Friendly Quotes

I have a great friend who sends me great quotes almost daily. Where she finds them, I have no idea. But I love it! Here is today's quote sent to me. I thought it was great and decided to share it with you...

To fulfill a dream, to be allowed to sweat over lonely labor, and to be given a chance to create, are the meat and potatoes of life. The money is the gravy!

- Bette Davis, actress

Fun Photo Day For Me!

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I spend so much time photographing for everyone else, homes, businesses, restaurants, apartments, cabinets, etc., that I sometimes forget to take photographs for myself. Part of it can be attributed to the fact that I love love my job, I get to practice my photography all the time, so I don't think to just photograph for me. However, there is definitely a different excitement and creativeness between shooting for hobby and shooting for work.

So last Sunday, my wonderful boyfriend took me to the zoo and let me go crazy taking photos of the animals. First, I really do need to thank him for his patience at the zebra habitat...I might have been a little too excited about all their patterns and wouldn't leave for a long, long time. Long Time. He was very patient as would I think I was ready to leave and then turn around and spend another 10 minutes there.

Zoos are really a great place to practice your photography. Not only are there a great amount of animals that you aren't likely going to run into on any normal day, but there are great habitats and tons of people there to practice on. Photographing at the zoo also tends to be sentimental for me. My father used to take my sister and me to the zoo when we were young budding photographers, I visited the Santa Barbara Zoo plenty of times to fulfill assignments while I was in photography school and while traveling in Europe with my sister, we visited a few zoos to photograph. So, photographing at zoos tends to take me back to very fun, creative and even comforting times.





My First Celebrity Home!

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For those of you CSI Miami fans...go ahead and feel jealous! Yesterday, I was lucky enough to photograph the beautiful home of one of the CSI Miami's actresses, Khandi Alexander. It was very exciting for me because I am a huge CSI fan!



What was a fixer-upper for her, is a dream house for most people. It looks like a smaller modest home from the front opens but up to a huge four story estate. The last photo in the slideshow really shows how big that house really is. It was a very beautiful house and that makes it so easy to photograph! Click here to view the slideshow.



A trip to Big Bear!

I got the opportunity to photograph five cabins in Big Bear last week. What made it even better was that the owner let us stay in one of the cabins for the night. Only one night away but what a nice time! It had snowed the week before, so there was alot of snow every where. It gave me the chance to practice my evening and sunrise photography. It's was worth standing knee deep in snow to get these shots...Also, click here to view some of the virtual tours!

Bear's Lair



Pine Tree Cottage





Summit Ridge



Meadow Lake Cottage


3629 Corinth St.

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I shot a really cute house out in Los Angeles last week. A broker is selling his own house and needed tons of photos for it. It was a really great house. A little waterfall in the back yard, a sunken dining room, and a bunch of little sitting area's in the backyard off of each room. Click here to view the virtual tours.

Active Rain

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I started blogging not to long ago, recently followed by another but similar blog on ActiveRain. Active Rain is a Real Estate Network, tons of great people on there and lots of good ideas and information. Not only that but I have some connected with some friends and made some new friends. If you are in the real estate profession at all, I highly recommend checking it out!

Where's the Virtual Tour?!

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One thing I have heard lately is "I have a listing but, it's not worth a virtual tour". This is something I don't understand, because that is exactly the house that needs a virtual tour! Not only should those big beautiful houses get virtual tours, but those little homes need them also. Nothing makes a drab home look worse than out of focus, dark, distorted, less than good photos. Well composed, well exposed, professionally edited photos can really show the real potential that a home has and get those buyers in there!

Something I feel strongly about is that your client wants to know that you are doing the best to market their home. However, something else I think should cross realtor's minds is this...Do home buyers think that if a realtor doesn't feel a home is worth professional photos and virtual tours, maybe it's not even worth looking at?

Believe it or not, there were many times when I have heard someone looking for a new place say, "if it doesn't have a virtual tour than I don't even waste my time." Believe me this wasn't said by my friends to make me feel better as a virtual tour photographer. I have heard this from co-workers and people in general. I used to work for Realtor.com and their apartment and rental site. One thing we wondered was why take the time to post a listing or apartment online, and not take full advantage of that internet marketing and post virtual tours and photos? From what I understand purchasing a quality virtual tour is less expensive than posting a listing in a real estate magazine or in a newspaper for the length of time a house is for sale.

