What I See vs. What You See ~ Vancouver, WA Photography Challenge!

I can’t remember where I first saw someone refer to “what you see vs. what I see” in terms of photography locations, but I decided that I wanted to do something fun, mix things up a bit from all of the editing that I’ve editing that I’ve been doing lately, and challenge myself. So, I reached out to a couple friends of mine, Meg with The Pursuing Life blog and Sara Webb (a fellow photographer), and bribed them with coffee (and a reason to leave their house) to loan me their bodies for 30 minutes one morning in a random Camas, WA parking lot.

Here was the idea… Meg just started this blog, and is working on getting a book published, and needed some headshots. I wanted to do a session in a “weird” location and document it for MY blog (hence where Sara came into play). I picked a parking lot, pretty much at random, and we met there. I had absolutely no “prep” in terms of location scouting. We just walked around why I looked for inspiration among the stop signs, delivery trucks, business signs, and dumpsters. Here is what we came up with! Click the arrow to see the pull backs!

First stop… chilling in front of a nail salon…

“Beautiful photos, ladies!” one woman commented as she walked out of this boutique…

And, of course, couldn’t do a parking lot photo session without a Starbucks drive thru…

Next, we wandered over to a dumpster…where I tried not to get hit by semi trucks…

Finally, we circled around to the street (192nd for those of you familiar with Camas/East Vancouver) and got creative on the back side of a Papa Murphy’s. (Which, just an FYI, is where I spent MANY hours counting out pepperoni slices and spreading sauce during my college years. lol)

So… are you asking yourself, “What’s the point, Brittney?’ Well, here’s the thing. I get requests all the time for location suggestions for photos. I definitely have some beautiful places where I love to photograph my clients, but you don’t need a gorgeous park, open field, or other amazing venue to get beautiful images. I’ve done sessions on street corners, parking garages, next to porta-potties, and in moving box filled houses… you don’t need perfection, you just need you and a photographer with a creative eye!