My photos of UVA

In my previous post, I showcased favorite photos that the kids took while we walked around UVA on a spring afternoon. Now, I get to share my favorites that I took, and I think the timing is great since the students are moving back in this weekend! I've enjoyed the quiet of the summer, and miss being able to walk unimpeded through Grounds, but it's also nice to see it come back to life.

I've taken to shooting in both RAW and JPEG so that I have the RAW files if I ever have time to edit/process them, but I'm also focusing on camera settings so that I don't HAVE to process them afterwards; I'm happy with how they look straight out of camera. This was a batch that I did not have the energy to edit, and didn't really feel the need to!

She's such a pretty subject. And capturing her eyes without needing to edit is hard! Thankfully I think I'm getting the hang of it.

 

The kiddos were so cute. I loved capturing them capturing their favorite images.

Henry out there did understandably give me some pause...he was a bit precarious! But Evan was nearby, just out of camera view, ready to intervene. Plus, he was so excited to shoot from that perspective, it was hard to say no.

And I love this one of N and I taking photos of each other!

I really love getting to share photography with the kids. Natalie is reaching the point where she wants to learn more about composing an image, what she can do with the camera, etc. Henry still just wants to take photos without any interference from me, which is fine! But I'm hoping I can teach him a few things down the road too.

Kid Photographers: At UVA

Back in the spring, we took a family excursion to UVA to walk Lucy. Not unusual for us anymore, right? But this time was a bit different in that part of the reason we chose to walk there was because the kids both wanted to take some photos and we knew it would be a great place for them to find fun things to photograph.

Henry used my slightly fancy point-and-shoot camera. I believe it was set to auto, and it has a pretty good auto adjustment in terms of ISO and focus. I sat down with him after putting them all on my computer, and he picked out a few of his favorites for me to share here.

MY favorite photo of Henry's wasn't one of his favorites, but I'm sharing it anyway. I am really impressed with how STRAIGHT the lines are in this photo! I didn't edit it at all. Nice job kid!

Natalie was shooting with my Canon Rebel, which she's used once or twice before. It has a non-kit lens attached to it currently which lets her do some good zoom, and it does take better photos than the kit lens (better glass). Here are her favorites that she chose after looking through everything.

My favorite photo of hers was also from when she shot through the tree branches. A good photographer knows sometimes you have to climb into a tree to get the shot you want! I just love these colors and patterns.

Since this class, Natalie has taken a photography summer camp and is now saving up to buy my Rebel camera from me - I'm giving her a great deal :) She even set up a photo studio in her bedroom yesterday and took some photos. I love that she's enjoying this as a hobby!

Cinderella: On Stage

In my previous post I shared photos of Natalie and her friends backstage at Cinderella; this post are my favorite photos I took of her on stage during the dress rehearsal.

Leaping elves and fairies!

Now is when the elves warn Cinderella that midnight is approaching...

And at the end of the ballet, I captured these more close-up shots of my girl. Her placement on stage was perfect! (I was trying to stay out of the way as I took my shots)

What a beautiful finale to a beautiful show!

Backstage at Cinderella

Natalie's first big performance with Charlottesville Ballet was in March 2019. She had auditioned for a role in January, and got one of the 40 spots that over 70 girls auditioned for! We were so proud of her, especially for being new to the school.

They performed Cinderella, which was choreographed by the head of the Southwest Ballet Company (including using his costumes and some of his male dancers for a few roles). The girls worked very hard for 3 months, as did the company members, and then gave two performances in Charlottesville and two the following weekend in Lynchburg. I volunteered backstage both weekends, which let me get a lot of fun backstage photos of the girls!

The Charlottesville performance was at the Paramount Theater on the Downtown Mall. We had about 24 girls plus a couple of parents wedged into this small dressing room for the show, but they did great!

They were excited by the mirrors lining the room in which they could get ready.

 

One of the coolest things at the Paramount is that through the backstage hallways, people who have taken part in performances have signed the walls. It's so cool to walk through and experience! Even cooler, is at only 11 years old, Natalie's name is now there!

 

In escorting them to/from the stage, I was able to grab a couple of photos with my phone from the sidelines.

 

You'll see Natalie appear in the video below with her fairy friend in blue.

Like I said, the following weekend we headed down to Lynchburg for two performances there. Natalie and I stayed in a lovely hotel on Friday night, after dress rehearsal, and had plenty of time on Saturday morning before we had to arrive at the theater to go for a nice walk! There's a beautiful walking path over the river, and it turns out there was a St Patrick's Day 5K that we inadvertently took part in.

I have a lot of photos from Lynchburg that I took from the sidelines but they didn't all come out that well; this is a collage of the 3 I took that I liked the most.

I did take a bunch of photos with my actual camera during dress rehearsal in Charlottesville; I have gotten those edited and will next post my favorite stage photos of my girl!

Virginia Museum of Fine Arts

A few months ago, I supervised Henry's field trip to the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond. They had been learning about ancient cultures in social studies, so the main point of going to the museum was to see the Egyptian exhibit there. It was pretty cool! Including an actual mummy.

You can see the mummy in the middle right, behind the headless statue.

Henry was pretty interested - was right up front while the docent was talking to them, engaged - I was proud of him!

After the Egyptian part, we chaperones each took our small groups (I had Henry and two girls) to whatever part of the museum they wanted to see. We wandered through some more ancient cultures.

And then I took the kids into my favorite part of this museum: the Faberge exhibit! For a relatively small arts museum, they have a huge collection! These were two of my favorite eggs; portrait mode on the iPhone really makes them pop.

 

In addition to the eggs, they also have a ton of other things made by the Faberge family, including these adorable little animal figurines

 And flower vases! These are tiny miniatures - the work is absolutely stunning.

Really glad that I got to spend a couple of hours there with Henry; Natalie has never been and I'd like to explore more, so I think we're going to try to get back there this summer.