Sarah Nielson

Sarah's Contact Sheet, originally uploaded by calanan.

Latest portraits for my new photo project, "This Is Their Place"

See: thisistheirplace.calanan.com

Liberty Lake at Liberty Park
Downtown SLC, UT

Sarah was as funny and quick-witted in person as she is in her writing and despite both of our minds and bodies protesting the early meeting time I chose (for the morning light!) the shoot went very well.

As for her place, I have only been to Liberty Park a couple of times since we moved to SLC and I can honestly say that I have been missing out. It's a beautiful park, it's peacefully quiet on a Sunday morning and if my alarm clock (and strong coffee) works I'll be spending more time there on future Sundays.

Be sure to check out her blog entry about this shoot, "Calanan Photo Project | Tales of Wit and Charm" and then go get caught up on her archives.

I'm enjoying how this project is progressing, how I'm getting to meet new people and see interesting places. I'm also learning a lot about my craft, especially learning from my mistakes. After Thom's interview I learned that swapping lenses just 1) takes up time and 2) distracts me from taking portraits. For this shoot I planned to slim down my gear but ended up doing the same dang thing again, just slightly less so.

I tried taking some environmental portraits with a super-wide lens (12mm) but the two I processed (2nd in and last on the contact sheet) just didn't cut it. There are some situations where wide angles work well and I'm still trying to sort out the best times to use them.

From now on I'm going to stick with one, maybe two lenses and concentrate on the portrait-making process. This will have the added benefit of giving the shots a more consistent look.