It seems simple to me. It's your job to market that house to the best of your ability, and it's our job as photographers to make that marketing even better! Now I know I am very enthusiastic about virtual tours, but there are so many times when I just don't understand... why you haven't ordered your virtual tours yet!

Travel

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I have been a Real Estate photographer for only 4 years but, I have been taking photographs for as long as I can remember. I met some of my best friends in photography school. It's a career, but also a hobby that I have been lucky to share with people very important to me. My father was a very talented photographer although he didn't always see it. I think my sister and I both inherited his talent but there are times when I think my sister got more of it. Now I love my photography if you don't mind me being a little less than modest, but she has this natural style that amazes me constantly. A few years ago I was able to take the trip of my dreams to Europe with my sister. We packed up our photography gear and trucked around England, France, Italy, Germany, Switzerland, and Austria for over three months. Now I am sitting on a couple thousand photos that many people haven't ever seen. So I thought I might start showing those off just so you can see a different side to me.

Home Staging

It used to be that the only time I saw staging was in larger apartment buildings. Now I am seeing staging a lot more. I think one of the best things to do when selling your home or renting an apartment is staging. on average staged homes sell faster and for higher prices than non staged homes.

Why stage your home? What you want to do is create a setting that inspires the visitor to imagine themselves living there. You want to show your house in it's best light. By taking out your personal mementos you are making room for the visitor to visualize their things there.

Staging is becoming much more popular and much more affordable! What was once reserved for large companies is now available and more widely used by the public. Still not sure about staging? Try these tips from "Get Staged to Sell" ...

Inside:

  1. Clear all unnecessary objects from furniture throughout the house. Keep decorative objects on the furniture restricted to groups of 1, 3, or 5 items.
  2. Clear all unnecessary objects from kitchen countertops, tubs, shower stalls and commode tops. Keep only your most needed cosmetics, brushes, perfumes etc., in one small group on the counter. Coordinate towels to one or two colors only.
  3. Rearrange or remove some of the furniture if necessary. As owners, many times we have too much furniture in a room. This is wonderful for our own personal enjoyment, but when it comes to selling we need to thin out as much as possible to make rooms appear larger.
  4. Take down or rearrange certain pictures or objects on walls. Patch and paint if necessary.
  5. Review the inside of the house room by room
  6. Paint any room needing paint.
  7. Clean carpets or drapes that need it.
  8. Clean Windows.
  9. If you need room to store extra possessions use the garage or rent a storage unit.
  10. Leave on certain lights during the day. During “showings” turn on all lights and lamps.
  11. Have the stereo FM on during the day for all viewings.

Outside:

  1. Go around the perimeter of the house and move all garbage cans, discarded wood scraps, extra building materials, etc., into the garage.
  2. Check gutters for roof moss and dry rot. Make sure they are swept and cleaned.
  3. Look at all plants...prune bushes and trees. Keep plants from blocking windows. You can’t sell a house if you can’t see it! Plants are like children—they grow so fast!
  4. Weed and then mulch all planting areas. Keep the lawn freshly cut and fertilized. Remove dead plants or shrubs.
  5. Clear patios or decks of all small items, such as small planters, flower pots, charcoal, barbecues, toys etc. (Put them in the garage or a storage unit.)
  6. Check the paint condition of the house—especially the front door and trim. Curb appeal really works!

New Employee!

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A great friend of mine from school started working with me in the last few weeks. Tracy Melchiori is one of my old roomates Brooks Institute of Photography and we have stayed great friends. A few weeks ago I had a big project for KB Homes and conned her into helping me shoot. Turned out she really loved it! So she has decided to finally take me up on my offer to work with me. She'll be working partially as a Marketing Manager and Photographer. So far we have been bouncing a lot of ideas off each other and it's all working out really nice! I'm pretty excited! This is a great job for her to work part time and work on her Fine Art Photography! The last few years she's supported so many other photographers and not worked on her on work. So I want to be able to help her in return and push her to work on her art! I'll try to get her to show some of her work on the blog!

Great Condo For Sale!

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It's been a few weeks! I've been busy and I think it's time to update the blog! Last Friday I got an email from Jim Parrish wanting a quote for his condo that he is selling and at the bottom was a PS saying how great my blog was. I love to hear that! He said it made MediaCarrot seem more human. I had no idea that my little blog would really catch attention, but I'm sure glad it does.

