canon 85 1.8: new lens
May 5, 2010 | Filed Under practice shoots | 2 Comments
just a few shots from today, which i took soon after my new lens came in the mail! this is the canon 85mm 1.8, a portrait lens just a little more affordable than its “L” cousin, the 85 1.2, which i rented a couple of months ago and really, really enjoyed. if you know me, you know that my favorite lens for weddings is canon’s 35mm 1.4L, which is so versatile and reliable and gorgeous that i could easily just shoot a whole wedding with that alone… but for portraits, i wanted something a little closer, a little more intimate, but with similar qualities of color, clarity and background “bokeh”… if you know what i mean. so i had some fun with this today – on my everpresent subjects: musa, his toys and the flowers outside.
i also played around on a few of the images with some premade photoshop “actions” i’ve been meaning to try out for a while… i generally don’t process my pictures very heavily, but sometimes an image benefits from the effects added by a unique black-and-white conversion, or the timelessness evoked by nostalgic tinting and fading. i don’t trust myself to do it very often, but… like i said, just playing. hope you enjoy these!
cherry blossoms
April 30, 2010 | Filed Under friends, practice shoots | Leave a Comment
it’s a little late, but while i still had the 45mm 2.8 tilt-shift lens and my beloved 35mm 1.4L after yasmin and tyseer’s wedding, i had the chance to take it out to DC at the tail end of the peak of cherry blossom season, and used them to practice on one of my favorite subjects – a dear friend of mine. so, here are a few of the images i took that day – thanks, shaf, for climbing in that tree, and jumping out again :)
spring at the harbor
March 21, 2010 | Filed Under friends, practice shoots | 13 Comments
i cannot tell you guys how thrilled i am that the season is finally turning… with a day like today, we couldn’t help but go up to baltimore harbor to spend the afternoon with family and friends, enjoying seafood and sunshine. i had rented the amazing canon 85mm 1.2L lens for a shoot this weekend and wanted to play around/practice with it, so this was the perfect opportunity. it also helped having a couple of extremely photogenic and photo-happy friends who really didn’t mind my experimenting ON them with the lens… as well as experimenting with them in photoshop… :) thanks humera and jawad! i really love you guys!
exciting announcements
March 3, 2010 | Filed Under photography | 22 Comments
so i have a couple of exciting bits of news to share with you all… the first is a little old; i’ve been sitting on it for the blog, although i did tweet about it a while back! but, in january i received an award from one of the national wedding service websites i am associated with, WeddingWire, an endeavor that links brides and vendors to facilitate wedding planning across the country.
from their press release about the 2010 Bride’s Choice Awards:
The annual Bride’s Choice Awards recognizes and celebrates excellence in quality and service within the wedding industry, as determined by recent reviews and extensive surveys from over 500,000 newlyweds.
Ayesha Ahmad Photography is among the top five percent of all vendors in the WeddingWire community, which includes over 100,000 wedding professionals across the US and Canada. Awards were given to winners across 19 different service categories, from wedding venues to wedding photographers.
the other news is more recent – just this week i received my long-awaited acceptance email to the fantastic Wedding Photojournalist Association, an organization that celebrates and upholds the standard of true photojournalism in wedding photography – capturing moments, emotions and stories as they unfold during the event, without direction or interference. every wedding has a place for posed shots, formal or informal, but for me the thrill, challenge and beauty lie in the truth of the day itself – the honor that i’ve been chosen to capture it, the responsibility of capturing it purely. so i’m absolutely thrilled to be accepted into WPJA, and – as a sometimes-writing-journalist, still – proud to call myself a wedding photojournalist.
from WPJA’s press release:
[WPJA is] an International, membership-based organization representing professional photographers skilled in the documentation of weddings and events in a candid, unobtrusive style. As a WPJA member, Ayesha Ahmad joins the ranks of some of the most talented wedding photojournalists in the world as judged by their technical, creative and visual aptitude.
Ayesha Ahmad will be held to strict membership standards regarding image quality and content, technical and creative technique, website and marketing professionalism, business ethics and communication. In turn, she gains prestigious affiliation with one of the industry’s top professional organizations. Ayesha Ahmad can further gain admittance into quarterly competitions, where her work will be judged by some of the world’s most respected and accomplished award-winning photojournalists.
so, here are the little badges you’ll see going up on my site soon! i’m so excited about these – if you know me at all, you know how much of my heart is in this business, and i can’t help but be thankful for the opportunity to work toward joining so many others whose work i admire and am inspired by.
AND, because no post is complete without a photograph… and this is all about moments… here’s one of my favorite father-daughter moments from sarah and eddie’s wedding last year :)
