About Me

Hi my name is Melissa. I was born the day after Thanksgiving 1976, got married labor day weekend 2002, had my daughter memorial day weekend 2005, had my son christmas weekend 2006. That makes my kids 19 months apart and for a whole lot of holidays that overlap with birthdays in this house.

I am a mother of 2 (currently ages 5.5 and 4), a self-taught photographer, and before all of that a naturalist and geneticist by training. I have always loved photography, I bought my first camera, a point and shoot pentax, with some of my high school graduation gift money, I wanted a camera, like that bad, totally. I purchased my first digital in graduate school, I took it everywhere. I took lots of pictures.

I got pregnant and talked my husband into an upgrade for my digital camera, you know, for the sake of the baby (I recently got my next upgrade, you know, for the sake of other people's babies). I had my daughter, I started a blog and taking lots of pictures for it. Then I had my son, and started doing some homecare, I was taking pictures of children every day. That's a lot of trial and error, and learning what works and what does not.   At the beginning of my client photography I focused primarily on honing composition and learning how to work outdoors.  Then I started to add the pieces in to start getting the exposures I wanted, shutter speed and aperture settings.  Moving on to a true dSLR, and being able to control more of the components of my exposure.  

I took my time, I didn't jump to full manual and lots of dial twisting on day 1, I let my manipulation of the light evolve slowly.  And that I recommend to anyone with a new camera, take your time.  It's not the camera, it's the 8 inches or so behind it that takes good pictures, that means you.  You can have the same camera as your favorite pro, but it won't take good pictures by itself, you have to be willing to practice, a lot. 

I believe in taking lots of pictures to get only 30 good ones. I believe if you see something special you take as many pictures of it from as many different angles as you can, as long as it lasts. I think everyone should have the choice to have real photos that aren't some pre-designed pose or generic setting that a photographer or studio picks out for them. That's not to say you can't get awesome photos at a studio, but everyone feels awkward under those lights being told to turn their head "just a little more to the left." I want you to be where you can feel comfortable, feel relaxed, and be yourself, if that's on a backdrop, then rock on. 

Your photo session should be an experience, a memory, for you and your family. That hopefully you can tell stories about your session, that it will hold special value beyond the pictures themselves, that it will add a chapter to your narrative- remember when baby almost caught the butterfly or when we all trudged through that stream? I want to follow you on an outing, one from which you'll have lots of pictures to remember.  I let children lead the way, they come up with the best ideas.   

You should walk away with the photos to the story of your life.  Your life. . .illustrated. It's more than a tagline to me, it's my mission.  I want you to be able to look back on your photos and remember exactly what every person in the photo was like on that day, who they were, not just what they looked like.

Circle the Sun Photography is more than just some pictures to me, it is a journey.
Follow your passion, it’s the only way you can find yourself.