Photo Tips For Your Fall Girl Era:

It’s fall, you have your PSL life is good. You’re walking in the park with the fall coloured trees and want your friend to take a cute photo of you but it keeps falling short? One of the first things a photo mentor of mine a long time ago taught me was the beauty of shooting through objects. It’s a simple concept but it works.

In these photo’s with Justina I wanted to soften the image, a $4.99 sheer from value village did the trick. There was a hole in the fabric, RIP my washing machine.. so I put my lens through the hole and let the edge of the fabric cover part of it. The effect was the softness and interest that I was looking for in the photo. having this bit of blurred mystery adds questions and emotion to your images. This season is perfect for added colour, as your in the park looking for that perfect photo, put a coloured leaf at the base of your lens so you’re shooting over it and the base of your photo will be this brilliant fall colour. Or shoot through some leaves so the focus will be you but the foreground will be this rich blurred colour.

This technique translates to romanticized images as well as political sharp images. Look at documentary photos on the front of newspapers, you will notice a trend that the person they are photographing is shot through a window, or through the carvings of a gate. Keep your eyes peeled and you’ll see what I mean.

Works every time - so this is my info gift to you this thanksgiving…go shoot through things! Have fun!

xo Marley

Reasons to love FLASH photography; and how to use it.

PHOTO TIP: Flash considerations! (and how to be budget-friendly at the end)

The first benefit: you can photograph directly in front of a window!

Don't be afraid of a flash. On-camera or off-camera flashes can add so much to a photo. They highlight your subject and make them stand out from your background. It also gives a flattering finish to your subject.

One thing I see happen a lot is when people start using a flash they think that it needs to be full power. This is anything but the truth. In these two photos, I did not have a flash on the left - while it is exposed well, this beautiful woman did not pop from the background the same way as in the photo on the right where a flash at the lowest power was used.

Using an on-camera flash should not be intimidating, the higher the numbers the lower the power, I was ranging between 1/16- and 1/32.

The next consideration would be diffusion. In this location, we went with minimal equipment which is the beauty of a speedlite. Compact and powerful even in a space with competing light and high ceilings. Diffusion adds another level of softness to the image. While you can still highlight and pop your subject from the background their skin will look buttery soft even using something like a sheer curtain or a shower curtain. Diffusion does not have to be expensive! A light white fabric is all you need. (Note that if you use a sheet with colour ie: green the skin tone of your subject will then also be green) Depending on the objective using a different colour-toned fabric can be both good and bad.

If you are starting out at home and do not want to invest in a smaller speedlite (marketplace is a great space for second-hand gear and you should be able to get one for under $100) then using a daylight lightbulb without a lampshade on it will work really well. Be sure that it is not right up next to the fabric you are using as a diffuser. (The further the light is from the sheet the softer the effect on your subject. The closer it is to your diffuser the harsher the light).

Hope this helps and demystifies using a flash for you! It will make a world of difference!

xo Marley

THE BEST cookie recipe and photo shoot idea

It’s the holidays. You want to have treats, you also want to keep your body nourished and not over run with sugar? 

Say no more. I got you with this incredible healthy chocolate chip cookie recipe. I made these this weekend to take to a Christmas dinner with friends and they were a hit!

So, I am going to get right into the instructions rather than a whole drawn out article: 

Also for instructions, after owning a cafe for several years and baking many many things, for the most part, can everything be chucked into one bowl and giver er? Absolutely. This notion of things in a certain order….. it doesn’t make a difference. SO in one bowl chuck in no particular order: 

2/3 cup plus 1/2 oat flour 

8 tbsp coconut sugar (I am sure stevia would work but unsure the conversion) 

1/4 tsp salt

1tsp vanilla extract

5 Tbsp Oat Milk - I used unsweetened Vanilla but any oat milk or milk in general would work

1/3 cup chocolate chips

2 Tbsp Coconut Oil 

1/2 tsp baking soda 

Pro tip** put tin foil on your baking sheet and it will come off way easier. 

Put in the oven (I did preheat to 350 when I made these and would recommend) 9 minutes

Take them out and leave them on the pan for a few minutes. (Disclaimer I ran to the grocery store and got some seafood for dinner so they were on the tray for probably 35 min before I got home) Took them off as soon as I got home and they had cooked the PERFECT amount.

When I tell you this is the last recipe you need…. I mean it, Grandma will love it, as well as the significant other that really doesn’t get the vegans. 

Having cookies is honestly such a cute photo shoot idea, you can set up a tripod while you cook in the kitchen with your matching aprons, or especially now with Christmas, have a cup of milk and plate of cookies beside your crew sitting around the Christmas tree. Perfect! 

Tag me on Instagram with your cute cookie pictures! I’d love to see them! 

I’ve been there - Tobermory: real travel advice from someone who’s gone.

I’m going to assume that because you are reading this article you too have heard of Tobermory. I had heard of Tobermory in online news articles, social media feeds, and from people who had been there. I heard all about how beautiful it was and how much fun was to be had kayaking over shipwrecks, the hikes and lookout points and of course the iconic swimming! But here is what you need to know if planning a trip!

There’s a few things that everyone failed to mention and that would have been very helpful in planning our journey. Parking is challenging and you have to pay for everything! If you are wanting to do the hike to Lions Head you will need to make your parking reservation well in advance to park at the entry point. This will cost $20 and it is STRICTLY enforced. You do have the option to park on the main street and pay on street parking and hike into the start of the walk. (This will add another 30 min - 1 hour of walking depending on pace) In Tobermory (25 min drive from Lion's head) the street parking is reasonably priced in town at $3 an hour.

