Photo Credit: jyangphoto.com

Here are the images of the same lens and camera the next day outdoor! I absolutely love the bokeh and how much it separates the subject from the background and to think about it only on a 1.8 aperture. We shot these images in back a coffeeshop building at sunset time, surprisingly for a winter the weather has been so nice that I could be in a skirt and without a heavy jacket. Also let's talk about how the new Lightroom update has made editing so much easier, I couldn't believe how quickly I was able to finished editing this set. To be honest I kind of feel bad for myself for the past many years spending so many hours on the editing by creating presets and tweaking each image light graph etc while all I needed was this new update and I could have saved so much time! 

Couple nights ago Josh got his new 85mm lens in the mail. That night I had made chicken curry in the instant pot my new favorite kitchen gadget. While I was serving dinner, he was going through the mail and pulled out the new 85mm lens out of the box and tested it on his Sony A7RIII camera and the result are these pictures. I have used 85mm lens before but the one I used didn't have an auto-focus so after 3 photoshoots I completely gave up on the idea and went back to my trusty 50mm. However it was not until I saw these results that I truly fell for this lens. The next day we went outdoors for a test shot and the images turned out absolutely beautiful . . I will share those image next. 

Uncommon Objects which is a well known antique shop in Austin, hosted a pop-up flea market in their backyard for Christmas bazaar, these images are from our visit. the images above is what Josh took on his film camera and the ones below are on my Fujifilm XT2 on 50mm 1.4 lens. This Christmas Josh gifted me this generous gift of this lens and I couldn't be any more grateful to him. I have been using a 50mm 1.4 Nikon lens with an adaptor with it, but it was not an auto-focus lens and made it very difficult to shoot for professional work or even out and about because the focus would be all over the place if I didn't pay extra attention which took fun out of the actual shooting process.

I absolutely love Toy Poodle breed, before I met them I have never cared about the breed of an animals as I thought that was the silliest thing to shop for a dog breed. While there are many abandoned dogs waiting to be adopted at the shelters, how selfish to think about the breed of a dog? should we not adopt any of them we can connect with? It was not until I met these toy poodles and my heart and soul have fulfilled. These dogs are not only hypoallergenic, won't shed, super smart, not to mention kind and cuddly and they hardly ever bark. In fact I love them so much that I have been in a search for 2 years to find another or two at the shelter and still I have not been successful. The only and the biggest issue that I found is their bad teeth - poor Chien Chien is having almost rotten teeth and one is almost loose and we are in the process of making appointment to take it out. It breaks my heart because she doesn't have that many teeth left in her mouth as is. 

Josh took these images on an expired film that his grandmother gave him on his last trip to Lost Angeles. I absolutely love the color and tons of these picture, it is such a beautiful surprise, previously the film that I have seen expired had a pink or red tone but I am not sure how these turned darker shade of yellow.  We shot these on a Sunday walking to a coffeeshop at sunset time, this winter has been very stressful because of my job I found myself thinking about work around the clock and spending even weekends and after hours working to make deadlines so after this shoot I worked on woke deadlines till late at night - Sadly I did not get a chance to prepare for Christmas and the holidays this year as much I wanted to. 

Photo Credit: Self-portrait with Tripod

This year the winter has been wonderful, it is not the cold that gets to me, but more the lack of sun. This years has been one of the sunniest weather and there is a nice balance between super cold days and 70 degree weather so I am a very happy girl! I took these self portrait on a tripod in our neighborhood park - I remember the weather had just started to get chilly in late November and I was so excited to feel the chilly weather and wear layers and warmer clothes. 

I found this documentary [What Remains] about a contemporary Photogrpaher Sallly Mann absolutely fascinating. While her choice of camera is a large format and black and white film, she prefers to shoot where she lives in a ranch in Lexington, VA with her family. What I found interesting about her work is that unlike some photographers she chose not to travel to exotic places, but to capture life as it happens around her. It was in fact the portrait photography of her children while playing about that got her the public fame, I believe she made a book of that portrait series however because some of these photos involved child nudity she faced with heavy criticism for exposing her children and making financial gain from them. That controversy aside I find her portrait work absolutely stunning, and her work has definitely made an impact on me to see and capture the world around me with a different outlook and to connect with life and time as it passes from a different prospective. 

Photo Credit: Self-portrait with Tripod

Visiting a pumpkin patch during fall has been a dream! Fall has always been the busiest month for me, when I was in school I couldn't imagine doing anything else but to go to class and work on the weekend and find sometime to actually study and when I started working as a makeup artist and Photgrapher it got even more busy - with wedding season and family portrait and back to back events from Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas I never got a chance for the past 18 years that I have lived in Austin to check out a pumpkin patch field to get in the spirit of fall. But this year finally my long waited dream came true! I have been trying so hardly to slow down everything as my office job has definitely took over my life left very little room for anything else. One weekend in fall when Josh was traveling and sadly because of my job I couldn't travel with him so I decided to check out a pumpkin patch farm on my own! I packed my tripod and drove about a hour outside of the city to Barton Hill Farms in Bastrop, Texas! When I arrived I realized to my surprised the entrance tickets to the farm were all sold out, but since I was only one person I was able to get a ticket and get inside (note to self buy tickets ahead of time). Then I found myself in a heaven of fields of corn and pumpkins - the whole farm was set up as a photoshoot backdrop, sunflower section, hay rolls corner and my favorite corn field, not to mention couple antique cars and carriage decorated festive for the season. They sold food and snacks and had play grounds for kids, games all over the place and a small zoo with baby pigs and goats. I absolutely had a blast and  definitely hope that I can go back again every year. 

Photo Credit: Self-portrait with Tripod

I shot these on a Saturday early morning while location scouting for a photoshoot the next day. I rolled out of the bed at 6:30am and last minute decided to bring my tripod to test out some self portrait images - funniest thing is the minute I step outside the house it started raining! Somehow I decided I was still going to check the park out and by the time I arrived there it became sunny again! I am very happy that I didn't give up because not only I found some really nice locations on this walk, this self portrait was very helpful where I got try couple different features of the camera and get more comfortable with them. 

This year Josh asked for a fruit pie for his birthday cake, so I bought him one and made him another. The one I made was almost pre-made, unfortunately because of my job I was not able to do more. I bought the pie crust and the filling and cut the fresh fruits and poured a pack of boiled jello over them and set it in the fridge to harden. The result was pretty legit visually, but it didn’t taste very good - it tuned very sweet. Hopefully next time I will be able to make one from scratch!