Crow's Nest Display

Come out to the Crow's Nest during February and March for some great food and lovely photography! My photography, film and digital, as well as some of my printmaking designs will be on showcase, so bring all of your friends and tell everyone!

Everything on display is for sale and anyone that is interested in purchasing anything can email me directly at ashlee.m.photography@gmail.com. There are other items on Etsy.com for sale (like greeting cards and postcards) but you will only find my film photographs and printmaking designs at Crow's Nest, so make sure you check it out! Once my film photographs and printmaking designs are sold, they will be gone! I cannot make anymore prints of those, so if you like them, you better snatch them while you can!

I am very excited for this opportunity, so I will definitely be frequenting this restaurant for the upcoming weeks. Hopefully I will be seeing you there!

Remembering East Campus: A Collection of Photographs

Today I launched my Kickstarter project for my East Campus Collection!

My project is to produce a book of my East Campus photographs as a collection. I hope to raise enough money to print 25 books and several original prints for my own photography event in Kalamazoo, MI.

I have 21 days to raise $700. That money will go toward printing costs for the books and photographs, shipping and handling costs, and the cost of incentives for my backers. If I raise more than that, then I can print more copies of the book and other items for my event! BUT if I don't meet my goal in 21 days, then I don't receive any of the pledges and the project comes to a halt.

East Campus holds a dear spot in my heart, as I know it does with many others in the community. I would really love to see this project come to life, so please spread the word!

Just click here to read more and watch my video!

Busy Bee!

So, I'll address that elephant in the room...

...it's been awhile.

I promise though, I have been keeping busy! Since I have last blogged, I was officially published in Asylum Lake's Summer Anthology! As you know from previous posts, I was very excited about my collaboration with Jesse and now I'm even more excited that it is in print AND I can finally talk about it! I have 3 photographs in the issue, all of which were taken in England. Jesse had been working on a poem that happened to match up perfectly with one of my photos, "Carousel Fare", so we paired them up together. Then I told Jesse the stories behind my "Sea Shell Man" photograph and that inspired him to write a poem based off of that picture. That worked out so well that he did it again for "London Bridge". I had a vision for a layout and was dead-set on making it work out. I was going for a vintage/nostalgic/drifting away tone, so I began making our background. I crumpled up paper and stained it over and over again with coffee until it had the look that I wanted. I took pictures of the paper and began fiddling around with a layout in In-Design. I also searched to find the perfect typewriter fonts for our titles and Jesse's poems. Eventually I pieced it all together and with that, we had our six page layout (we are first in the issue too!). The last thing we had to do was write a short bio for ourselves. Jesse hates writing mini bios but I was determined that ours would be cute and funny. I worked on it for a bit and then had Jesse help me, and he even loved it in the end. You will have to look at an issue to see what it says, but the idea stemmed from how we use our fingers with our crafts and combined that thought with a song that Jesse wrote about us years ago. ANYWAY, I am so excited to be a part of the Summer Anthology and I've been telling everyone about it. Go check it out! There is some awesome stuff in there! You can find it at Michigan News Agency, People's Food Co-op, and Fourth Coast Cafe.

I have also been a busy bee taking photographs and editing them. I have focused a lot on the East Campus photos and I am trying to set up a Kickstarter account to raise funds for my project. I want to make a book of my collection and print 25 copies to have at a book release. I also want some other prints for display and I want to make an event out of it with refreshments and other do-dads. I will keep you posted on when that begins!

Since I've last been on, I have gone on a camping trip in Indiana for 10 days and visited my best friend, Katlin, in New York for about a week. So that is also why you haven't heard from me...I've been traveling without a computer. But don't worry, I've been taking pictures of my adventures and I will be posting some of those very soon =)

Oh! And I forgot to mention that I made my first photography sale through Etsy, so that is SUPER exciting. I logged on today to see that I had some wonderful feedback that made me smile =)

I'm trying to think of what else...
-Published in Asylum Lake with Jesse
-Taking/editing photos
-East Campus and keeping you posted on the Kickstarter
-Traveling to IN and NY (I will also be in MN for several days soon)
-Etsy Sale

Well I think that is it for now. I'm still waiting to see if any photographs will be published in Hear, Here or for the Study Abroad Contest. I'm trying to possibly have another Art Hop and I'm waiting to hear back about being on display at Crow's Nest, or having stuff for sale at Nature Connection. And of course, I am always working on printing more goods for my Etsy shop.

Stay tuned!
xoxo

There's Not Enough Coffee in the Coffee Pot for Me

I'm in that transition phase of Post-Graduation-Pre-Career and let me tell you, it has its ups and downs.

