Peachtree Roadrace in Atlanta, Ga

Ashah Smith July 13, 2011

Last Monday on July 4th my friend Chelsea and I ran the Peachtree 10k Roadrace in Atlanta, Georgia. It was SUCH a fun race!!!! It was my second time and her first. We had an absolute blast! I got 17,302 place! Haha! What a dream come true right?! Lol! Okay basically there were 55,000+ people who ran the race and I've never had so much fun running! I'm a slow runner but I finished without stopping and that made me a happy girl:)

I took a few iPhone pics along the way! I'm writing this blog post from the airport on my phone so I have no clue if these images are the right size for the blog. Please forgive me if not, I'll fix it when I get to Texas. ;) Oh, I'm headed to Texas for a few days to visit my best friend Michelle and to meet my new niece who is just over a month old now. I'm stoked!!!

Image #1 There were so many people!!! Image #2 On the Marta! It was soooo crowded! Image #3 After we finished! Image #4 I ran into Emily and Tyler! I'm photographing their wedding in November! It was so cool and random seeing them! Image #5 Celebration drink afterwards;)

The Nida Family

Ashah Smith June 27, 2011

The Nida family (Jonathan, Abbie, Grace, & Jack) are friends of mine that moved today from Milledgeville back to Louisiana. All of us at First Baptist Church have grown very attached to them and are so sad to see them go. God will use them in a ton of ways I am sure. They are both amazing Christians and godly examples to all of us. Jonathan isn't in these because he was working hard packing with his Dad.

Abbie would take Grace and Jack on many walks though front campus at GCSU...so I followed them around yesterday on their last walk(for now) and got a few pictures....

Grace loves to chase her shadow, I can't remember what Abbie said she called it but I'm pretty sure she said she has a name for it;)

She picked flowers for her Dad...

Grace jumped EVERYWHERE, it was so cute...

Abbie taught her how to walk on front campus so this place is extra special...

Smile with your teeth! ;)

She loves looking at the fountain...

Haha I love Jack's hair!

Wink at us Grace!

The front porch where they always watch the cars go by...

We love all of y'all and are praying for you!

Six Years Ago Today...

Ashah Smith March 12, 2011

Six years ago today I was one nervous 19 year old. I was going along with Joe DeGrandis & Shelly Watson for my very first wedding photography job. The only flash I had was the one that pops up from the camera. I basically just watched what Joe and Shelly were doing and just tried to imitate them. Joe and Shelly quickly showed me the ropes and I caught on. I will always be grateful for them! It has been a crazy fun ride for the past 6 years. I absolutely love it. I love photographing love. I feel so blessed to do this in my life.

I'm so grateful for each and every one of you who has encouraged me over the years. Thank you so much!

Lastly and MOST importantly I want to thank God for blessing me with a love for people and photography. He is the Lord of my life and my Savior. My life would be pointless without Him.

WPPI 2011 - Las Vegas, NV

Ashah Smith March 2, 2011

A lot of you know I just returned from WPPI (Wedding & Portrait Photographers International) in Las Vegas, Nevada. It was my second year going. I learned SO much this year and I'm SO pumped about it! I've heard there were around 16,000 photographers there(WOW).

Here is a video that Still Motion did for WPPI! It will give you a small idea of it.

WPPI 2011 // behind the scenes from stillmotion on Vimeo.

It's such an incredible learning opportunity. I was able to learn from some of the world's best photographers. We learned things such as lighting, posing and business. I also attended a HUGE tradeshow there. It's so much fun seeing all the new and improved products & ideas. By the end of the week, my brain wanted to explode.

NOTE: I borrowed(with permission) some of the pictures below from my friends(you will see their watermark on the ones I borrowed). Please check out their work. They are great!

In-N-Out was a MUST! I waited all year to go back to this place! (this is most definitely a cell phone pic btw;)

This year(and last!) a big group of Christians at WPPI met together for a gathering called UNITE. We met on Monday night and we were able to listen to a message by Albert Tate and sing praise and worship songs lead by Brian Wurzell. Vegas is a really weird place, REALLY. It was so encouraging to be able to just sing to Jesus in the midst of Vegas. After the Unite meeting we met up with some people and went zip lining on Fremont Street. It was AMAZING! We had a blast! My AWESOME roomies (Alyona Semenov, Valerie Schooling, Laura Sitzman, & Kelly LaBruyere), along with Sarah Bardo, Shannon McMahon, Montana Dennis, Josh Newton, Kristen & Matthew Roberts! PLEASE check out each and every one of their websites. They are AWESOME people and photographers.

So, there was this other guy that came along. His name was Horse. You will see him dancing in this next video and then you will see some people ziplining! Click here for the video!

Because there were so many of us, we took a limo. Our driver was the bomb.com fo sho! I thought he had the COOLEST mustache thing ever! Check it out! I COULD NOT stop laughing! To see his mustache thing move, click on this video lol! Yes, I asked him to.

We also went out shooting at Red Rock Canyon...I love it there. I wish we could have stayed longer. It really makes me want to go hiking now. I seriously need to find a rock to climb or something.

That's our shadows:)

Okay, I hardly ever see pictures of myself taking pictures...and let's just say I HOPE I'm not always this classy...

Photo by: Kelly LaBruyere

So, Kelly caught me getting a pic of myself and the canyon... Photography tip for the day, never shoot yourself with a fisheye lens because your head will look like a pea, like this....! ddd..ooo...r...kkkkkk! One day Laura and I decided to go out and take a few pictures of each other around Vegas. She's so beautiful! I'm so thankful I met this girl. We met at Passion in 2009 on an escalator. It's so cool how God allows you to meet people in random places and become great friends. She flew to Georgia last year to shoot a wedding with me and here we are roommates at WPPI :) God is just cool like that! She's the best!

Oh, one other thing! I won a photography scholarship with faux/tographers!!!! I won through a Twitter game. After Sara Kauss & Josh Newton (the teachers at faux/tographers) spoke at Millers (at the tradeshow), they said that whoever can get us 47 Twitter follower first wins a seat to their workshop! So, a bunch(50+) of people followed them for me and I won(along with Trevor Dayley). Woohoo! Thank you Sara & Josh! Haha!

Follow them on Twitter at @faux_tographers ;) http://twitter.com/#!/faux_tographers

Okay, that's enough blogging for me today. :)