BRACELETS? MERCH? VIDEOS? What's next?

Hello friends! So... I have a couple of updates to talk about...

Recently I upgraded my SMUGMUG website. I decided it was time to take the jump and dive into the merch side of the site and see if anyone is truly interested in maybe purchasing some prints or something. SMUGMUG is the site I use for my clients galleries. When you book with me you get a digital download link. The link takes you to a gallery that is all yours and filled with only your photos. If you've ever booked with me before, you can now find a cart and a buy now button on the photos in your gallery. There are a decent amount of items you can purchase with your photos on them. There's mugs, prints, canvas, magnets, buttons and more! I'm excited for this new change and I really hope it's something that catches on. I hope my work is good enough for my clients to want to purchase a print or two to display in their house. Because of this new update, I have decided to change the way I watermark my photos. This is a risk for me...

My watermark is my signature and the photos are my art. Plus watermarking is a great marketing tool.

Although I will still watermark my photos, I have taken the opacity way down and fixed the mark in the bottom righthand corner of every photo. I hope this is an incentive for people to purchase items from my website. I also really hope that my client still give credit where credit is due and tag me if they post them on social media. We will see....

Next up... let's talk about my new shop I just opened. I really wanted to open a shopify account, but the monthly/yearly subscription is just a little bit out of my price range at the moment. So for now I will be selling my handmade bracelets and other artworks on the app MERCARI. I know it's a popular app, but maybe not as widely known to the local people around me. I hope this works out so I can make some extra money, because I cannot explain how bad I want this full time. My big dream is to eventually be able to leave my medical billing job and have a career as an artist/photographer. I want to create beautiful works of art and although I'd rather just do it for free... I am truly miserable at my medical billing job. It's not my coworkers or the company I work for. It is purely because my heart lies elsewhere. Art is so extremely important to me and truly makes me the happiest I've ever been, so yeahh...

I'm hoping if I can get some extra income from selling on Mercari, then I can eventually open a shopify to sell my original art and jewelry. I know I need to have patience, but it's so difficult when I am wanting it as bad as I do right now.

Moving on...

Now, some of the most exciting news for me is that I finally bit the bullet and bought a wireless microphone. I have toyed with the idea of starting to get into videography for a while now, but I haven't taken the leap. All my photographer/videographer friends have told me to just do it and just start, but anxiety and insecurities always get the best of me and I back out like the giant crybaby I am. HOWEVERRRRR.... I did it. I bought a mic and I am ready to just start. I know this is going to be one of the biggest learning processes for me, but I have all these ideas for videos in my head. I NEED to get them out someway and somehow. SO! I just received the mic in the mail yesterday, charged the receivers up today and I am ready to test them out with my camera and start the journey of filming. Most of you might not know, but I actually started my photography journey with videos. I used to stand on the sidelines in any weather condition and film every game of Bubbas, clip by clip and play by play on just my phone. I would then review every single clip and post them in the flag football community group on Facebook. I would get comments a lot about me being out there rain or shine... and sometimes snow blizzards... but my motto has always been "if you see Bubba out on the field, you'll see me filming on the sidelines". I have been missing those days recently. So simple and so fun. I can't wait to see where this new development takes me. I hope I can do my clients and supporters justice with these new changes and create some incredible things with my new equipment. I feel blessed and honored to have the privilege to be on this journey. I'm just truly excited to see what's next.

Thanks for listening. Talk soon...