September is mine


August was a busy month for me. To be honest, my creativity and inspiration was consumed by so many different projects, none of them being my own. This was good but then it wasn’t. Though I was completing projects for others, I myself could no longer afford me.

Until now. Since I worked all of August, I financially can hire myself.

There are a different few projects I am working on this month.

The first one, I was inspired to jump in to children photography. I was out shopping with my sister in Baby Gap and was taken by the photos on the walls. The kids were just so darn cute! I told my sister, “I would love to do children photography, that would be awesome.” I then remembered some wisdom I learned from, Robert Rodriguez.  -If you wanna be a filmmaker, then do it. That night, I posted up a status telling my 500 friends, “Free portraits for kids 2-5, book now.”

I have around five photo shoots booked, yes, for free. I am hiring out myself.

Second project, is to get my portraits done. I wish I could take them myself. I asked a few friends but I decided to do it myself. How you might ask, well.. I will post a blog telling you all about this.

This month of September. A month to stop saying “One Day”.

Testing out 16-35mm on David

Video: The Kids

Yesterday when I was sick I recorded my nephews. I don’t know if others will find this as entertaining as I but I find kids so creative. I thought it was pretty cool that David, my three-year old nephew, sat down and had a conversation with me.

Being Still.. It’s not so easy.


It’s interesting how hard it is to be still. Even watching Jacob, my nephew, it was hard for him to stay in one spot.

Today I woke up pretty stick. I slept most of the day but for a few hours when I was awake, my nephews were here visiting.
Strange thing is that my three year old nephew came in my room and hung out with me. As I laid in bed he began to tell me about his world. He saw a baby photo I had taken of him and we began to talk about growing up. I even witnessed him playing with his imaginary friend Jessie.

Being still wasn’t easy for me. As you can tell, I had my camera right next to me snapping photos. haha. Being sick makes you appreciate being healthy. It also teaches us to notice the small things in life that make it so great.

What matters

I bought a photography course from Creativelive of famous photographer, Zack Arias.  During his introduction he said somethings that stood out to me.

We want to be the photographers that master the medium, not let it master over us.

Photography will take everything from you, it will take your time, money, family, your credit score, if you let it. Its’ a wild beats.

The Balance: We have families, we have lives. Photography is everything but no it isn’t, photography is stupid. At the end of the day, its just a job, we’re not curing cancer, but its the only thing I know how to do.

When my nephews visit they light up my world. There have been times where I am working on my computer and David the oldest says, “Monica, come play with me.” Or my mom ask, “Do you wanna put Jacob to sleep?” At those moments, what ever I am doing becomes meaningless. The past few weeks I have only been taking photos with my film camera of life. I felt like I needed a break from “photography”. I know a creative break will help improve my professional work.

Life is full of joy, we just have to stop and notice it.

A clip of Jacob. I love his reaction to the sunlight.It’s as if he is seeing it for the first time.

Feeding the Poor

Feeding the Poor, originally uploaded by Monica Briano.

The last roll of film my camera produced before it’s death.
It’s great being a part of a church that cares for the poor. This is the The Rock and World Outreach Center’s Food Distribution.

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