That Bachelorette-feeling

How it felt good being behind the camera today! Okay, I was taking photographs almost everyday while I was traveling in Asia, but I mean really being behind the camera: having the responsibility of photos turning out to be good and adjusting lights etc. No tourist-snapshots.

So I had this gig photographing a bachelorette-party. Their photographer had canceled at last minute (well, on Wednesday) and so one of the bridesmaids asked my friend K for help, and that’s how I ended up there.

It was so much fun to shoot the entourage of seven people with their costumes and it really brightened my weekend after a long and stressful week of studying and job-hunting (yes, still!). It was also nice to get encouraging feedback from them. Apparently I am easy to get a long with and posing for me felt comfortable, unlike their previous experiences with some photographers. Just the site (the bridesmaid’s home) was challenging, so I can’t wait to go  to school on Monday to do something to the ugly backgrounds in the pictures, since I still don’t have Photoshop on my home computer…

Here’s some preview of the pictures (I hope the bachelorette-celebrants won’t mind, after all they are in disguise. :))

The Bachelorette party

Besides this fun gig I have to mention one other thing that has been cheering me up lately. It’s this soft toy gecko J bought from Cambodia. Go ahead and laugh, but since I don’t have a dog (yet ;)) it has become sort of a pet and talking to it is a fun inside joke between me and J. Oh, how many laughs can one soft toy bring…? And how crazy do you think I am now…? 🙂

GeckoGecko

Back to Business and Normal Life

Getting life back on track after a long vacation has been ups and downs. (Seriously, I can’t remember when I’ve had a three months holiday. Maybe when I was 13?) I have to admit I was in distress about going back to my studies but everything has gone better than I imagined. It’s actually so nice to have something “more important” to think about than what should I eat today, or which spot on the beach would be the best.

Hard part in normalizing life has been the happiness of seeing everyone again and at the same time facing the sadness of saying goodbye (again!), because after our reunion, one of my friends left back to France to continue her exchange studies and other one is leaving to Sweden. Being back in Tampere just won’t be the same without them.

What gets me little bit out of spirits too is the job hunting for summer… I failed to apply to two of the biggest newspapers in Finland for the summer because of the trip to Asia, and many of the other magazines and papers have already picked their journalists and photographers too. Who invented this early picking tradition anyway? On other fields it’s normal to start looking for a summer job in March, when we young reporters of Finland start in November.

I’m also in middle of this professional crisis. I don’t know do I like photographing or writing more. Or I do know photographing is so much fun, but I just don’t see myself letting go of writing entirely. And I think that’s one of the facts that makes finding a job more difficult. I want to be a press photographer in one place and a reporter in the other.

Hmmm, well it’s better to focus on the good stuff in life, that make the troubles seem much less weighty. Like the ending of a long distance relationship and I don’t mean break up, but my boyfriend finally living in the same town with me.

And a study project we do for our advanced studio-course this spring sounds really interesting. We are going to photograph the work safety in the most dangerous professions for the Finnish ministry of social affairs and health. So I’ve got no photos for this post, but I’ll get back to business soon when I get my brains totally off of this still continuing vacation-mode…