Lake Huron is incredibly beautiful, there’s no doubt about that! Bit if you want to go day of without a reservation your best bed it going early or later in the afternoon when crowds are thining out as again you need to have paid parking and admission. $20 parking and $10 per person admission. For the very popular places like the Grotto you will need to make your reservation at least a week in advance of your booking at the very latest. It books up and they will not let you drop in on the same day! The Grotto is where most of the infamous pictures of Tobermory come from! It is important to note that all of the provincial park parking is on per person admission and paid parking as well.

My absolute travel highlight from Tobermory was kayaking over the shipwreks. There are two different places to kayak to. If you’re up for a bit longer of a paddle you can see two very large shipwrecks, it was surprisingly a very eary feeling gliding over the surface looking down to the abandoned decaying wreck below. Words fall short to put all of my feelings into that, suffice to say it was an experiance and I would strongly reccommend it. Closer to shore where you can easily wade/swim out to are two smaller boats called the tugs. From the boat rental location if you follow the coast to the right not very far at all you will see a metal ladar from the street. If you go into the water from that ladder its only 50 feet of so into the water and on the left hand side to find the boats. If you’re not wanting to paddle to the far shipwrecks I would reccommend just jumping in the water and swimming to the two tugs. At the boat rental they say you need 2 hours to paddle to the far boats and 1 hour to the near ones. This isn’t true, we got to both locations in an hour total.

Now after all of this you are probably thinking : ok but what about food options? Tobermory / Lions head are very small towns. In Lions head there really isn’t much in way of food options, in Tobermory you do have a few places to choose from as well as a grocery store you can get a solid amount of basics at for anything you may have forgotten. In full transparency we didn’t have the best food luck, however there was a fish and chips place in Tobermory (litterally called the Fish and Chips place) and I thought it was good.

Would I reccommend a trip to Tobermory? Yes, only for the fact I would be dissapointed not to have seen it because of all the hype. However I will be frank it was very different from what I was expecting. What I would reccommend is take a day to see it, go kayaking for the afternoon and then take the ferry to Manitoulin!

4 tips to make you a better photographer

Let me preface this with - I have been very lucky to have been around incredible photographers that taught me a lot and had the gift of working with them, however there is SO MUCH you can do if you don’t have access to tagging along with a pro.

So how do you become a (better) photographer? 

A young girl sent me an IG dm a couple weeks ago, she was incredibly sweet and asked me what tips I could give her for becoming a photographer. 

We talked for a bit and I told her the biggest thing was taking your camera EVERYWHERE and continually shooting but after thinking about it for about a week here are a few more tips that I have thought about that helped me and I think will help you too!

1. Start shooting on manual. The sooner you figure out how to use manual you will get into finding your own look and groove. This may be a controversial idea but the thought that there is a perfectly exposed or ‘right’ settings is a load of crock in my opinion. I tend to shoot what would be deemed ‘under exposed’ or ‘over exposed’ to give a dark and broody feeling, or a very light bright and airy feeling. I shoot on feeling and when I feel the feeling is right be it ‘too dark or too light’ the image is generally a banger. Now that isn’t to say that the feeling of ‘perfect’ hasn’t changed, as I learn and develop as a photographer that changes a great deal. However it was because of this principle of continuing to try different ratios in the manual setting, trying different angles and the beauty of digital is you can take thousands of shots and delete…. Keep going you will get better

2. Shoot all the time. My first camera was a Nikon d3400 dinky sure, did it do the job? Absolutely, one of the pictures still on my website was taken on that camera. You don’t need the most expensive gear to get started, in fact the cameras I use now would probably be a tad intimidating if I had started there. It was also a small enough camera it was light and I would take it to and from work and would photograph anything and everything all the way there and back every. single. day. Did I have a longer commute? Yea sure, but did I also see the same things every day so it forced me to get a big creative with the images I was taking? 100% Adam Scotti is the current Prime Minister of Canada’s photographer and he has the same person to shoot day in day out for - well years at this point and he continually amazes me at the portraits you can get. Having the same route or object isn’t a bad thing and certainly isn’t boring because you have the gift of expanding how you view things. That is what photography is all about, you are showing the world a different way of looking at something and giving a new perspective.

3. Spend time with photographers better than you. This was honestly such a gift and something that fell into my lap. Through an interesting turn of events I became friends with probably the greatest photographer I have ever had the privilege of knowing in real life. An incredibly talented individual, who I was able to spend time in the studio with while they were working on projects and was able to, learn about lighting and angles, and met other photographers there too. This is when I really got back into it and realized how much I LOVED the art of photography. It was the beginning, I built my foundation this way and then took off and made it my own. I remember walking through this very obscure part of Ukraine playing with the manual settings and realizing if I underexposed things it was actually such a vibe. It was the first time I really got into what was my look for awhile, and now it is overexposed and super vibey instead of dark and moody but that’s the beauty of art, you don’t have to stay in one place. Instagram has also made it so easy to connect with amazing people around the world, wherever you are going there are brilliant photographers there, meet up with them and go on photog adventures together!

4. YOUTUBE is your friend. Do you realize the wealth of knowledge on there? And it’s free…… need to learn what everything in manual setting does? Spend time diving into Youtube, I still have so much to learn and go there to learn new skills I need to improve and get better on, or learning a new style. All of it is at your finger tips

I hope this general direction really helps you, there are so many different styles out there, so following these tips will help you figure out your style what you like and how you want to shoot. You will grow along the way and I look forward to seeing what you create! Tag me in your work after you have learned something new! I’d love to see! 

XO

Marley