#4- Mom & Dad

Dear Mom & Dad,

A letter is not enough to show my thanks towards you guys. From the first day you adopted me until now when you are about to send me off to college you have showered your love upon me. You two are the ones you instilled in me the values that you were brought up with. I can always count on you to make me laugh, to be the shoulder I can cry on, or just support me in whatever I choose to do. Mom- I shall miss our car rides, where we sing and dance to the songs on the radio. Dad- I shall miss your corny, but sometimes funny jokes. I shall miss coming home to people who I know will be there for me until the end. You are the best parents anyone could ever have, even my friends agree! I know I will miss you guys while I am away at college, but I know that this experience will only solidify our relationship and make us grow closer. I can't wait to tell you all about my college experience. It will be hard saying goodbye Monday, but I know I will get to see you in October! I love you guys! 

Love,

Irene

#3- David

Dear David,

I love this picture of us. We have taken similar ones over the years, sometimes they are forced, and sometimes they are natural. First off, I can't believe what I am wearing. I think it's an exercise outfit? I don't really know. Secondly, look at my hair! Why would Mom ever cut my hair like that? I look like Aladdin! I love this picture of us and I have loved being your sister! When we were younger we used to be very close. We would play on the playground together, race cars, or just laugh together. As we got older we started to grow distant, and it wasn't until this past year that I started to grow close to you again.  I have loved becoming close again. It has been so fun telling each other about our high school experiences and being there for each other. I hope that we remain on good terms while I am away from college and I hope that we still talk whether it be through texts, by phone, Facebook, etc. I can't wait to hear about your junior year, and I look forward to tell you about my first year in college. Thanks for being there to support me, for being the person I can yell at, knowing you will forgive me, and for being an amazing brother. I know you have my back, and I will always have yours. It won't be a goodbye when you leave Monday; it's a "see ya later."

Love,

Irene

Crazy For Chinatown

Today I went to Chinatown in San Francisco. I love going there because it's so different than any other part of San Francisco. I decided to take the picture on my phone with an application called Hipstamatic. Now there is a very popular photography app called Instagram. Instagram allows for someone to choose different filters to apply to a photo. I like Hipstamatic more because it's like a real camera. I can change the lens, the film, whether I use flash or not. Hipstamatic allows me to make more decisions on how I want the photograph to look like. I like this photo because of the angle. I decided to take this picture from an upward angle. I wanted some of the sky to show because it creates a good contrast against the building. I loved using Hipstamatic to take this picture because I don't usually take pictures with it and it pushed me out of my comfort zone.

First For Everything

This is the first photo taken of me. I was a couple days old when it was taken. I think looking at this photo no one would know that I was East Indian. Comparing how I look now to how I looked when I was baby, no one would know the person in the two pictures was the same. 

This is one of the first photos I took. It was on a disposable camera. I don't remember how old I was when I took it. I think I was around 5 years old. I asked my mom if I could take a picture of her, with my aunt and Grandpa and she said yes. I just looked into the view finder of the camera and clicked when I could see them all in it. 

This is the first photo I took where I looked to photography as an art instead of just snapping pictures to remember events. I was 14 when I took this picture, and it was then that I realized that I could used a camera to show my art to the world. Since then I have looked at photography as an art and I always try to take photographs in new and interesting ways. 

Color Blend

Today I used photoshop to blend two photography I took. I decided to keep the piano shot in black an white, so that the background colors from it wouldn't distract the person looking at the photograph. The emphasis is on the flower, which is why I left it in color. I like that the flower is transparent because it creates a unique effect. I decided to try different things on photoshop, and I really like to blend photos together. Taking two photos and blending them can create a whole different look. Doing this pushed me as a photographer because I am not too used to using photoshop, and it caused me to be open to new things as a photographer.

#2- Balki

Dear Balki,

When we first got you and Minka I thought it was just going to be fun to have some dogs, but having you guys as meant so much to me. Whenever I come home and walk up the stairs from the garage there you guys are wagging your tails ready to greet me. If I am having a bad day, knowing that you guys will be there makes me smile. If I am sad I can always come to you and you will lick my face or just sit on my lap and make me happy. You and Minka are part of the family and I will miss you a lot in college. I will have no one to come greet me when I come home to my dorm room and no one to throw toys to when I am bored. I know it's weird, but I will miss talking to you when I am in a bad mood or just when I need someone to talk to. When I come home from college, I will look forward to seeing you as I come up the stairs again. 

Love,

Irene

#1- Grandpa

Dear Grandpa,

I can't believe you are 90! You have been a part of my life for 19 years and I love you so much. You are always able to make me laugh, and you can put a smile on your face when I am having a bad day. Since I was little, I've always looked forward to our visits. You have taught me how to become a better checker player, how to play a little on a guitar, and you have helped me become a better person. I love looking at all your paintings and having you tell me the story behind them. Your stories about when you were in the army always interest me and I find them very interesting. I can't wait to share my college stories with you. Thank you for supporting me all these years. It has meant the world to me!