So Saturday morning I went to his beautiful huge condo and took some virtual tours and photos. Jim and his wife Sara (spelled just like my mother's name...that either means she's a great lady and probably a little wild!) were just really really nice people! It was such a relaxed and nice shoot. It was a great nice Saturday morning! So, take a look at the Virtual tour here!

San Diego

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We were in San Diego a little while ago and I thought I'd put up some of the photos that I took. There are a few I think are pretty fun. We had gone to ComiCon (I'm not sure how it's spelled) It's the huge comic convention in San Diego. My boyfriend is an Animation Board guy. He had quite a few friends at booths in the convention and just running around. It was my first time but it was pretty fun, well I go back and forth between it being nerdy and fun. But we will probably go next year. Mario will be working on putting out his own books.

While at the convention we took a lunch break with some friends. I have to say, it was the best lunch I have ever had! If you love to be abused by your wait staff and love even more to watch other patrons be abused, you have to go to Dick's Last Resort! We stayed twice as long as we needed and I laughed so hard! If you ask for a straw they throw 20 at you. If you want a refill, they bring you a pitcher all to yourself. They really love making a fool of you, but it's great! Really really fun.

Afterwards, we took off for the water front to look at the boats and see the "Star of India". We didn't see the star of India but we toured the Russian Submarine there and another pirate ship. Check out the photos I took there. The green photo is taken on the submarine threw the parascope, I think it's one of my favorite photos!

Wedding Weekend

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I spent this weekend in Paso Robles, CA for our friends' wedding. They are wonderful friends that I got as a bonus when I started seeing my boyfriend. Let me tell you, I have been excited for their wedding for months! It was beautiful! As hot as it could be, but well worth it.

The ceremony and reception were held at the Still Waters Winery. The view was incredible and the grounds beautiful. It was a short wedding ceremony and a nice long reception with lots of wine. Even the caterer marinated the tri-tip in the wine from the winery. What could be better than that!

It was really a great weekend full of fun with all of our friends and all the family that comes with these friends. Yes some very crazy family... the Bride's father for one! He said he'd be coming back to CA for my wedding next summer as long as I didn't marry my boyfriend (he really did love my boyfriend!). So I guess we'll have to start planning! Here are a couple shots of the rehursal and one of the wedding. I'm not a wedding photographer but look at that view!

Bella Vista

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Equity started building this gynormous apartment complex a couple of years ago in Woodland Hills. I used to drive by it on my way home and watched it progress. Somehow I knew then that I would shoot the photography and virtual tours on it. Sure enough I shot them last week.

Let me tell you I love to shoot for Equity! I've shot a few of their buildings around Southern California. They have the most fantastic models! They are staged so well and really do their job of making you want to live there. This new building has some new floorplans and they are pretty nice...I must have shot more Equity apartments than I thought if I am recognizing their floorplans!

Linda Drive in Torrance

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Last Friday I drove out and shot a cute little house on Linda Dr. in Torrance. Ante Perkov filled out my order form online and I went out there 2 days later. Apparently he's been reading this little blog here, when I walked up, he said he felt like he already knew me from my website and blog. So now I know this isn't just fun but it works!

I'm still not sure what Ante does formally. Obviously an agent, I think Investor, owner of Ante's Restaurant, and apartment building owner. For some reason I think there's more on that list. Either way he is helping his friend sell her house. Check out how cute this house is and check out the virtual tour.

Another Ojai Photo Shoot!

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After Shooting for Jeff Goodman a couple of weeks ago, he passed my name on to couple other Realtors. Low and behold I got a call from Vivienne Moody from Coldwell Banker Property Shoppe. I drove out last Thursday and shot two beautiful houses for her. I was ready to move into both houses.

One was atop of a hill, beautiful views but lots of walking up and down the hill for photos! There was just so many different places to photograph there; Reflection Pond, wine cellar, Great rooms, and gardens! I had such a great time shooting and the owners were so fun to talk to. Take a look at the virtual tours here.

The other was a warm family home. Smaller but so welcoming and great little outside areas to hang out. A beautiful porch area, firepit area, hamock, a huge tree to sit under. I loved all the outdoor areas to lounge around. Inside was a nice big fireplace surrounded by a huge open living area. I liked everything being open, being able to visit with the family while working in the kitchen. Take a look at the Virtual Tour!