christine coté

i spent my weekend in leakey, texas on a youth retreat with my church. i was surrounded by trees, hills, and a very cold river. i had no cell reception and the quiet was perfect. i went as a co-counselor for 8th & 9th grade girls and i had been praying for the girls the week before and praying that if there was anything they needed to hear that God would use me to speak for Him. every time i help with things like this for my church i go into them hoping that God would use me in the kids lives and every time it's completely the other way around. i learn so much more from them than i think i could ever teach them. i met some wonderful people, had some great conversations and so much fun.

we went on an hour long hike sunday morning and i'm embarrassingly sore; i'm so out of shape. but it was beautiful at the top and despite being in pain now i enjoyed every moment of that hike. 

i gave myself a mini creative challenge over the weekend; i left my digital camera behind and brought along my canon ae-1 instead. more often than i should i pick up my digital camera, snap ten pictures in a row of the same thing, process them and pick out the best one from the bunch. lately i've been trying train myself to take my time; to really understand my surroundings, the object i'm shooting and to make sure, often double check, that my settings are correct. film demands this of me because there isn't a pretty LCD preview screen to confirm the shot was what i wanted or not. (not to mention that film isn't free and neither is developing it; i better make sure the shot's good for my wallets sake.)
I love the processing part of digital photography, i love editing and creating within photoshop; contrast, color balance, levels, everything. but i also see the difference between those who have a fancy camera and the latest edition of photoshop and the people that know their camera as if it's just an extension of their arm. I don't say that to be a hater on the modern photographer or the digital world, cause i love it! i'm a product of it! for the most part it's all i've known. i've only really been shooting film for a couple years. i'm not an expert by any means, i probably lean more toward the fancy camera side, but i desire to be authentic in the pictures i take. I don't want to hide behind pixels and photoshop's quick fixes. the deeper i get into this world the more i hate the dependency on photoshop that so many people seem to have; including myself often times.i really hope i'm not coming across as the elite artist type that holds the word artist or photographer up as something sacred; judging everyone who doesn't meet a high enough standard. honestly i haven't even come to a point where i'm comfortable giving myself either one of titles. i'm just striving to learn and grow in this world as much as i can.

Anyway... being film is a slower process i do not have photos from this weekend quite yet. What i do have is a few photos from my phone. It's no iphone photography, but it does the trick for now. I think an iphone is in my near future. [:

these are just my ramblings.

Xx christine

 man, you wouldn't believe the most amazing things that can come from...
some terrible nights...