barren landscape – Promoting Passion

Promoting Passion Week 76: Editing Tutorial!

brookeshaden — Mon, 06 Jul 2015 16:50:50 +0000

If there is one thing in the world I love more than anything else, it is helping people in any way shape or form. I don’t know if this week’s video will be of any help or not, but I sure did try! So today I’m sharing and editing tutorial on two different aspects of my creative process: creating shadows and saving images for print. When I asked online about the top techniques that I could share in a video, those were the top answers, so here is the video all about it!

If you want to see more of my editing process, you can purchase any of my CreativeLIVE classes, most notably Fine Art Compositing (all of my classes are currently on sale!). If you’d rather some in-person hands on training, my convention in October is taking place the 2nd-4th and I’d love for you to be there!

I’d love to see your favorite editing tips!
Share a bit of your process in the comments so we can all learn from each other!

I hope you have a very inspired week!

Model: Jen Brook

On The Horizon

brookeshaden — Thu, 18 Jun 2015 14:44:18 +0000

There exists within each of us a certain fear that hangs above our heads like a black cloud, threatening to pour rain down upon us at any moment. The more we believe in this fear the larger it grows, and the threat spreads beyond your control, to other people who are passing by, who cannot escape the rain when it pours. Some fears float out in front of you, looming in the distance, a storm cloud rolling in, while others fade into blue skies behind you, and you’ve seen their demise.

Fear is a funny thing. No matter how often we confront them we find a new one. When the clouds clear up and the sun shines through we find another cloud to take it’s place. And that is the human condition. It is the desire to find fear and face it that makes us unique. It is our undying affection for challenge and rebirth that makes us interesting.

We shelter ourselves with umbrellas and hats and rain coats so that we cannot feel the sting of the rain, but the rain is rarely as bad as one thinks it will be. It can be unpleasant and cold and lonely, but it lets you know you are alive. Just the same with fear: when we let it touch us, when we do not run away, it has no more power. The more we ignore it or shield ourselves from it, the larger it grows, an ever-present entity in your heart. But when it is unleashed, and we feel it’s full effects, we know it for what it is. We call it by name and look it in the face. We understand what our fear has to say, and we respond in kind.

Do something that requires bravery every single day.

That was the thought I had the other day that changed everything for me. I no longer felt bound by life’s rules. I simply wanted to be brave, to do something that scared me, and to face that thing head on. When we do something that takes courage, we diminish fear. It will never leave our side completely, for if it does we know we are complacent, unchanging, and stagnant. But that cloud will grow smaller, as I have watched mine for the last few years, until it is a friend, a companion, waiting to challenge you.

Don’t let your storm cloud grow so large it changes the lives of others. And just as importantly, don’t let it cast a shadow over your life. Take control of it. Embrace it. Learn to see the good in it. And when you do, you might find that it has moved on without unleashing the storm you were expecting. Because when we love our fears, we make room for blue sky days.

Model: Mia Hutchinson

Share here a fear that you are currently struggling with.

Share one way that you exhibited bravery in the last month.

My current fear: That my convention won’t be a success.

Moment of bravery: Emailed new galleries to request exhibitions.

A picture of the scene from where I stood doing this shoot.

And now a view of me where I stood doing this shoot!

Creating: “The Shadows We Follow”

brookeshaden — Tue, 03 Feb 2015 15:28:27 +0000

Sometimes change is necessary to feel refreshed, inspired, and motivated. It could be something as simple as changing your daily routine. For me, back in November, it was changing my hair color. I made it white/lavender so that I could feel more like a fairytale character. However, after a couple of weeks, that color faded to a bright yellow, and I had lost the inspiration that came with the change. Once my travel schedule settled down I went back to get my hair done and said only one thing: “I don’t care what color my hair is, as long as it’s not yellow.”

We settled on a brown color, though which brown I did not know. I like bold change, and so I left the salon with dark brown hair…and I adore it. It is just the change I need to feel like a character again. When I catch a glimpse of myself in a mirror I hardly recognize myself…I am a natural blondie after all. The other day I was thinking about this change, and although it is only superficial, had me thinking about more internal matters.

Noticing the stark contrast of my pale skin and the dark hair, I began to think about how white and black are perceived through symbolism. Very often the connotation is good vs. evil, and so I decided to create an image with that theme in mind. I used my hair to my advantage in this self-portrait, allowing it to pull me in one direction while my white dress pulled in another. So often we feel this pull: good/evil, life/death, right/wrong.

To create the image I photographed it on my patio, as I so often do, using my neutral wall as a backdrop. My hair was just dark enough against that gray color to isolate it and cut it out from the background to place it on one I photographed when I was in India a week or so ago. I started this shooting process by flinging my upper body forward with my hair to capture that portion. Afterwards, I began moving the dress behind me and capturing that movement.

Mind you, when I say “dress” I really mean “bed sheet”, as that is one of my favorite costumes. It is versatile, simple, and very inexpensive…my kind of costume! No matter how many dresses I buy, I always go back to different colored bed sheets as my favorite of all. There are so many possibilities with them!

Finally I knew that I needed a dust/dirt effect in my final image. I also knew that I needed to photograph something light for the dust on the dress and something dark for the dust on the hair. That was when I decided to photograph just one handful of “dust” – or in this case I used baking flour – and then invert the color when I needed to make it darker. By adding contrast to that shot, the background became darker while the flour became whiter, making it easier to isolate the flour from the background.