If there was ever a quote that would describe Donna, the subject of this portrait sess, this quote would fit her like a favorite, go-to LBD.  Donna is physically strong, yet also holds a fervent flame of determination inside of her sculpted physique.

She has conquered a tremendous weight-loss, listening to her inner voice as she continued to push her body to uncharted limits.  Right after this Saturday afternoon shoot with her, she competed in a fitness competition.  In front of thousands, she bared it all.  Everything was on the stage, for all to witness, observe, and evaluate.  The thought of this alone intimidates me more than Clint Eastwood with a loaded shotgun.  I am in complete awe of this woman.  As fit as she is, she is both humble, playful, and open-minded.  Having never taken modeled in a professional photo shoot before, she was a touch apprehensive at first, but soon her inner goddess emerged.  Her strong presence complimented the surrounding trees and scenic sites of Madison, Connecticut’s coastline.

It was such a pleasure to shoot Donna, and such a motivation to hit that gym just a little bit harder!  Work it!

Donna was a great model.  She was open to new ideas, yet still brought some personal photo ideas and touches to the shoot.  How could I resist a Yankee hat?

I just love it when the wind blows.

Fierce!

I always kept finding myself asking Donna to flex!  I couldn’t help it!  Get em girl!

We were totally getting a fabulous Pocahontas vibe here!

Special thanks to Nicole Visel for bringing her fabulous makeup skills and creative vision to the shoot.  And thanks for bringing this awesome hat!

Beautiful, and mysterious.

Hats off to you Donna for being such a mentally and physically strong young woman.  Thanks for letting me be a part of your journey and I can’t wait for another shoot soon!

Thanks for stopping by.

Similarly, I have a love affair going on with the subject of this shoot, my boyfriend, Victor Congionti.  Now, I may be partial, but I just can’t help but admire Victor’s strong jawline, his light eyes, and his bountiful locks.  I tried to capture a funky aspect of him, but at the same time play around with many different emotions during our afternoon sess.

Thanks for being a guinea pig babe.

Go ahead.  I give you permission to check him out.

He has clearly done this before!

Victor wanted to incorporate his fun side with his white suit jacket.  Man, he just loves that thing.  I just have to give him credit, though.  Not many people can pull that off!

I’ve always had a thing for James Dean.  Can’t ya tell?

Knock em dead babe!

Thanks for checking us out!  You’re making us blush.

Now that this whole photography experience is coming to fruition, I needed to build my portfolio.  I needed to build it fast.  I was completely shutter happy!  I felt like I just needed to use my new toy and take as many images in a day as I could.  Knowing that my best friend, Nicole, is GORGEOUS and helpful (take note eligible bachelors), I knew that I could confide in her to conduct a professional shoot.  I saddled up all my gear, picked up a fancy bottle of red, and made my way over to her condo on a sunny, peaceful Sunday.  We flipped through magazines, we inspired by what we saw (and by the wine), and knew that we could make magic happen, even inside of her quaint bachelorette pad.

Hair, makeup, wardrobe changes.  We guessed at everything.  Should I wear hot pink lipgloss?  Should I wear heels?  Does this outfit even make me look good?  We weren’t really sure if it would work, but afterwards, we knew that we had done something amazing.  Here’s the final result of my very first EVER portrait session, with my one and only BFF.

Work it, girl.

Nicole has an effortless beauty.  She doesn’t have to try hard to look absolutely stunning.  It was quite an easy undertaking if you ask me,  not to mention SUPER fun!

Nicole knew that since I was just developing my photography style, I wanted to capture timeless, classic beauty.  I have always been a fan of icon beauty.  Marilyn, Sofia, Bridget, Audrey.  There’s something so elegant and mysterious about black and white photographs.  They are simply breathtaking and leave the viewer to wonder exactly what the subject is playing in their mind.  Nicole captured this elegance with absolute grace.

During our shoot, we headed over to the indoor pool in her condo.  You can only imagine my thoughts as a photographer.  Water, falling, broken camera.  Luckily, I had all of my bearings that night and we captured some pretty amazing shoots with whatever light we were given by the lights from the ceiling.  The above image is probably my favorite image from the shoot because it captures Nicole’s playfulness, yet still offers a classy twist on beauty.  Besides, all women look their best when they are smiling and having fun!

Those eyes and that smile.  Go ahead girl, knock them out!

Here’s to you Nicole.  Not only did you agree to commit your whole day to helping me build my first ever portrait shoot, but we shared an experience that I will never forget.  Muah!  You rocked my world!

When I work with more clients, I will model the fun, carefree experience that we had.  I can’t wait!

This is what many fellow photographers have suggested to me.  I am selling my services and my professional style, so I am literally selling myself, in a beautiful, neat, branded package.  Sounds simple.  Well, let me tell you.  It was quite a journey!

I started off my branding journey trying to come up with snazzy, photographic names.  What ended up happening was that every name I thought of, already existed.  It started to become really challenging to create a company name that was uniquely original, but not too cliche.  My business partner (my honey too) thought of the idea of calling our company “First Slice Photography”.

The very first concept.

