Initially I started because I wanted to take better pictures of my kids. Courtney & I had just met in Japan & she convinced me shooting with a DSLR wasn’t as intimidating as I thought it was. Knowing I had a friend who could basically hold my hand & teach me everything I needed to know sealed the deal to buy my first DSLR camera.

Honestly, I just wanted good pictures of my kids that I could hang in my home or give to our family. And I definitely wanted to be proficient at manual mode, custom white balance & my editing software.

That I was actually better at shooting food than I was my kids.

Probably when I started my blog, Eat Your Beets. I really had no idea what I was doing with food photography but I just started shooting & putting it out there. In my heart, I knew my images weren’t very good but I had to start somewhere. In hindsight it was the best thing because it totally pushed me to learn more & improve my skills.

2013

2015

First, because unfortunately, I rarely shoot my kids. Second, because don’t we all love pancakes like a 3 year old loves pancakes?

I really get excited when my image comes out in camera the way I envisioned it in my mind. When I’m shooting food I’m constantly getting to create something new because it’s a new dish every single time. I love surprising myself, letting the food guide & influence the way I shoot & I truly feel like it’s a way I can create art for other people. I remember when I started taking myself seriously as a food photographer I explained it to my kids by telling them just like they would make a drawing or painting & give it to us, I was creating art to give to other people.

Keep learning. Keep shooting. Keep studying other people’s work. Don’t compare yourself to better photographers. Instead, embrace them. Find out what it is about their work that intrigues you & discover how that can inspire your own work.

I’ve feel like I’ve had so many! I’m constantly seeing things finally click (no pun intended)! If I could pinpoint only one light bulb moment it would be when I finally realized how to manipulate natural light under any conditions. I don’t feel confined to using light in one singular way now. I know that I can use back lighting, dramatic lighting or full sun & still achieve a great shot.

I’m super inspired by Jenni Hulet of The Urban Poser.

Her use of natural light & her consistently beautiful images were a big inspiration to me when I first started. I remember thinking, if my images could look anything like Jenni’s I will have succeeded. I also love how she incorporates her whole family & you often see her sons & husband in her shots. She definitely pushed me to further investigate dramatic lighting.

Another huge inspiration for me is Sonali from Sugar et al.

Sonali has her personal photography style on lock down. I can spot one of her images from a mile away & every time I see one I say, Yep, that’s Sonali. Her images are like looking at a dream world. Everything is consistently gorgeous & her use of light + color blow me away every time.

Biggest success? I think finally feeling confident enough in my own skills to be able to help other people learn more. I love the feeling of helping people get the shot they wanted or explain a concept they felt confused about. Writing my ebook, Eat Pretty Things, is honestly something I wanted to do for so long so I definitely consider that a success as well.

Failure? That’s honestly not a word I use. I don’t even consider something poor that comes out of my camera as a failure. Everything is a learning process & every shot I take is getting me closer to some goal. To me, learning isn’t failure. Bad shots, poor lighting, those aren’t even failures. They are simply tools I use to make myself better. The only actual ‘failure’ I can think of would be when I neglected to back up my hard drive & desktop. I dropped my external hard drive & lost over a year’s worth of images I’ll never be able to recover. That was certainly a failure but not reflective of my photography. It was reflective of my poor managerial skills.

Hard to choose. I would make a top 5 list of England, Morocco, Prague, Ireland & Omaha. The first & last places I lived in, the middle 3 I just visited. Each hold a special place in my heart.

Who’s paying for this vacation? Seriously, though, I’ve often regretted the fact I wasn’t into photography when I was younger & traveling the globe. I would pretty much go anywhere I could photograph people in their natural environment whether that be a market in Mauritius or a small homestead in Iowa. I love meeting the people who inhabit a place. They make up the best parts of the story.

Funny, empathetic, intense.