say cheese

It is actually happening.  Well, I guess it already happened.  

I spent the week of Feb 27 - Mar 2, and Wed, Mar 7 taking more than 2300 photos of students and staff at Alliance Academy International.

Since then I have selected the best of each person, edited those, named them with each person's name, delivered them to the yearbook team and ordered over $2000 worth of photos online.

God has abundantly blessed this endeavor - above and beyond what I asked or imagined.  It has completely been His thing - from how well the photos turned out, how much support and encouragement I have received to how many people placed orders.  It is overwhelming.

Aire Fino is well on its way.

While Sherri was here, she helped me sort out the studio, such as it was.

The lights that the school has - thankfully I didn't have to buy my own yet - are old and even Sherri with her knowledge and experience could not get them to work how we needed them to work.  We couldn't switch them to a low enough power, so I had to deal with some very bright flashes.

As frustrating as it was, especially for Sherri (I sat ignorantly by) we managed to have a good time.

Once we got it all set, we taped everything off and put up all kinds of nasty signs threatening peoples' life and limbs if anything got moved.  Before the actually photos started, I had the kids come and help me make sure everything was still in working order....

Here is my beautiful, highly technical set up.

Because the strobes/flashes were so harsh, a lot of shadows were cast.  Sherri helped me set up the white foam core that we found in the dungeon I was working in to reflect a little light.  It still wasn't quite enough, so I brought in my reflector and a little bitty spot to fill in the backdrop.  While still far from where we want it, it worked.  And I have portraits of some lovely children to prove it.

I still have much to learn on the whole deal, but over all I am thrilled with how well it all went.  Now I need to pray that people are happy with their purchases, the name will hold a good reputation and other schools will join in.  But that too is in God's hands.  In the meantime, my heart is full of gratitude for God's amazing grace in all of this.