Amy Sandoval Photography Blog

Still keeping up with my iPhone camera project – in which I attempt to more simply document the day-to-day moments using my iPhone camera. I am liking this so much that I really want to be sure these photos are printed as keepsakes, too. I’m looking into options for keeping it as simple as possible but making sure I have prints of the photos. Have been looking at album options on kolo.com and printing options at Shutterfly.com and Blurb.com – yes, I will use a non-pro site for this project! Still haven’t decided if I want prints or a book when it’s all said and done. May also look at albums at Michaels, etc. How do you print and enjoy your cell phone photos?

Here are some moments caught in the last couple of weeks with the iPhone.

Morning before the first big snow – much excitement was brewing!The same evening – her first loose tooth was barely loose in the morning and magically fell out while she was eating that night. We couldn’t believe how fast it went.
Watching the first snow fall from her bedroom window. Just love the backlighting of this photo. Here’s a camera phone tip that works well with iPhones. When I set my camera’s focus on the window itself, it darkened Olivia so you could barely see her, because it was compensating for all that window light. So I moved the camera’s focus to Olivia – and it lightened up the shot so she’d be exposed correctly. As a result, the window appears “blown out” or overexposed, creating the dreamy, bright effect.
Here’s a similar shot but with the focus on the window – so in this case you can see what’s out the window because it’s properly exposed for that area of the photo (and the rest is darker).
Our first batch of snow cream in many years. This is a family tradition – my dad makes it anytime we have enough snow. You can Google for recipes as there are many varieties – we use 1 egg, 1 can evaporated milk, 1 can (fill up the evap. milk can) regular milk and 1 cup sugar. Cook on stove, add 1 tablespoon vanilla extract, cool and then add snow in – it’s like a custard-style ice cream.
And a tradition that we created: Snow slushies! We poured Sugar-Free Grape Kool-Aid over snow. Tastes like a true slushy!
“Mooch” at the vet. This is a cat that I literally brought home from the office last year – she sat outside my office for several months “mooching” off those of us feeding her (thus her name). She’d never been kept indoors or had a home. It’s been an amazing year of working with her and she is near and dear to our hearts. She’s now becoming very friendly – from scratching us if we attempted to touch her to sleeping belly-up next to us at night! She’s recently had some health problems and it’s been vet trip after vet trip to get her well (totally worth it!). This is at her last appointment – she knew what was coming and scooted as close to that wall as she could! Love her reflection in the table. Reflections are a great example of the little things to look for when capturing even the simplest of shots. (And while I’m thinking about it, thank you tons to Dr. Derrick Kier at Princess Anne Veterinary Hospital for going above and beyond (performing surgery during his lunch hour at one point!) to nurse Mooch back to health.And finally….Uno. We asked for a lot of games for Christmas as Olivia had outgrown many of the ones we’ve been playing. We have really enjoyed playing Uno these past few weeks.