Sharing Stories, Creating a Legacy

Anyone who knows me well, knows I love a good book and a good story.

There is nothing like sitting around the kitchen listening to people tell stories of their adventures, their travels, their successes and their failures. Stories of courage, hardship, risk and reward are more a part of our everyday life that we realize.

I have spent a good portion of January with this idea floating around in my head regarding the power of the story and how to integrate it into my work as a portrait photographer.

It is always good to have personal projects that you are working on. These projects push me to stretch my muscles as a photographer, to capture unique portraits, think creatively as an artist, and lately, a writer.

Do you know someone who has a story to share?

Wouldn’t it be wonderful to capture their story and have an amazing portrait to go with it?

Be sure to check out my portfolio; there are some amazing stories behind a lot of my photos.

I have always loved photos and their ability to tell stories. I believe the saying goes, “A picture is worth a thousand words”, and imagine having a loved ones story, either a current story, or a story from their past captured for all time.  What an amazing legacy to pass down to to future generations. One day your children will look for photos of you and stories of your courage, strength and adventures.

What will they find?

To get this project started, I am sharing this old photo of myself that I found.

Likely circa 1976, golden yellow was a very trendy color around that time. *wink*

We probably had company on this day, as I don’t recall us having this car (although I could be mistaken…), and the camera did not come out on a daily basis to grab a quick snapshot like we do today. If I recall correctly, the dog’s name was George. I say that because it seems to me we had a run of about 3 or 4 dogs who had that name. Being a farm dog has its perils, perhaps this was to lessen the questions about what happened to “George”?

“Don’t be silly! George is right there see?”

*Whistle*

“Come here George!”

And George would respond to his name and come.

Well then…it must be George!!

(I seemed to recall he looked different, but oh well, George was George!)

The other thing that strikes me about this photo is that it would have taken months to actually see it.

It would likely take a month or two to use up the film in the camera. (Remember it only came out on special occasions), and then the process of getting it developed would entail sending it in an envelope off to a lab in the city, and waiting 2 to 3 weeks, if not more, to get it back.

We’ve come a long way baby!