Abi Coop
Melissa Richard
Kristen Ryan
Tell Us About Yourself!
I’m a family lifestyle photographer. Over the past few years I’ve started to dabble in macro photography and it makes my heart swell! Something about using light to highlight such miniscule details gives me all the feels. I shoot with a Canon 5d Mark IV. I’m born and raised in Maryland and hope one day I’ll plant my roots out west, preferably by a lake where the trees are so tall it makes you realize just how small you are. I’m a coffee lover by morning, sparking water by afternoon, and dry wine by evening kind of gal. I have a blended family of seven kids with ages ranging from 10-21, and a sweet grandson who just turned 5mos old. We also have two amazing pups, August & Kali, who are what my husband and I call our kids. We live in a small city about 50mins (without traffic) from DC in a little neighborhood without street lights surrounded by farms. It’s AHmazing! It’s our little piece of heaven away from the hustle and bustle of the city. I really, like really, dislike being in front of the camera. But, 2021 is the year of change… So maybe I’ll find creative ways to get in the frame in the months ahead.
How Would You Describe Your Photography Style?
I love to use light and blur to tell my story whether it is with my kids or out in nature.
What Inspires You To Create?
I truly love creating magic through different perspectives, especially with macro photography. Macro is my true passion with lifestyle storytelling coming in second. My goal is to create an image that makes you say, wow, that is some serious detail, or look at that texture, or how cool is that flower lit by the evening light. I hope my images invoke emotion to the viewer, for that is what inspires me to create.
What goals are you hoping to achieve as a Hello Artist?
My goal it to learn and grow deeper through the wonderful talented community of Hello Storyteller. The more I learn the better photographer I can be to myself and to others that enjoy my art.
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Tell Us About Yourself!
I am Danielle Thurman Trina. I specialize in creating beautiful and emotive children’s fine art photography. My desire is to discover and tell the story of the greatness of your child. I have always had the internal desire to create. My artistic journey, however, felt rather eclectic until I gave birth to my daughter.
Watching her grow has inspired me to tell children’s stories in a unique and artistic way. I am not your average photographer. And, I hope that is why you found me. I love the magic of children. They are able to create a force field around themselves and sparkle in everything they do.
I whole-heartedly believe that children are just closer to nature than adults. As we grow, I think we lose some of the magic that I see in children. Do you ever notice that children sometimes just dance even when no music is playing? They have a divine connection to the pulse of the universe that cannot be found as we grow into adulthood. Children’s stories and their divine connection to the universe become vital parts of our memory as they grow.
Children’s fine art photography is not about the practical. It is 100 percent about the magical, the little things for which there are no explanations. It is about this precious and rare gem, your child. And, it is about those few short years you get to hold your children’s hands and watch them be their greatest. Children’s fine are photography captures these moments. These magical moments are being captured as I watch my daughter grow. I want to capture these moments for you also.
My definition of a portrait challenges what we know as portrait from our old masters. Rather than focus on composing a still life from a person’s face, I focus on the depth of what is happening with the body when a person moves. In a world where we see more images and more faces than ever before, my approach often obscures the face or leaves it blurry. I feel it is important to capture how a person feels and how that resonates with the viewer. I capture the feelings we express with our soul and spirit, making these moments more memorable than a canned smile ever could be.
How Would You Describe Your Photography Style?
Whimsical, fine art
What Inspires You To Create?
My passion for life’s little moments came when I was battling pancreatic cancer. So I create and aim inspire others based on the fact life is short and tomorrow is not promised.
What goals are you hoping to achieve as a Hello Artist?
To share my love for photography and to inspire others to live in the moment, to create for you and to let go of fear. The moment I let go of fear, everything changed for me as an artist. My style is different, unique and I was scared to put myself out there at one point and one day I just let go and put myself out there, not for likes but for my own soul, to just simply share my passion and if others liked it great, if not, it was okay because at the end of the day I create for me. I want to inspire others to do the same.
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Tell Us About Yourself!
I am a wife and mother in Southern California. I discovered photography while traveling and working abroad in the human rights field. I spent most of my adult life pursuing human rights law, but when I got married and had my daughter, I picked up my camera and never looked back. I feel the common thread in all my work is telling people’s stories. I love to travel, explore, and be in nature (and look forward to doing all of those things again post-pandemic!).
How Would You Describe Your Photography Style?
I am mostly focused on documentary type images and I love to use color and beautiful light to enhance the storytelling quality of my images. I mostly document my daughter in her every day life, and I love to use bright, vivid tones to capture the sense of joy and wonder in childhood.
What Inspires You To Create?
I have always been obsessed with preserving memories and documenting life. The moments and details I want to remember are the ones that inspire me most.
What goals are you hoping to achieve as a Hello Artist?
I want to push myself continually as an artist and build more of a community in my work. I believe we all have important stories to tell and I would love to help others find the beautiful moments in the midst of every day.
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Tell Us About Yourself!
I am an Air Force veteran currently married to an active duty Air Force soldier. I am mom to one extremely active little boy who I am currently homeschooling against my will. I am a retired roller derby player, true crime addict and connoisseur of Nordic noir fiction. I picked up a camera 3 years ago when a good friend made me, and I love getting reacquainted with the creative part of myself. I dream of buying a cheap Nordic house and moving to Sweden one day and I’m currently trying to finish my first book. Yes, it’s about crime. I love coffee, pasta and podcasts, have over 50 tattoos and my favorite color is yellow. Nice to meet you!
