A Shadow in the Background

As tomorrow approaches and brings yet another birthday I can't help but examine my life and wonder what its all been for. 31 years of age loom over me and I ask myself "what have I achieved?" I'm relatively middle aged tho I don't feel middle aged, I don't feel 18 but my lack of parental responsibility leaves me feeling younger than I am... and a little bit empty.

I come from a large family and therefore always felt that i would have a large family of my own. As the second oldest of 8 children I have helped raise quite a few children and can't help but wonder if I'll ever have any of my own. My older sister has 3 beautiful children and even my youngest sister is about to be induced tomorrow with her second child. While I didn't want to have two children by the age of twenty two like her I did think I'd have two by now... least that was my plan for my life, which leaves me to wonder what is God's plan for my life? Why hasn't he allowed me to find love and family? I don't have dreams of grandeur like fame or wealth, all I want from this life is to love someone and be loved, to build a family, to be a good husband and father. Looking at my life I feel lost, having achieved nothing of substance, made no impact in this world. I haven't saved any lives or any souls, haven't created life or created anything for that matter.
I've been in love but not not sure anyone has ever been in love with me. Always the friend and rarely the boyfriend, been told by almost every girl I've ever liked how someday I was gonna make some girl very happy but just not them. I can't help but wonder why I don't deserve love, don't deserve the family I thought I'd already have by now. I go over and over in my mind what I could've done that would leave me where I'm at. I won't shine you on with stories of how perfect I am... I've lied, cheated, and stolen... I've comprised my morals and I've hurt people in my lifetime. I also have been there for my family and friends, even occasional strangers.... I've been the friend that every friend deserves, even when I felt I didn't have a single friend I could say the same about. I've been a rock for my family to stand on throughout the years. A counselor and a rescuer. One thing I've always done is lead with my heart and give all of it to everyone in my life.
All these things leave me feeling like I'm merely a shadow in the background, like I'm without a purpose and once the lights go out I'll just cease to exist. I know I can't rush God's timing and make him show me what he has in store for me but I can't help but fear as yet another birthday passes that its one less year I could've been spending with the children I know I'm destined to have.

As I sit here writing this I'm not even sure where I'm going with it, what I thought I was gonna write went away as I continued to type, I find myself lost in my words, lost in my thoughts as they whirlwind through my head. This for me is just a release of my private contemplations and fears... I just keep reminding myself that if you don't put yourself out there then you never risk getting hurt and therefore are not really living life. Our lives arent meant to be safe or easy, not simple or explainable, we're not meant to hide ourselves away from those around us in order to protect ourselves. I've learned to live half alive, a ghost of my former self, not sure what to do about my scars, but im trying to pick up the pieces and figure out how to reattach them. I'm hoping that opening up to the possibility of total strangers looking into my soul is a step in the direction of healing and self discovery, of love... love of self, love of God, love of those in my life, of sacrifice and death to self, death to selfishness and foolishness. Pray for me. May God be with you.



Photo Title:     Lost in the Crowd

A Rising Sun

   Last week I received an assignment to photograph a sunrise or sunset, being a night owl but not an early riser I decided the only way I was going to get such a shot was to stay up til the sun rose. This is not really the easiest thing to do... its not that difficult for me to stay up til 4 or 5am but after that it gets hard to keep myself awake especially when there's no one else up at such an hour to keep me awake. Luckily I made it and was able to get to the location I had picked out and get set up (without my tripod sadly because my sister borrowed it to get her sunset shot) just in time for the colors to start coming over the horizon. 



Fire Water



   Slowly the sky started to change from dark blue to a royal blue and as the sun crept closer and closer to the horizon line an array of colors began to appear in the sky. Shades of pinks and purples began to stretch across the sky, all the while even as the sky brightened the moon sat high in the sky continuing to shine down adding to the dynamics of the shots I was getting. I continued shooting for almost an hour, moving around for different locations and angles and once the sun got too high and too bright I put on my neutral density filter and resumed capturing images... enough to fill up two 8gb memory cards. 

   I found myself leaving the site feeling very satisfied with how it had gone and went home only to get about 4 hours sleep before I had errands to run. The rest of the day though my body screamed at me for the sleep I had deprived it of and I felt horrible. All was redeemed though once I got to look through the pictures on a screen bigger than the 3" LCD on the back of my camera which I have learned not to trust.

   So here are a few examples of what I captured.

Cool Blues



Risen Sun



Red Sky

   Welcome to my first ever blog post! My name is Christian and I am a photographer and a student of photography, as I believe all artists are students of their craft because you can always grow and get better and learn new things. I am currently a student in a photography program at my local college, meanwhile I am also in the process of building and opening a photography business, with my sister Lana, specializing in studio and on-site portraiture.


   Growing up I have always felt that I was creative and had such vivid pictures and creations in my head that I could see so clearly when I closed my eyes. The problem I found was that I had no outlet for them... my hands couldn't draw what my mind could create or what my eyes saw. This lead to many years of frustration for me in that I felt artistic but could never express it or share it with anyone, so eventually I gave up and years flew by. I like many people had always enjoyed photography and taking photographs and preserving memories, but my family never had the money for a good camera or even a decent one so as a kid I loved playing with my Polaroid and eventually a cheap little Kodak Advantix camera (that I loved for the new panoramic technology). But they were so limited in what they could do, having only automatic settings, so I still didn't feel that they let me capture what I wanted and again years flew by that I didn't pursue this passion I had burning in me.

   I ended up going to school and became an automotive mechanic because I was good at fixing all kinds of things and because I loved cars. Fixing cars to me was my way to give back to people, to help them when they were in need and it made me happy and fulfilled for a few years but it never seemed to complete me. As my love of fixing cars slowly seemed to fade I began to realize that I still had this need to release my creativity and that I wanted to use photography as my medium. So I made a risky financial decision to take every dollar I had and purchased my first Canon DSLR and a few lenses and accessories so I could start my new hobby (not knowing at the time, and with no intentions, that I'd ever pursue it as a career).

   Over the next two years I found myself enveloped in photography... reading books, talking to people, experimenting, trying unconventional ways to get my shots. I was happier with my life because I was continuing to help people with their cars and also express my creativity with my photographs. It wasn't until last year when my sister, whose hobby is show dogs, suggested that I come to the shows to take action and portrait shots of the dogs because people would buy them, that I ever tried to make any money off of my work. The owners instantly loved my work and began buying from me and we realized that we could make some decent money with her handling the business side and me doing the photography. Then something else happened in that while watching me work my sister realized how much she too had always had an interest in photography and so as we started to develop ideas about starting a business she bought a camera and I began to teach her many of the things I had learned and taught myself over the past three years. It wasn't always easy and being siblings we didn't always agree, her being the oldest can at times make it hard for her to accept learning from her younger brother but we got through it. Lana picked it up quickly and has shown me that she too has a real vision and ability, leading us to make changes in our business structure and direction. We both decided to enroll in classes to learn as much as we can and refine our skills and knowledge, so here we both are... almost finished with school getting ready to launch our website so we can officially launch our business and our careers.


              So welcome to Dream Images Photography!