Last night was the first class of my four week photography course for Community Education.  I always like to start off the first class with tips on Halloween shooting since the date usually aligns nicely with the holiday.  In the interest of bringing this blog back to life (see what I did there -Halloween + raising from the dead), I'm passing on those tips here as well:

• Take your posed costume photos early in the daylight or inside in a well-lit area, if possible.
• Best mode: Full manual, but Aperture Priority (AV/A) works as well.
• Set your ISO high – 1600, 3200.
• Be careful of “noise” - grainy photos can happen when you set your ISO too high
• Set a W I D E aperture.  Go as wide as your lens will let you, which means if you're using a zoom lens, keep that lens as wide as you can and use your physical location for the zooming you need.
• Use a prime lens if you have one as it will allow for a much wider aperture.
• Set slow shutter speed, but be careful of blur (too much movement)
• Use a tripod or rest your camera on something sturdy to avoid movement blur.
• Use ANY available light, be creative: move your subject close to light or YOU move close to light.
• If you need to use a flash, use an external one.  The pop-up flash in your DSLR will light your subject too unevenly compared with the background and you will likely get a washed out photo.

Ahnna and Dodrick are the daughter and son-in-law of my good friend Carrie.  I used to work with Carrie when I came back from England to work at Mayo Clinic 10 years ago.  We worked in an office full of women and it came with both its pros and cons.  One of the pros was the amount of laughing we did on a daily basis thanks to Carrie's awesome sense of humor.  For as much as we complained about working there back then, I do miss seeing my friend everyday.

When I asked for models to launch Momarazzi Photography's photo sessions, Carrie was quick to tell me that I needed to ask Ahnna and Dodrick.  I didn't hesitate and I am so lucky that they agreed to work with me because these are some of my favorite images.  We trekked out to Quarry Hill Nature Center in Rochester on a Saturday morning after a fresh couple of inches of snow had fallen the night before.  Cross country snow skiers and families visiting the nature center joined us in the wintery wonderland.  It was a beautiful day to photograph such gorgeous models.

It has been ages since I updated this blog. My apologies to any of our avid followers.

 If you are in need of a family photographer in Rochester, Minnesota or would like to take some digital photography classes, please visit my new website at http://www.momarazzirochmn.com or "like" me over on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/momarazzirochmn.

 And as always, you can see what we are up to by visiting our photo site at Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/familieschmitt/

 Thanks for your support!!

The instructor of the photography workshop asked all of her past students to put together a little statement about what we learned in the workshop and why it would be beneficial for others to take the class. I could have listed a million reasons, but I thought this one was the most appropriate for other photographers:

I am very excited, my photography workshop began today. I've decided to post my assignments here on the blog to document my progress. Our first assignment was to provide an "emtionally perfect" photo that we had taken prior to the workshop. It didn't have to be technically perfect, but rather display or evoke emotions. I chose this photo:

And here is what I said about it:
Mode: Auto
Aperture: f/2.0
Shutter Speed: 0.017 sec (1/60)
ISO: 320
Lens: EF50mm f/1.8 II
Focal Length: 50 mm
White Balance: Auto
RAW or JPG: JPG
Photographer's Comments: This is a photo of my son popping off one of those champagne bottle poppers on the Fourth of July last year. I hate the holiday because fireworks scare the living daylight out of me, so this is as far as we go to celebrate. I think the photo shows two emotions - one being the excitement on my son's face at his popper exploding and two my own emotion of fear from the popper shown through the shakiness of the camera and the lack of focus in the photo. I'm pretty sure I edited the photo's exposure and maybe color saturation through picnik when I uploaded it to flickr.

Our classmates are asked to provide constructive feedback on the photos and the instructor also does the same. Can't wait to get my first comments!

** warning - this is a very photo-heavy post! ** Mike and I decided to invite AJ and John over for the weekend so we could take all of the kids to a new exhibit at Quarry Hill Nature Center (one of our favorite places in Rochester). Twilight of the Triceratops sounded like something the boys would enjoy, so Mike picked up tickets and I picked up the boys Saturday afternoon. The weather was windy, but nice on Saturday, so we spent a large part of the day outside playing with bubbles, helicopters and ride-on toys. The three boys are all obsessed with everything Harry Potter at the moment and between the three of them they acted out scenes from the movies with Benjamin's Halloween costume and any stick wand they could get their hands on.

