Personal Journey and Adventures of Nina

My third visit to Thailand but my first with my daughter and Steps With Hope , a charity supporting a school on the border of Thailand and Cambodia, but more of that later. There are several things I took note of on this visit. The streets were clean. The rubbish was swept up and neatly stacked ready for collection by the evening leaving the streets spotless for the morning mix of tourists and work commuters. The air was still polluted and humid but it didn't stink like Hong Kong. I wasn't approached by people selling their wares.  For the most part, people seemed content, as though they had plenty of business and didn't need to pester.  Maybe with the exception of this boy who was left on the steps of the 7 eleven by his mum with a large cup to collect coins.  Thailand relies very heavily on migrant labour which encourages people to cross the border from Cambodia to look for work. Around 130,000 of these are undocumented. 15,000 are children. As part of the Child

I needed some sample images to show a client. I knew what I wanted to do. I had ideas flying around in my head (such is the life of a creative).  The only way to show someone else what is in your head is to create it so I asked my lovely neighbour if we could borrow Lulu.  Well, Lulu was a dream.  She stayed in the exact spot for the perfect lighting setup. (Doggy treats were definitely the motivating factor.) We also used funny noises and a squeaky toy to get the expressions. In all, we had most of the images within 15-20 minutes. The chair was a last minute thought but so glad as I'm really pleased with this shot. I was so excited by the images that I went out to Kmart and picked up a few more doggy/kitty accessories ready for my next shoot. Can't wait to meet my next mammal subject! FOR PHOTOGRAPHERS Here is my lighting setup for the shoot. If you have any questions, pop a comment below this post.

Great photography is vital to lifestyle bloggers who want to stand out and get results. Impactful images get increased engagement on your posts, as well as attracting new followers. Here are my top five tips for great photos. Location Pick a location that compliments the theme of your blog and at the same time provides you with a variety of scenes within a short distance from each other. That way you can capture various different looks, quickly, building a library of stock images to use for future posts. My aim is 2 hours shooting, 5 different locations and looks with approximately 100 images (Stay tuned for my upcoming post on my favourite locations.) These were all taken in the same block for fashion blogger, Kirsty, With Love .. Lighting Always the key to any good photography is lighting. Whether you manipulate the natural elements or use lighting equipment to achieve your look, it should match your style. For a more fashion look, use flash equipment and for a

I have never been to a yoga class, let alone a three day retreat. For me, this was going to be a challenge but one I accepted with an open mind and open heart. Guess what happened? After three days of yoga and meditation I was left physically and emotionally revived. My body and soul, regenerated. I felt engulfed by an aura of bliss and I adorned a constant smile. Exuding happiness and reflecting love. What a wonderful feeling. How did this happen?  Yoga touched my soul. The most moving of my experiences was Yin Yoga with Nik Robson . I cried.  Yes, I cried! Whilst holding one of the dragon poses, a little movie played out in my head. My younger brother was there, strawberry blonde bushy hair and caramel coloured freckles, smiling and laughing as we played with a toy phone we had made with two cups and a piece of string. It was clearly our family home and we were around six or seven years. I began to sob. I hadn’t remembered my house or my brother in years (he was killed a

This holistic health team at Elemental Health had a great website. Every page was informative, professional and in its entirety the website was aesthetically pleasing. The only glitch was the page featuring the team of practitioners.  It lacked uniformity and professionalism. The photos were dark, badly lit giving them an unfriendly feel.  Before... After... It is really important that when you are looking for someone with whom you will trust you specialist care, that they look competent yet approachable and friendly. When you have a team of people, it is a good idea to choose a backdrop colour that will be suitable for majority of skin types and hair colour as well as work well with the colours on your website so we chose the light grey. You cannot go wrong with grey. It is complimentary for every colour and every skintone. The team have received countless comments so far and plenty of phone calls. Will update the post with more accurate sta

Interloop Sculpture Installation - Taken with the Samsung S7 without additional lens Following on from my previous post on the Olixar Macro lens , another fun part of the Smartphone Lens Kit is a .36x Super Wide Angle Lens.  There is still nothing like setting up my Canon 5Ds with 16-35mm lens onto a tripod for spectacular city and landscape images but when I'm travelling around with just my phone, this lens kit is a perfect alternative. To test it out, I headed to downtown Sydney, firstly to the scultpure,  Interloop by Chris Fox  where it hangs in Wynyard Station. Upside - Get everything into your frame The above pic was taken straight up with the Samsung S7. Its nice and sharp and bright but we've lost the edges of the sculpture. Below, I've added the super wide lens and I now have everything in the photo. Downside - Loss of quality, light and some distortion. I've lost a little light. The photo isn't as sharp and the edges are qui