Your Starting Point

[Saknika]

There's a beginning to everything, including our photography. And we're not talking about those cute snapshots you took as a five year old. We're talking when you first really realized that you wanted to be a photographer.

Mine came in my Junior year of highschool, around the age of 16. I was taking photography as my art class, because there was no way I was going to school without an art class, and it was the only other one that interested me. I'd already done Studio Art, and Ceramics. My only options left were Photography (if you could get in), Sculpture, Drawing & Painting, or Portfolio--and I'd already decided to save Portfolio for my senior year. There was no way I could do D&P, and I wasn't interested in Sculpture. That left Photography, so I went for it.

So I was lucky enough to make it into the highly-coveted Photography class (quite possibly because the art teacher loved me since I was well behaved and helpful). Really though, I wasn't expecting it to be anything special. In my mind we were just going to go out and snap some photos and be happy.

I WAS WRONG.

For a small school, my art teacher pulled a lot of strings and made us terrific classes. And so I talked my Mom into getting me my first SLR for 35mm film (and I still have it!); and I learned how to use b+w film, and how to develop it myself.

During this, people were always complimenting my photos, and they really loved them. Like, REALLY loved them. Which I didn't think anything of, because hey, it's just art class and before that I'd just used my little film camera to make snapshots during vacation (because digital cameras did not exist then! )

After a while though, I began to listen to everyone, and I started educating myself on photography as well. And I started to really see as a photographer. From HS I went to a trade college (Hallmark) for photography, and even though I failed their art standards (it was bs), I'm still learning today.

Now I'm 20 years old, taking photos I never dreamed I'd be taking when I was 16. And I plan to still be doing this when I'm on my deathbed.

[shp]

I actually started having a love for cameras when I was just a toddler. My father had a Polaroid camera that I always wanted to try, and when I was four I took my first shot of the family cat. It was a good picture, too, and we still have it today somewhere in our storage. I didn't know much about photography or anything as I was growing up because none of the schools I went to really had anything to offer that had to do with it, but upon my senior year in high school I decided that I was to be a photographer. I was hoping to start a business when I graduated, but realized that I needed to learn stuff. I never knew there was so much to learn and to do, and despite the fact I'm not always motivated to just go out there and take a photo, I keep wanting to do more whenever I see some photos. I learned about photographers such as Sally Mann, Eugene Mi-something (his last name is always too hard to remember), Peter Rowan (he used to work with U2 in case you thought his name was familiar; he's that boy), and a few others that I liked, and saw plenty of photographs that kept inspiring me to do more. I'm hoping that in the near future I would've improved and that my business would be running smoothly. I just need a place for a studio since my house's kind of small, and I could build one in my backyard but I would rather stay in my house than go rot in jail for "damaging the property". Our landlord's that mean and stupid. -.-

Now I'm twenty and I'm still improving, but only at a slight bit. My computer runs on dial-up, so I can't really read tutorials when I would love to, and I do use my PS3 (PlayStation3) but I use my neighbor's wireless, and I think my TV's getting ready to crap out on me.

[ŋєт™]

For me photography has always been there in the background. I've been on Deviant Art for 4 years posting my work (the early stuff was mostly snapshots). For me it all began 2 years ago when I took a digital photography class. I caught the bug there and continued on with it after the class. I decided that I wanted to possibly make a career out of it about half a year ago. I have to give props to the various photographers I follow out there because they've been a huge inspiration to me.

[Hope C.]

It's tough to put a finger on when my photography started, simply because there are so many different aspects of it. Since I am an equine photographer, I suppose you could say that part of it has essentially always been prevalent. I was the little girl who never grew out of her obsession with horses. When I was about 10, I was given one of those little Polaroid digital cameras where you can't even see the picture until you plug the camera into the computer later. Surprisingly enough, I somehow managed to pull off fairly decent (though extremely low quality) pictures with that thing, and absolutely loved it. My dad, who used to work for the BLM as the photographer for their wild mustang round ups, was impressed with what I was able to produce with that little piece of plastic that probably weighed about as much as a cell phone for its lack of technological advancement, and figured I needed an upgrade. So abound 15 or so I got one of those canon point and click cameras... which I grudgingly had to share with my younger sister. Obviously, my pictures improved from what I had been taking on the other camera, and I really started loving it then, when I could see the pictures I was taking before I had them on the computer. At 17 my dad upgraded me again to the Canon Rebel XTi that I'm still using today. I took a photography class at the community college here in the Fall of 2008, and that opened my eyes to all the possibilities involved in photography. So I went to a horse show and took pictures for maybe an hour, and found that I really liked being able to incorporate horses into my photography. So I started going to every local horse show I could and staying all day (resulting in multiple sunburns) taking around 300 decent pictures per show day. I offered a friend of my parents some of the pictures I'd taken of her, and next thing I knew, she was asking me how much I charged for them and if I needed help advertising and all sorts of different things. I told her, of course, that I wasn't in it for the profit, but she insisted on paying me for them, and that was how "Cowgirl with a Camera" initially started. I've made probably about 100 dollars just from that one lady, and I've taken some in exchange for riding lessons with one of my high school friend's riding trainers. So I suppose the horse part of my photography has always existed, but the photography part started about 10 years ago, and I suppose you could say my desire to go somewhere with my photography started this summer.