2: Because it's worth it

     5am on Saturday morning I got up, packed my camera bag, and then headed out in the snow to begin my early morning drive to Machesney Park, IL. It just so happens that it was snowing and the plows hadn't been out where I was driving. Seemed like the middle of know where for a while until the sun came up suddenly and I finally was able to see farther than my head lights.

     My shoot was at the National Guard Armory during their weekend drill. They did their Psychical Fitness Test (PT), which included timed push-ups, sit-ups, and a mile run. Then they did class room work, got "smoked," and learned formations and walking patterns. Very interesting experience to say the least, if people complain at drill I can only imagine how they handle actual basic training.

     This shoot was the beginning of a 10 week project for myself and a class at school. I am specializing in photo illustration in my specialization class. However, I haven't done much with photoshop and illustrating images, so I am a little nervous about this and not sure I'll stick to photo illustration.

     I have just started really going threw the shots today and started editing them. They didn't turn out how I wanted, but being over tired and over worked may play a big part of that. So I know for my shoot on Friday what not to do and I have more of an idea of what type of shots I want to get. It will be a new challenge though since it is in a different location and I wont be able to get up close to the action because it is going to be at a graduation ceremony.

Here are some of the images so far:

1: Those who keep me on track

     Thanks to my parents support and other family members support I am slowly becoming the artist, the photographer, that I want to be. Attending school isn't an easy task, especially while working a full time job as well. Thanks to my wonderful support group, my friends, my family, they have helped me threw the rough patches and of course are there threw the good as well.