Hi there,
I'm Vanessa and this is just the beginning of an interesting endeavor.
You see, I've technically been a photographer since the summer before 8th grade. Though I can't write "14 years of experience" on job application, I can say it has been an ongoing journey to get me to this next chapter.
To sum up that 14 year: I took my first black and white, darkroom photography class at the Silvermine Arts Center in Connecticut one summer and clearly got the bug. I then took photography all throughout high school: darkroom, digital, honors art, you name it. However my goal was to be a professional dancer with photo being a second love. After 3 college dance auditions and an early onset existential crisis, I pulled a 360º and decided I would be a photographer. That's 4 years, plus 4 at Marymount Manhattan College, takes us to 8, throw in a graduation, the stress of finding a job in the arts, working as a producer at a loft in Brooklyn, a wedding photography editor and then landing photo retouching gig. I segued from a few stints of unemployment and freelance into full-time and spent the last 4 years at a cooperate fashion brand working as a photo retoucher. What started off as something new and exciting grew into the classic "soul-sucking job" no one wants to have. I found myself dreading going to work every morning, not being fulfilled and feeling like my photography career was slipping away from me just as dance did. So, this summer I took a major leap and quit my job to go freelance. Goodbye security, consistent income and benefits, hello endless possibility.
That brings me to here... I have now been out in the freelance wilderness since June 7th, and so far the hustle is real, but the feeling of freedom is even more real. I'm still mostly working as a retoucher because I have bills to pay, but the goal is to really step my photography up a notch.
My old friend @drwatson told me about steemit, and I figured why not give it a go. I'm not quite sure what I'm going to do on here, how I'm going to post, or where is may take me, but that's the beauty of this new chapter of my life, right?
Here's to going with the flow and sharing it along the way.
-Vanessa
P.S. Please feel free to hold me accountable to shooting, posting and being creative!
Welcome aboard! Fellow photographer here! I post my stuff here to ensure there's the accountability of me continuiing to shoot!
Following you with the expectation of seeing more work. :)
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Hey, Vanessa! Welcome to the platform! I found you because of your second post, since you tagged it with "tarot" and I run the Steemit Tarot account. 😊
I'm more shutterbug than professional photog, but happy to see another photographer here. There are tons of groups and Discord communities to explore to connect with others (who will help keep you accountable for posting and such 😂). For now, I'm going to tag @pixresteemer and I highly recommend glancing through his feed to find other Steemians you vibe with.
Please feel free to shout out if you have any questions, or you're looking for recommendations of communities to join!
Oh, and here's a welcome to the
madhouseplatform... !tip steemThank you so much for connecting @traciyork! I'm so glad you found my post. I'm very intrigued to see what Steemit brings my way and I will definitely check out your recommendations! Looking forward to chatting more soon :)
🎁 Hi @vgbphoto! You have received 0.1 STEEM tip from @traciyork!
Sending tips with @tipU - how to guide :)
Welcome! Looking forward to your photos! What photographers do you study for inspiration?
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Welcome to Steem. I've followed @drwatson for a while. There are lots of photographers here and it's a good place to show off your work. Have fun.
Welcome Vanessa! Plenty of photographers and visual folk here, so you will find quickly find it a great place to showcase your work and discuss the art :)
You have an awesomely experienced journey by the sounds of it; all sounds like it’s in the search of balance between the work you love the freedom you are trying to can attain whilst doing it.
With Steem, I’d suggest finding some interesting accounts and then engage as much as you can with comments and votes (where you see fit)
The Steem token is amazing and has huge potential; my advice is it’s worth keeping hold of what you earn here. They’re not worth cashing out anytime soon - so enjoy posting and interacting :)
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Hiya Vanessa @vgbphoto, welcome to the platform!!
I am happy you opened this new chapter!
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Hello, you are very new to steem block chain so it is likely a bit confusing, it does sort of get better with time. I see you ahve some advice already, being a creative person, and a photographer, recently steem block chain has taken to having what are know as tribes, (pre-SMT community type places), one of them is creativecoin - https://www.creativecoin.xyz ,an alternate front end to steem block chain. You use your steemit name to log in and your posting key is the key you use.
to start being seen by a large creative crowd the tag they use is #creativecoin, so when you ahve a spare tag and your post is creative in nature, then it is a very good tag to use.
Steemit is a tad bit complicated, but not overly so. It is just very hard to find any place to go for help. There are a ton and a half of Discord chat rooms, of steemit chat rooms, and most of the time it is still hard to find help in one of them.
I used to be more involved in helping on board new users, but I have lost touch with many of the on boarding people, I am surprised to not see any here on your intro post yet.
If you do have trouble finding help when you need it, I am one of those people that do not get upset at having unrelated "can you help me with this" type of questions on any of my post. So feel free to ask for help if you need it, if I can not help I will try to find someone that can.
So with that I think @heyhaveyamet knows a lot of the newer onboarding currently active teams. So I am sure now that they have been tagged they will pop around.
Welcome to the blockchain, Vanessa. :3 I had a rather similar journey as an artist and as a person. I related to your story very much. I'm new to steem as well. I'm a musician. And I've found it's a tremendously rewarding platform to make important connections with like minded individuals and to get constructive input on what we produce. I suggest using steempeak, if you aren't already. I prefer it to steemit myself.
Good luck :3 See you in the funny pages.
~ C.K.M.
Welcome to steemit.
I think you have to use these tags for your presentation: #introduceyourself, #introducemyself
Maybe you can do it again. Think about it.
I love your content. Good luck here!