One big down is that I'm not getting hours at work and that has a lot to do with corporate cutting hours for the summer. My paychecks are pretty much non-existent at this point and that makes it really difficult to save up for big girl things like a car, moving, and paying off student loans. Looking at the positive to this negative though, it was a huge motivator for me to spend some major time on my portfolio/website and research big girl jobs. However there are only so many hours in the past two days that I can do this. As I am starring at my computer screen for the second shift of 8 hours at Starbucks, I realize that my brain is on overload and I am melting into my seat, morphing into a coffee zombie. I decided that I need a break, hence this post. You may not think so but it is hard to lay out everything that is impressive about myself and think only about me for millions of hours. I can only hope that the end product will be a success.

(Keep your fingers crossed!)

Back to positives though...that is one thing I am grateful for on this Thankful Thursday...motivation and time!

My list of companies that I want to apply to is growing! It is so overwhelming. I'm spending so much time researching companies and finding campaigns that I love and what I can highlight from my experiences that could get me hired.

Another thing that keeps motivating me is my friend, Meg Craig. She also nerds out and appreciates great marketing like I do. So when my career search has been enough for my brain to explode, she reminds me how much I love the field and why I will be great doing it. After talking with her I get excited all over again and then I dive back into the process. With that, here is a shout-out to you, Megan!

I also love to have a million things on my plate. For instance, I want to draw sketches for my printmaking class, work on photography, and start my career. I don't want to sacrifice anything right now and with that I have Jesse serving me endless amounts of coffee. Back to me morphing into a coffee zombie... ;)

On a photography note, I am entering several photographs from London into the Study Abroad Photo Contest. There are four categories: Places, People, Food, and Students Abroad. I think I have decided on the photos for Places and People, but I have two for food and I can't decide. One is of an English Breakfast and the other is of a curry dish (curry is their national dish). It's a toss up! Take a look and let me know if you have any opinions...

Food

Curry Food

 

 

 

English Breakfast

People

 Places

P.S. You have before July 31st to let me know your opinions!

Much love!

xoxo

Hot in Cleveland!

I had a bit of an impromptu mini vacation to Cleveland for the holiday. While I was there, I managed to convince my family to go to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Museum, which was awesome. When I was last there in 2009, no one was allowed to take pictures so I assumed those rules still applied and I left my camera at the hotel. Apparently, things change. I didn't get any great photos because I only had my phone, but I must say that having some pictures is way better than none!

We also went to the Cleveland Zoo! That zoo is amazing! Not only do they have so many animals, but the exhibits are fabulous, unique, and fun, the animals are happy and roaming around, AND visitors actually get to view the animals while the animals are enjoying life. You don't have to sacrifice anything at this zoo. I managed to capture some great shots while I was there! Check them out!

Testing the Waters

Polar Baby

There are more photographs from the zoo and other snapshots on my Facebook page:
www.facebook.com/AMPsnapshots

In other news, I have also turned a few photographs into postcards and those are for sale now on Etsy! Check them out along with other photographs:
www.etsy.com/shop/ReallyPretty

Three Owls Update #2

My dear friend V, er Veronica, was the second to finish her postcard! She did some awesome work, adding color, humor, and some additional drawings! I don't know about the rest of you, but I definitely laughed when I saw her alterations! Check it out!

It is pretty much adorable and awesome. I love the bat suit especially! Fabulous work, Veronica!

Whoooo's next!?!? I can't wait to see!

Ashlee
xoxoxo

Wesley the Owl

I recently read the best book ever. Do you want to read the best book ever too? All of the cool kids are doing it, I swear. Well, at least I am and I'm all the cool you need, right?! Okay, maybe not but still, you should read this.

It's Wesley the Owl by Stacey O'Brien.

This book is SO COOL. It's an autobiography/biography on a girl and her owl. There are funny stories and interesting owl behavior stories. It is great for reading about love or communication, or just because you love owls like me! There are some scientific things (it's easy reading, I promise) and best of all it's about my favorite, BARN OWLS!

I fell in love, 100% in love, with this owl and story. I want more books like this one! Who knows of any?! You better tell me if you do!

Anyway, here is the point that I am getting at (other than this is the best book ever and you should read it). The point is that I decided to donate a portion of my sales (10%) to WWF for endangered species and possibly to owl rehabilitation centers.

I feel really good about this decision and I hope everyone that purchases something from my shop, or supports my work, does too!

Ashlee
xoxoxo