos, and researching some locations in Upstate and Rochester, New York for wedding engagement photography sessions.

June 5, 2008

Routine Basics.

I find writing to be relaxing and words easy to come by. In fact, one of the biggest problems I have when I write is trimming back the words. I guess I have a lot to say!

I started writing this blog at the beginning of 2008, and while I was able to maintain writing every single day for the first month, I simply found it impossible to write every day. I should really keep a voice recorder handy and just dictate my thoughts at the end of the day. 🙂

Tomorrow I’m looking forward to catching up on a long-distance project with a group of friends from high school. We’re trying to organize a fund raiser for a fellow student who was murdered back in February. The proceeds from the fund raiser will be used to establish a scholarship in her name – the Lindsay Graygo Empowerment Scholarship!

I’m planning on tomorrow being a good day to hunker down a bit on that project, and a few others. 🙂 For the most part, I’m in a good place with respect to my projects and my tasks that have deadlines approaching.

It’s hot right now – really hot, almost sweltering. In fact, at 12:32am, it’s 73 degrees outside. And, tomorrow is supposed to be 90! Someone kicked it up a notch alright. Bammm! I have a few more things to do before heading off to bed. I’m meeting my friend Craig for breakfast in the morning too, which will be nice as we have fallen out of our usual routine of weekly breakfasts. I’m definitely looking forward to it. 🙂

There is some photographic equipment that I’m looking to buy in the upcoming months, that should really come in handy photographing weddings here in Rochester, New York. Upstate is such a beautiful location to have your wedding photos taken, and the new equipment will surely augment New York’s beauty! 🙂

June 4, 2008

Finger Lakes Wedding Photography – James & Luba

Congratulations to James and Luba Mason on their marriage May 31, 2008!

I had the pleasure of photographing their wedding on Keuka Lake in Upstate New York this past weekend, along with my good friend Craig. It was a beautiful wedding with the ceremony taking place at Garrett Memorial Chapel and reception at the Esperanza Mansion – a truly remarkable setting for a gorgeous wedding couple.

Here are a few of my favourite images. Enjoy!

June 3, 2008

A Webster Site Visit.

The family portrait session that I’m going to be shooting in July will be shot on location at the Webster arboretum. Since I’ve never been there, I thought I would take advantage of the weather today and go do a site visit.

The arboretum was fantastic! I’m even more excited to shoot there in July! There are plenty of different areas at the location where I can shoot. I ended up spending about an hour or so there just exploring all the different angles that I can use for photographing the family portraits.

🙂

June 2, 2008

Wedding Photography At Keuka Lake.

I photographed James and Luba’s wedding on Saturday and I’m very pleased with how the wedding photographs turned out.

I spent most of Saturday photographing the wedding, which was right next to Keuka Lake in Upstate, New York. I wrapped up taking photographs by 5:30 and I was able to manage a few hours at home afterward to import the nearly 2,700 wedding photos, select all the good images, kick out the bad, and have them posted online by 12am!

There were some really excellent images that I was able to capture that I hope to post in the coming days. This was the first wedding trying out a new post-production workflow and I was pleasantly surprised by how quick and efficient the new workflow is – it will dramatically cut down on the amount of time I spend post-processing photos.

On Sunday I received confirmation that I would be shooting some family portraits in July at the Webster Arboretum which I’m really excited about! I’ve never shot there before, so I’m looking forward to it!

The weather in Rochester, New York has been gorgeous, perfect wedding photography weather!! 🙂

May 29, 2008

Do West-Coasters Get SAD?

Today is the Chase Corporate Challenge at RIT and I’m excited because I’ll be getting out of work a little early to join the other 11,000 participants at this year’s race. Though, I’m on the fence if I’ll run, walk, or just hang back with my wife and help her out at her company’s tent. 🙂

I’m going to bring my camera and see if I can’t pop of a few shots before the race starts. If I end up not running, I’ll take a few pictures of the race start and of the first hundred finishers and my wife’s team’s picture too!

Portrait photography is something that I’m starting to really enjoy, along with wedding photography and fine art photography. There are so many beautiful locations in Rochester, New York and really in Upstate, New York in general. Photographing weddings in Rochester is truly exceptional!

It is beautiful outside! Something that I’ve noticed is that I’m much happier when the weather is very sunny and warm. I started reading forward into my Stress Management text, to get a jump start on things and not fall behind, and in the chapter the text refers to SAD, a phenomenon that occurs when people do not get enough sunshine – such as in the arctic circle. While I definitely do not suffer from SAD, it was interesting to read about the link between weather and personal health altogether.

There’s a consensus that folks on the West coast are a lot happier than us East coast folks, maybe there’s a correlation there. Can sunshine make one warm on the inside too?

Anywho – I’m excited for the weekend, as I’ll be photographing a wedding in Keuka Lake, New York which will kick start the wedding photography season in Rochester, New York. 😉

I’ll post some of the wedding photos later on in the weekend. It’s gorgeous outside – warm, sunny, and 70Âº!