Love,

Irene

Sprinkle Sweetness

Yesterday I had a chocolate cupcake. I got out my camera and took pictures of it. I picked this photo to create a variety of shots for my blog. This shows my food photography skills. Food is one of my favorite subjects to shoot. I used my Nikon D5000 to take this picture of the cupcake. I love that it's a close-up shot, which is different than my other photos. Taking the picture of the cupcake while I'm close to it allowed me to capture the cupcake with all of its detail. I can see the creases in the frosting in this photograph. Taking this picture pushed me as a photographer because it made me take a close-up shot, which I am not used to.

Go Go Giants!

Two nights go I went to another Giants baseball game with my friends and family. I took this picture of the sign of AT&T Park because during the summer I was at a baseball game almost every other week. I love wearing Giants gear to a game. I love screaming at the top of my voice with 40,000. I love the moment the Giants win a game and everyone goes crazy. I love AT& T Park. I know where everything is in the park, and I feel comfortable in it. Going to the games is one of my favorite things to do. I took the picture of the sign with a regular point-and-shoot camera. I shot the picture in color to show that the AT&T Park words are in Orange and therefore contrast against the rest of the sign. This shot tells people where I was, and because of that they know that I was at a baseball game.

Peace, Love, Indie Music

A couple weeks ago I went to a festival called Outside Lands with my brother and a friend. It's a three-day festival held in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. About 60,000 people were there everyday and it was one of the coolest experiences ever. I loved listening to the different musicians and I loved noticing the different outfits people were wearing. I took a picture of two people in bright tie-dye clothing. I love their fashion sense and that they like to stand out. I was sitting down when I took that picture, so it was taken with an upward angle. The second picture I took at Outside Lands while Muse was performing. We were in a crowd of thousands of people watching Muse. It was incredible. Muse is one of my favorite bands and they put on an amazing show. I like this picture because it shows the bands on stage with the lights, but it also shows all the people in the crowd. I think this picture is a good representation of Outside Lands.  

Back In Time

My family and I recently went to Los Angeles and visited Universal Studios. We went on a tour that showed the Backlot, which is the place where the movies are filmed. All the different sets are on the Backlot and I took a variety of pictures of them. I liked this picture because it showed all the buildings that looked identical. I shot the picture in black and white because I wanted people to focus on the buildings when viewing this picture. I didn't want the colors in the photo to distract people who were looking at it. I liked this set a lot because the buildings look like the buildings in New York, and I love that city! This photograph shows a different side of me as a photographer. I don't usually shoot architectural photos, but I really liked this one.

How High

We were walking back to the hotel one night and decided to walk on the beach on our way back. My friends and I started taking jumping picture in the water. My two friends, Mackenzie and Kristen, were trying to see who could jump higher. I like this picture a lot because I think it almost looks like it was taken with a camera that only uses film. The colors are dark and there's spots in the picture that gives it a different vibe. I like the dots because they look like water droplets and I think it makes the picture look like it was taken a long time ago. This picture shows the subjects and the surronding area too. I was able to capture the surf coming in and my two friends, and even include the black night sky.

Out of the Ground

On this day our group went snorkeling in the ocean. We went on a boat and went to different lagoons where we could see turtles, coral, eels, and schools of fish. I love taking landscape pictures, so I chose this one for my blog. I like that the island creates one line that is almost flat, but the rocks create a variety of lines. The rocks make the picture more interesting. The variety of colors make the picture interesting too because there are light colors and dark colors. I think this picture is a good representation of Hawaii and what it looks like. I took this picture with no unique angle. I just wanted to show the landscape of the island and it's natural beauty. I like that there are no building or man-made things in the picture. It shows Hawaii in its natural state. 

Sparkles in the Sky

While we were in Hawaii we went into a shop that sold different kinds of nicknacks. I looked up at the ceiling and there were hundreds of different things hanging from it. I loved this shot because everything in this photo just sparkles, and I love sparkly things! I love the upward angle of this shot and the different colors shown in the picture. I think it's a unique photograph because people don't usually see this sort of thing in a shop when they go in. I like how everything has a bronze tone to it and there isn't too much white in the photo. The subject of this photo is different than in my other photos because there are multiple things in it. Usually when I take a picture I only have one subject, sometimes two, but this one has multiple objects in it. This picture shows how the different objects unite together and look similar and alike. 

Nature's Beauty

I was away on a vacation in Hawaii, but I took a picture a day that I am now posting. I love taking pictures of things in nature, and flowers are one of my favorite things. I love the color and the small details that make each flower different. Hawaii was amazing, and I loved seeing all the different flowers. Waking up and seeing all the color and smelling their different aromas was incredible. I like that the flower's color pops against the green background. I think the angle is interesting because it's a little bit of a downward angle on the flower, not the usual straight-on angle that is used to photograph a lot of objects. 

Torture Can Be Good

I love the Giants. I was born and raised in the Bay Area. When watching Giants games it's common to say this is torture because several times the Giants will lose until the last couple of innings and then they will have a victorious comeback. I have been to several Giants games and sometime three in a week! I watch the games at home if I can't go to a game. I took this picture of my friend Megan at one of the games we attended. It was her first baseball game. She's wearing a Panda hat because one of the players on the team is known as the "Panda." I love this picture because it's a really nice portrait piece. I love that it shows Megan, but also the field in the background. Someone looking at this picture is able to know where the picture was taken and what is happening.