Five for Friday

georgia o'keefe portrait via peabody essex museum

Another incredibly fast week and we are in March?! What the what? I could use a little slowing down of time, you? No worries, we are feeling extraordinary productive and on a creative upswing. I wonder if it has anything to do with our #fotorx52 photo project? Having a photo prompt and weekly deadline is working since we spend the week thinking about what we are going to shoot and how and of course prepping our prompt ideas for the following week.

I. Have you heard about this company that is basically a Wholefoods without the branding? Everything in the on line shop is $3, their brandless branding is A-OK with me, most items are organic and GMP free, worth a peek!

II. Michelle just finished reading this fictional book based on the correspondence between Georgia O’Keefe and Alfred Steigliz, it’s on my list to read next.

III. Fuji Film just released their newest camera model and the word on the street is the video capabilities is aces. The better news is their pro camera X-T1 is a steal now, and I am trying to figure out any good excuse why I shouldn’t have it (I really, really want it).

IV. I have been on the hunt for a good dry shampoo spray, I recently picked this one up made with clay. So far it’s not leaving my hair white or gray, which seems to be the norm with dry shampoos. The scent is strong, but not unpleasant and dissipates fast, under $10 to boot!

V. If you missed it we did a mega round-up of our favorite Skillshare art classes– drawing, lettering, watercolor! Not to be missed! I mentioned in that post that these classes have helped me immensely with my once sub-par drawing skills.

Our mega list of favorite Skillshare classes!

favorite online art classes via besotted

We recently found out that we are ‘teachers to watch’ on Skillshare, a huge honor considering how many wonderful teachers and the volume of classes there are available at Skillshare. We know how overwhelming it can be so we have created a list of some of our very favorite Skillshare classes broken down into accessible categories! It’s amazing the talent that has pooled together in the Skillshare community, you truly get to learn from individuals that are at the top of their game in their industry, many are also blessed with the ability to easily translate their knowledge into consumable bites. I don’t think I would be this far in my drawing endeavors without having taken some of these classes that really gave me many ‘light bulb’ moments!
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Annie Liebovitz teaches photography!

annie_liebovitz_online_photography_course

There are so many magical things and opportunities that have transpired because of the internet, but truly one of the most thrilling for me has been the introduction of Masterclass an online resource of classes taught by true masters in their craft. Their latest coo?  Why having the famed photographer Annie Liebovitz teach a class, for get this under $100 USD?!  This feels like a Christmas miracle! I have taken many a photography course on line, but this is an entirely different level. Michelle recently had the opportunity to meet with Ms. Liebovitz at her book signing and if you are wondering Michelle said she was just lovely.

If you have any interest in portraiture both the class and the release of her latest book should send you into an inspiration tailspin.  Michelle and I have had taking portraits high on our list of projects to conquer and we think with this added motivation (and now knowledge) we just may make it happen this year!

we may receive a nominal affiliate fee from these links, the tiny bit helps us pay for the hosting to keep this ship afloat!

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Masterclass

Annie Liebovitz teaches photography online course!

Annie Liebovitz Portraits book 2005-2016

Author / Miss Tristan B

Miss Tristan B. is the co-creator of the world’s best + easiest product photography editing tool-Foto Rx | Shopkeeper’s Helper and one of the writer’s of this delightful blog. Her lofty goal here is to make this a creative resource repository and to inspire you to fall truly, madly, deeply in love with your life.

Mega list of documentary family photography resources

documentary family photographyI wanted to do a round-up of documentary family photography resources in case this subject has peaked your interest. I know how hard it can be to find good information on a subject and how convenient it is to have it all in one easy to reference place, so I collected the following documentary family photography resources for you!  Even if you don’t have children, I think that if you are interested in documentary photography for friends and family that these are great starting points. I have loved researching this genre, Michelle and I even have a beta set of black and white documentary style presets we’ve been working on in the Foto Rx lab that we will be releasing next year, from rich and sharp to dramatic and gloriously grainy, sure to make editing your sessions a breeze.  We want you to have images that are print worthy!

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Classes

Kirsten Lewis Real Family Photography-The class is long, but Kirsten is one of the top photographers in this field and it’s chock full of information, I can highly recommend.

Felicia Chang the Unapologetic Life-I wrote a review here.

Point of View Documentary photography

The Documentary Approach

Composition Clinic for Documentarians with Zalmy Berkowitz

Documentary photography with Ami Vitale

Tutorials, Interviews + Inspiration

Jennifer Tonnetti Spellman shares many of hers here.

Kirsten Lewis on family photojournalism

Sham of the perfect-I devoured all of their artist interviews in one night. Such incredible insight and inspo.

Community for documentary photographers

Photographer and father of 6 Alain Laboile offers endless inspiration a must visit!

The difference between lifestyle and documentary photography

Equipment/Tools

Your iphone would work for personal work, but if you are thinking o taking on clients here’s some of the equipment the pros recommend-

Full frame camera (we have a Canon 6D in the studio)- Nikon 750 (what Felicia Chang uses)

Sigma Art 35mm (this lens kept coming up over and over again)-For Canon | For Nikon

24mm lens for wide angle shots

50mm lens

Photomechanic for culling images

$10/mo Adobe Creative Cloud plan

Foto Rx Black and White documentary style presets (coming soon!)

photo by alain laboile