They all really enjoyed exploring the exhibit at the nature center on Sunday. The triceratops section was a bit small and slightly disappointing, but we also spent some time with the permanent parts of the center like the fish, turtles and ever-popular microscope. My photography workshop begins next week and I've really been trying to be more diligent about picking up my camera and taking it out of the automatic setting. I am so glad to be getting some instruction soon because (as you can see in the photos in this post), I need some help. Yesterday the kids and I went to a park after work/school/daycare and I played with my camera a bit. Here are some of my favorites:

We all seem to be moving so quickly lately. Lucy's speeding through toddlerhood, Benjamin is rushing through addition and subtraction and right onto multiplication and division, Mike is spending his time increasing speed on his brand new triathlon bike and I've been cruising around the pool and on my bike for my own triathlon training. Days and weeks go by without us even noticing that they're gone. Today is the first day of March and it is hard to believe spring is just around the corner. Usually I'd be all "Woah! Slow down, I need to breathe." But lately, I have been embracing this full steam ahead progress. We're moving toward great things. It feels good. A couple of weeks ago we visited the Minnesota Zoo with Grandma Chris on the President's Day holiday. The zoo was overrun with school children, but neither Benjamin nor Lucy noticed. They had a great time. We are so lucky to have such a great zoo here, we all really enjoy it.

Multiple times a day Lucy insists on sitting at the kitchen table in her booster chair. We've stored the high chair for a possible spring garage sale and she's exclusively sitting at the table with us now. She loves to "color" in coloring books. I use quotes around the word because to her coloring means holding too many crayons for her tiny hands, dropping most of the crayons on the floor, scribbling for 30 seconds on one page and whining until someone gets her down from the table. The whole process takes maybe 3 minutes. We repeat it probably 2-3 times in the morning and 4-5 times in the evening. She enjoys it so much that we continue to oblige her. It is pretty cute. She is in full-on toddler mode right now though. I forget how demanding they can be at this age. Lots of yelling and whining and this face:

I couldn't resist posting this one of our handsome grown up boy!

Time is just flying by. Lucy's six month birthday is not so far off and before we know it, Benjamin will be SIX! This week's Lucy photo is special to me because the blanket she is laying on was a gift from a dear friend of mine, Rae, who has been in my life since high school. She was so sweet to send this blankie that matches Lucy's nursery colors. It is one of the softest, snuggliest blankets Lucy has and is sure to be a favorite of hers.

I made a big purchase last week - a new DSLR camera! I have finally jumped into the world I've been longing to join. Hopefully now all the time I have spent reading photography blogs and how-to websites will pay off. Now I have the equipment to take the photos I've been envying. My old Canon SX10 was an awesome awesome camera and surely introduced me to my new found love of photography, but now she has a new home and I've welcomed the Canon EOS Rebel T2i into my life. The kids are being really patient with all of my photo snapping as I get used to my new gear.

Lucy and I made a little trip up to the Mall of America yesterday to meet up with my Mom, Bayola cousins from Hawaii and Great Aunt Arlene from Illinois. Lucy hadn't met them yet, so we showed her off.



We will soon be able to see even more family from my side as the kids and I are taking a trip to Florida. Lucy will be able to meet her Uncle Mark and Aunt Debbie for the first time and both kids should be able to have some quality time with their Great Grandma! The warm temperatures and beach will just be a bonus to the trip.

Week Fourteen? How could that be true??

The special guest star in the photo is Lucy and Benjamin's new baby cousin Albert. It is amazing to think that someday Albert will be the same size as Lucy or will likely be even bigger than her. AJ and Benjamin are the same amount of time apart in age as Lucy and Albert. I only hope that these two newbies will have as much fun as the old guys!

We took Benjamin and Lucy to a portrait studio today to get their first sibling photos done. Of course, Benjamin was a big ham and even threw out some Zoolander-esqe poses. The photos we received are great. I used my camera to capture them so I could share them here. Click on the small version to see the full-sized photos.

Benjamin and I decided to make the most out of the beautiful day we had yesterday (60 degrees and sunny in mid-November?!) by visiting Oxbow Park and Zollman Zoo, a favorite of our family. I snapped a few shots of him outside, but they were cut short and not great because he had to go to the bathroom badly, haha.

I also got this cool one of the turkeys...