I often talk about approaching photography based on who you are as a person. For myself, I have found that my photography mimics my life in many ways. It wasn’t apparent to me until other photographers would question me about why I routinely made the choices that I did. Those choices could be the lighting situations I am photographing in. Or it could be the locations I chose. It also incorporates my equipment of choice.
“Being true to who you are as a person is something that I have always embraced within my life and my work”
I am definitely a creature of habit. It takes a lot for me to embrace something new or different. I have found that I like to perfect that things that I do, and when I do that I am, in a sense, trying something new! With that said, being true to who you are as a person is something that I have always embraced within my life and my work and I will share how I bring that into the photographs that I create.
I will always be a wife and a mother first and foremost. My family has, and will continue to be my first priority. When I began my career, I made sure that I conducted my photo sessions when my boys were at school, or when my husband was home from work and could be with them. I also wanted to be home for dinner. That was the schedule. I never ventured off of it by choice! You know what that did? It left me with a small window of time to conduct my photo shoots — 10am to 2pm! Definitely not the time of day many photographers found themselves photographing in.
Overall, we are told that photographing at high noon isn’t something photographers should strive for. Now add to that lighting scenario, I also used only natural lighting. I would photograph utilizing only natural lighting, and I never used a portable reflector. I know, I have been told that sounds crazy before! Now let me add one more thing I would routinely do. I would always use very wide apertures. So photographing at high noon, using only natural light, and I used very wide apertures almost sounds like a recipe for disaster! Well, I nailed this set up. It actually made me the photographer that I am today. I was able to create a recognizable style that wasn’t forced. It was simply based on who I am.
My favorite lens: The Nikon 85mm f/1.4G IF AF-S NIKKOR Lens
One thing I have to have is a really fast piece of glass. My favorite lens is my Nikkor 85mm f/1.4G lens. I use this lens 99% of the time in all of my work. It doesn’t matter how many people I photograph, I will still use this lens! Aside from the technical aspects of having a very sharp, and fast piece of glass, it also incorporates qualities that I also need.
The focal length of 85mm works well for me because I often talk loud! It gives me a nice separation between me and my client. If I were too close to them, I would literally sound extremely loud to them. The other aspect is the fact that it is a prime lens. I must move when I am photographing. It is literally second nature for me to move. Because I need to “zoom” with my feet, using a prime lens works perfectly with my personality and my need to always move!
As my career progressed, I created a motto for how I approached my outlook to planning an image. That motto is, “Light first, location second”. This means that I will always look for the perfect light that I want. When I am searching for a place to photograph, I see the light first all the time. Although the light looks beautiful, the locations are often less than ideal. There could be a really busy background, or a ton of people everywhere. There could be a number of reasons why the location just doesn’t look “pretty”. My 85mm lens is definitely my workhorse lens that allows me to create the images that I envisioned.
The photo:
In this image, I was out of town in the city of Cleveland, Ohio. I saw this really good alleyway that had lights hanging. I just loved it. The downside is that it was a really really busy area. It was completely chaotic. There were people walking around the entire time. Remember when I said that my photography often mimics my life? Well, having 4 boys, and our younger 3 boys are a year apart, my life was always chaotic. So I realized that I am drawn to those situations.
With this image, I didn’t care about all the people in the background. Not only was I going to capture the image, I needed to make sure my subject stood out. That is always my girl. I used my Nikkor 85mm lens, and I used an aperture of f/1.6. I used my distance away from my subject to make sure the depth of field was exactly how I wanted. My goal was to make sure the feel of where she was was apparent to the viewer. But I also wanted to make sure she was the main subject in the image. I didn’t want anything else to compete with her.
The reason why the 85mm lens was a perfect choice was because if I used a wider focal length, the background would be as shallow as I would have liked. If I would have used a longer focal length, I would have either lost too much background, or I would be so far away that I would have to be in the street to capture the composition I wanted.
Embracing who I am as a person really allowed me to naturally create a photographic style. I am able to create a consistent portfolio that embraces what I want to create, regardless of where I am. My Nikkor 85mm f/1.4G lens is definitely the lens that I must have. It allows me the flexibility to create the images I want within the conditions that I consistently find myself photographing in.
Is it possible to create an entire portfolio of images that span for well over a decade using only one lens? I am proof of that! I’ve been a full time professional photographer for the last 17 years. My lens of choice over that entire timeframe has been the Nikkor 85mm f/1.4 lens. I predict it will be my lens of choice for the next twenty years!
