I finally got the keys to the new studio! It’s going to be a little while before its completely cleaned up and ready to go, but I am still super excited!

Here’s a photo of the way it looks now.. all empty and bare!

There is a large back room which is definitely not in usable condition in its current state. Since it will take lots of time any money to fix it up, I am going to work on it slowly, bit by bit, and keep business up front until it is ready to be seen!
It’s located just north of Woodstock, GA in a tiny historical square. It may be a little bit of a drive from downtown Atlanta (about 40 minutes), but its totally worth it!
I will share more photos once I get it looking presentable. I have a lot of work to do!

Ok I admit it. I am falling in love with this style. I spent some time trying to improve my techniques from last time and am having a good time fiddling with all the possibilities. So here’s my new batch of edits. Which of these do you think works best?

As an aside, I was asked if I would share the editing process for my future retouch updates. Yes, I promise I will! I just usually don’t keep track of what I do, and there’s a lot of back and forth fiddling involved so I don’t always remember my exact process. I will do my best to write down my steps and hopefully you can try these edits at home too.

#1: This photo I found of the Duran Duran concert my buddy Lindze and I attended back in December. You can see us rockin out with our cameras in the front row. Definitely the best show of theirs I have seen (and I have seen quite a few!) Click on the link to see the photo all zoomed.
#2: These dinosaur stud earrings from Modcloth.com. This site is totally my favorite for unique fashion finds.
#3: The interface design and general themes in the video game Fallout 3. I am late on the boat, as this game has been out for a little while, but I just started playing it. Only a few hours in, I am mesmerized by the style of everything. It’s all post apocalyptic but has a retro 40s feel. It’s really a must see for game lovers and design lovers alike.
#4: My new lens: the Canon 50mm 1.4. It’s sooo nice and sharp. For the price, it’s a majorly good lens.
#5: Retro cartoons, in this case: Lady Lovelylocks. I was having a discussion with some online buddies about the awesome girlyness of this long forgotten cartoon of the 80s. I personally loved the nemesis Duchess Ravenwaves. I wanted to be her when I was a little girl.
#6: Thinkgeek.com’s April fool’s day items. They totally made me laugh. In particular, this sleeping bag that I really really wish was real!!

Lo-fi photography is all the rage these days. Scene kids everywhere are scrounging up their old Polaroid and Lomo cameras and making lots and lots of photos that look like something you mom might’ve taken. But you don’t have to go out and pay top dollar for a vintage camera to get the effect. Plenty of people are creating this look with photoshop. There’s even a Flickr group dedicated to this art form.
This was my first attempt at trying to create the retro effect. I took two photos from an old set that I thought was not salvageable. The originals are slightly out of focus and the exposure is a bit off. I thought maybe an extreme retouch could save them. I am not so sure it did completely. But it was a fun exercise! The first photo is more saturated and contrasty (i totally made a new word) and the second is more muted. Which one do you think works best? Maybe they both fail? You decide!

Today’s photo archive is from 2006. I had just gotten my shiny new Canon 30D camera and wanted to go outside and take photos of anything and everything. I don’t usually take photos of nature, but what better subject is there for practice? I drug the hubby out to Callaway Gardens and took about a zillion photos of everything in sight. The first one is from the totally awesome butterfly house. A giant glass house full of flowers and butterflies? Every girl’s dream. It was more challenging than I ever thought it would be to get them to sit still long enough. The second photo is from a flower called Snow White. Magical. I will totally admit the name of the flower is half of the reason why I took the photo in the first place. Maybe I should have titled this post “Allison’s photos of fancy girly things”. I’ll always have a little bit of that girl in me, I suppose.

Oh, I’ve been such a bad blogger. I am certainly not used to keeping up with a blog and sometimes I totally forget I even have it. Well no more, I say! I’ve decided to add some new weekly blog features that will ensure that I keep updating as much as humanly possible in between work. Of course the photoshoots will remain the feature presentation of this blog, but a little personal fun can’t hurt! So here’s the new lineup:

The Photo archive - In this category, I will dig deep into the depths of my hard drive and pull out a photo that hasn’t been seen in a while (or maybe not at all!) Some of them may be more recent, some may be suuuuuper old. So you will see my skill and style differences between the years.

The Retouch Remix - Sometimes I like to get super creative with my photos and try a new photoshop technique I haven’t tried before. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t, but it can be fun to see the results. I will post the original photo and then the creative retouch.

The Week in Photos - This will be random photos from my weekly life. Totally random things that interest me.

Things I Love - This will be the things I am currently loving this week. Food, music, shows, clothes, whatever!!

I’ll be starting these features on Monday so check back this coming week! Make sure I keep up with it and feel free to nudge me if I don’t, cause I totally deserve it for being lazy last month!

Pixelette has joined the crazy world of facebook. Come by and be our friend!
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Atlanta-GA/Pixelette-Photography/54414418310

and just so this post has a little more substance, here’s a sneak peek at a super fun fashion photo shoot I did featuring the clothes of designer Vanessa Vinci. I’ll be posting the rest of these soon.