Photography Website

Kiley Melicker /// Let It Be Raw

My new website is up and running! 

Please check it out and let me know if you see any errors or issues. I haven't decided if I will keep posting here because I have been able to transfer all posts to the website. I will let you know about any changes I make, but for now blogger lives on.

Jackie + Billy's Engagement pt 1

I am so excited to share this! Two lovely friends of mine asked me to do their wedding photos. As a thank you for giving me such a wonderful opportunity and to give an early wedding gift, I offered to do their engagement photos.

We hiked around Pogonip park on a very warm Fall day in Santa Cruz. Jackie and Billy picked great outfits with a vintage feel for the photo shoot.

We made little bouquets from the forest!

Jackie's Bouquet

Billy's Bouquet

Pogonip has a lot of rock stacking and beautiful moss covered boulders (which you can see in this post). It made for a great setting during the shoot. One difficult thing to deal with was the low lighting and shade - I try to keep things looking as natural as possible when it comes to lighting and I'm very anti-flash, but it was difficult to keep things clear and colors warm. Luckily I was able to bust out my new f1.4 stop lens which is perfect for low lighting.

Being cute as usual.

Part II on Monday - have a great weekend!

Straight Lines For States

Visit my friend Eric's blog!
I designed his first (of many) album cover :)
He's decided to write about his musical experience and share his thoughtful and creative ideas about making music, playing music, and having a life filled with... well, music. Drop by and say hi!

2011 - the year that kicked my butt

2011 was a tough year for me. I lost my grandfather, my sense of home, a job, plans for the future, felt very alone, useless, and over all a giant mess. Nothing is resolved and for a lot of things I will not receive a sense of closure until much later, if at all. All these things have changed me and influenced me in some unexpected (good and bad) ways.

In review of older posts from this year, I found the way in which I reacted to life.

In this Rock Collection post, I consoled myself over the loss of my grandfather through learning about the things he was interested in. One such thing was the rocks and minerals he studied.

Nick has stuck with me through this tough year and we're both beginning to learn more about the struggles and triumphs of a relationship. I shared my favorite pictures of Nick in this post.

Though I did feel very much alone, my friends and family were always there when I needed them. Eric wrote a very lovely song about my photography in this post. They encourage me and even got together to give me the money to purchase a DSLR so that I could further pursue my dream to be a self-employed photographer.

Being unemployed was a mixed blessing. The positive part about it was the time I received to be creative and stretch my artistic abilities. I did more experimental work this year than I ever have with film: Halloween portraits, expired film, double exposures, graphic design, event photography, studio work and lots more.

This year I worked on two big projects in black and white photography. Both projects reflect the loneliness and distance I felt, and being able to work with those feelings in a creative way was very therapeutic. You can see both completed projects here and here.

And in helping with keeping up a weekly blog schedule, I started two themes a few months back. This is my favorite book review and this is my favorite Flickr inspiration.

Good-bye, 2011.

Ingrid and Odie

I photographed Ingrid while she practiced dressage in the sand arena with her beautiful horse, Odie. I used Ilford SFX 200 which has extended red sensitivity. In other words, it's almost infrared film. With the film, I made sure to use a red filter to add more red sensitivity and dramatic effect. In the end, the photos came out pretty rustic looking and look as if they were taken at night. I definitely want to do this again with a less experimental type of film and with the new things I learned about getting good action shots.

I have too many photos of llamas.

Summer Medium Format

I use my medium format camera sparingly, and have been taking my time with this last roll of film. It spans from the beginning of July to Monday of this week. The camera still needs many things, like a new battery for the light meter and some sort of janky home-made UV filter for the lens. I'm still figuring out the details... Anyways, let's start from the beginning of July.

July 5th was my cousin's wedding. I took advantage of how well dressed my brother and his girlfriend were so I cold add some cute couple pictures to my portfolio. Aren't they cute?

This picture is kind of funny. I think it's the sunglasses that makes this image look like a "hey, we're cool" kind of thing, but really we were at the beach and it was really bright out.



More camping photos from Memorial state park. The first is of an uprooted tree that was near our campsite, and the second is of the sun setting in the trees.

And lastly, these two images are from Sunol Regional Wilderness. My friend Lev and I hike all around so he could research for his geology thesis. I learned a lot about rock and land falls that day. It was awesome.

Nick the Model

The film delay is over for now! I developed a roll of 120mm (which these three pictures are from) and a roll of 35mm. Both rolls span from June to the first week or so of July, and were taken mainly in the lovely and summery coyote valley foothills. If you are in the area (south San Jose or Morgan Hill) I definitely recommend you drive around the foothills that are filled with abandoned farms, old houses, wild oats, lakes, county parks and have a picnic. I feel lucky to have grown up exploring such a beautiful place.

These three pictures were taken on a foothill near my home called El Tulare with Nick D as a the ever-so-patient model. He is great to photograph and understands what to do when I ask him to move or look a certain way. So far, I practice with models like my significant other or friends but I am excited to eventually take pictures of people I don't know. People fascinate me and I love to photograph them.

Medium Format Love!

I don't think it is possible for me to be anymore in love with medium format. Te quality of these photos is just outstanding! And I just love the colors the the film (Kodak Portra 160 vivid color) I'm using right now. Vivid color and neutral color are my two favorite films made by Kodak because they look so great after development and I hardly ever have to use any photoshop touch-ups. The only part of these photos that I edited were the addition of my website.

These four pictures and the previous post of the Celtic band photo are the start of my portfolio. I need something to show that isn't personal photography to prove that I can take photos for other people and not just myself. That doesn't mean I'm not being creative or having fun, because I totally am. I mean look, there is a llama and a city girl! It's great!

Kavanaugh Brothers Celtic Experience

Kavanaugh Brothers Celtic Experience, a photo by Let It Be Raw on Flickr.

My first band photo! Also, my first roll of medium format color film. This film is amazing. The detail, the color, just wow, blows my mind.

So this is a great band that has played at a few epic parties. They play Celtic and Americana music as well as a few fan favorite of mine like John Lennon's "Oh Yoko!" They asked me to take a picture of them after the party and I was more than happy too. They're a great group of guys that are fantastic musicians, check them out!