It made sense to us.  The first person to receive the cake at a wedding, birthday, or special celebration was the priority.  We figured we could brand the image of our clients being our first priority, just like the idea of receiving the first slice of cake.  We bought the domain name, created a logo from scratch, and then asked for some feedback.  We had a lot of honest, constructive feedback (special shoutout to Scott Kretschmann and the photographers of the Facebook group, Jasmine Star:  The Fix NYC ).  Some people thought we were selling pizza, some professionals thought it was too clique that we had a camera in our logo, others thought our logo and idea was too corporate–it was missing my personal touch.  The day my partner said jokingly, “Well babe, if our business ends up not working out, we can always sell pizza”, we both laughed, dropped our smiles, and realized this maybe wasn’t the best idea for us.  Pizza companies, have at it!

We started all over. AGAIN.  There were tears, screams, laughs, and cheers.  We finally got it right.  We listened to the advice of fellow professionals (thanks again Scott) and decided to add me, well to my business!  Ahh, how something so simple can sometimes be completely over thought!  The first step was to ditch the whole name.  We just couldn’t get over the whole pizza vision.  We decided if we are selling our services, we should sell our name.  Cait Fletcher Photography.  I was hooked as soon as I realized phonetically Fletcher and Photography just had that certain smooth alliteration.  Kind of just rolls of the tongue.  To add more me to the logo, we decided to add some of my artistic flair to the logo image itself.  I sat down with a black Sharpie and a piece of computer paper and just began to sketch.  I drew about 15 images of the initials of my name, in all different ways.  The very last one I drew just looked gorgeous.  We scanned it into the computer, made some minor adjustments in Photoshop, and voila!  A completely unique logo font.  Boy, was it cool to see my font on the computer screen for the first time!  Now, what to put those hand-sculpted babies on?  Do we leave them by themselves or do we put them on a camera?

Then, my partner had a lightbulb moment (there’s that teacher talk).  It’s kind of like the a-ha moment when if you look closely enough, you can see the lightbulb turn on our someone’s head.  I swear I saw it.  Knowing that my style is kind of old school (I still send cards and write letters, believe it or not), he came up with the brilliant idea of putting our crafted letters on a wax seal.  The seal would be our trademark, kind of like when an artist signs a piece of artwork.  Each photograph would have our seal, our proud, glorious seal!  I almost fell out of my chair, black Sharpie and all.  This idea just FELT better than First Slice.  It sent nothing but good vibes and feelings throughout my entire body.  This was it.  We had somehow synergized our collective brainpower into the perfect logo and brand for our company.  Ladies and Gentleman, I am so proud to show you our final logo!  I’m probably going to do this full size because I’m so excited!

I feel like a proud Mom!

A brand new company, logo, and website.  Cheers to new beginnings.  And, cheers to you for reading this and supporting my dream.  Until next time!

Growing up, I have always seemed to study the world and its surroundings with an aesthetic eye.  I would find the beauty in the simplest things.  I was the timid little girl on the playground in elementary school, sitting in the grass, studying the busy bee.  Literally!  Back in my Kindergarten days, I told my classmates that there was a bee that was “talking to me”.  That was a sure fire way to make friends!  Sure, that bustling bee wasn’t using words to actually communicate with a 6 year old, but still, I was completely captivated by it.  It’s huge black eyes, it’s furry body, the sticky pollen attached to it’s legs.  I painted a picture in my mind watching it dance around the blades of grass on the playground, a series of mental photographs.  Today, I live right down the street from my old elementary school and to this day (20 years later), I can remember exactly where that bee was prancing around and “talking to me”.  Oh the beauty in the simple things in life…

I guess the reason I’m sharing my embarrassing bee story with you is simple, just like the beauty I found in the bee.  When you find something you are passionate about, you should do it.  People spend years and a whole lot of money trying to find something they are good at doing.  I went to school.  Twice.  I have a piece of paper that tells me I can teach and I have my Master’s.  I am very proud of my accomplishments and take pride in being a fun, hip kinda teacher.  Part of my passion is teaching children, but I’ve noticed something was missing.  Running around all day teaching, copying, meeting, collecting data, calling parents can be a whirlwind.  I realized if there was ever a “bee moment” that presented itself during the school day, I would totally be the kid that would squash the bee, unknowingly.  My artistic eye is hazy and obstructed as a teacher.  Sure, we do arts and crafts, but it’s a little cheesy and unimaginative.  I yearn for my “bee moments”…

Photography.  Mental photographs emblazoned in my mind, able to come to life.  Breath taking, 20 year memories made possible in a real, tangible form.  What a concept!  What an idea!  I can share “bee moments” with everyone?  Now, this is a concept that just makes sense for me.  It is completely natural…and such a simple idea.  If you love it, do it.  If you can find beauty in things, why not share them with the world.  To me, this simple explanation is the essence behind photography for me.

Now that I’ve figured out my essence and my passion, I am starting up my grown-up artist business with my artistic eye and new camera toys.  Inside of my grown up body, I have a little bit of schoolgirl nervousness, I will admit.  I have been warned that photography is competitive, the market is over-saturated, and I should just stick to teaching.  However, I’m not going to quit.  I’m going to keep that worker bee mentality and keep on trucking, like my honey depended on it.

With the help of my real-life honey and business partner (shoutout to my lovely techie boyfriend, Victor Congionti), we are up for the challenge of making this dream a reality.  We created a logo, pondered with many ideas concerning how I can brand my vision, and even started a spanking new website, Cait Fletcher Photography.

Thanks for being a part of my new journey and stopping by my first blog post.  I hope to see you back sometime!