Thursday Throwback, Vol. IV | The Original and First-Ever Safari

For this week’s edition of Thursday Throwback, I’d like to feature some photos from the first-ever safari that fellow photography enthusiast Brandon and I took wayyyy back on Saturday, August 2nd, 2009. I mean…this is THE safari. The original, one-and-only photo adventure that spurred me on to learning as much as I possibly could about photography. This is where Urban Safari Photography began, long before I ever even knew I could have a future career as a photographer, and long before the idea of Urban Safari Photography was ever conceived.

When these photos were taken, I was very new to the game, had just learned the terms “f-stop” and “aperture” and had an intolerably short haircut (word to the wise, ladies: proceed with caution when considering an A-line hairstyle). I constantly oversaturated my images by jacking up the contrast in post-processing and wasn’t quite sure what it took to really compose a solid photo. I didn’t have PhotoShop or Lightroom, any prime lenses or flashes, and I didn’t even shoot in RAW; JPEGs all the way! Woot! But…we all start somewhere, right? And for me, it all started in downtown Denver with Brandon, my Canon Rebel Xsi and its horrible little kit lens.

For the sake of simply having fun doodling around in PhotoShop and being artsy fartsy, I’ve “remixed” the original photos with some of my favorite, vintage-y Florabella actions. Hope you enjoy!