How Would You Describe Your Photography Style?
I am drawn to all different genres of photography; documentary, street, macro, self-portraits, landscape, composites, I love it all! Within those very different genres I would describe my style as natural, humorous and confident.
What Inspires You To Create?
I have been an artist from a very young age and I have always felt a need to create, whether it was painting, ceramics, collages, essays and stories or photography. I think that my inspiration comes from finding beauty amongst the mundane; looking for highlights throughout an ordinary day in an ordinary life. Constantly looking for beauty helps me feel gratitude for my life and the people that surround me.
What goals are you hoping to achieve as a Hello Artist?
I would really like to be a part of a group of like-minded people that can both support me in my creative endeavors and push me to learn more and become better. I would love to eventually become a part of the educational aspect of Hello Storyteller and help other photographers that are just starting out and looking to learn more and become better also. I also would love to possibly teach some courses or write blogs about street photography or creating diptychs, which I don’t necessarily see within Hello Storyteller currently.
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Tell Us About Yourself!
I am a mother of five children, 1-9 years old. I homeschool them all and currently, thanks to Covid restrictions in my area, they are home with me pretty much all the time. My formal education is a degree in English Literature so naturally, I love to read and write. When my first son was about 1, I picked up my first DSLR camera and I haven’t had much time for pause since. I am a jumper-inner.
We recently moved to a rural community in a new province (where it snows way more than I’m used to) on a small acreage and we have huge hopes and dreams to homestead our little property. We plan on chickens and a dairy cow and gardens and bees and mushrooms. I like to think I’m an avid gardener (but it was so temperate and mild where we used to live, it wasn’t much of a challenge). I am a terrible bread-maker but it is one of my goals to master the fine art of leavened doughs, along with making our own dairy products. I like to dehydrate stuff (like watermelon and marshmallows haha). I am filled simultaneously with the confidence to take on the world, and the self-doubt to second guess myself at every turn. And, finally, as I mentioned above, I feel that creation is divine and it fills my soul to create something beautiful to add to the world.
How Would You Describe Your Photography Style?
My style is rich, deep toned fine art children’s portraiture, with a little lifestyle flair thrown in. I try to think of details in our everyday that I want to remember and then to create a space for them to unfold naturally and beautifully.
What Inspires You To Create?
In my everyday life, I am drawn to create because I honestly find it godly. I hope that doesn’t sound hooky but I believe that to create is one of humankind’s noblest and truest purposes and I find a lot of fulfillment in the simple act of creation. In my photography specifically, I am inspired by my children and the moments that pass me by all to quickly: the way my son smiles at me with cheekiness and trouble written all over his face; how I find my oldest daughter tucked away in the silliest places absorbed in her book or her art, the way my sweet baby clings to my husband when he carries her or, how she makes you do “this little piggy” one million times if you ever start., and the way my middle two look at the world around them with such wonder and awe (to name a few).
What goals are you hoping to achieve as a Hello Artist?
I have loved working as a professional photographer for the last 6 years. I have grown so much and have found such joy in the work. But, I have five young, homeschooled kids. We just bought a small acreage of wilderness, and then act of getting on the computer to run a business or edit wedding or newborn photos for anxious clients just doesn’t seem as compelling as it once was (also, Covid). Spending time doing experiments with my kids, gardening, and taming our wild homestead are all much more compelling to me right now, but I just can’t let go. Photography is who I am now. So, my goals for becoming a Hello Artist are hopefully to contribute to the community and continue to learn and grow eventually becoming a Hello Pro and a teacher. I’d love to share this wonderful gift of photography with others in a different kind of way than by taking on clients.
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Tell Us About Yourself!
I grew up playing with lizards in my backyard in Florida. As a kid, I camped and RV’d around the US with my family, visiting all the major national parks and lots of really cool and underrated state and local parks. I also spent a lot of time in a 3rd world country growing up (my mom is Dominican) and I think these things shaped a lot of who I am today.
I lived in NYC, CA, and London UK as an adult and traveled more (revisited many of the states I had seen as a kid, and added on one more to complete the lower 48.) I also did a lot of overseas travel as a freelance travel photographer, visiting 34 countries across 6 continents (just missing Antarctica.)
I have a lot of miscellaneous experiences from my time living in NY – I ran for and won an elected position as a delegate to a [political party’s] national convention, was on the board of directors of a non-profit organization, fostered dogs that were made homeless during Hurricane Sandy, worked as a stylist for a (now defunct) fashion magazine, and was the director of sales for the women’s specialty sales division at a major apparel manufacturer headquartered in Times Square.
I’m now settled in MD, just outside DC with my husband and toddler. Hoping to travel extensively again once the pandemic is over.
How Would You Describe Your Photography Style?
Grounded, Thoughtful, Reflective
What Inspires You To Create?
It’s hard to pinpoint. I think in my personal work, it can sometimes be something really small that sparks an idea and then it kind of balloons from there. In my client work, I bring a lot of grounding elements and prefer calmer images, and I think a lot of that preference stems from trauma I experienced during my own pregnancy as well as the severe PPA/PPD that I experienced after birth.
What goals are you hoping to achieve as a Hello Artist?
I think for me, the biggest one is the community aspect – forming professional and personal relationships with other artists.
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