My Path to Choosing a Career

Courtesy of http://www.buzzfeed.com/peggy/cow-and-dolphin

My life-long dream has always been to swim with dolphins. When I was 8 I figured this would be possible on a regular basis if and only if I became a marine biologist. Animal Planet was my favorite channel, and whenever Flipper was on TV it always intrigued me how someone could have a pet dolphin---just like Jasmine's tiger or Emily Elizabeth and her giant red dog, Clifford. 

A few years later, in middle school, I started learning a bit more about biology. Animals were interesting, but mazes and dream houses were just as well. To this day I still have a series of dream house plans, some even with a span of remodels that would take place as the family grew, so that as a newlywed it was tiny and by the sixth imaginary child there would be 7 suites and a pool in the backyard. I loved helping my mom move furniture around in the house--changing things up.

One day, I had an AHA Moment:

I was telling my dad how I would love to be a home decorator, so I would probably become an architect for that and yatta yatta, when at one point he mentioned he once had a friend at BYU, Provo that was studying interior design. 

Interior Design?!

That was JUST what I had been thinking of all those years (after all I felt that architects needed too much math for my taste...). So I went on to explore that major, but to my dismay BYU Provo didn't offer Interior Design as a major anymore--they had moved it over to Ricks College, or BYU-Idaho. 

I refused myself to even consider BYU-I, because marrying a potato farmer sounded like a potato overload I wasn't willing to get. So because of that I would probably have to consider NOT going to BYU-Provo--which had always been my dream (along with swimming with dolphins), or changing my career plan.

Latter-Day Saint Business College (LDSBC, or LDS Brazilian College for some) offered Interior Design as a course, but it was just a college--too easy to get in, too small to be accredited with things pertaining to my course, and simply not BYU. I wanted Brigham Young University...IN PROVO!

So I let it rest....after all I was just a freshman in High School by then.

Finally my senior year came and Broadcasting caught my attention, as well as Humanities and English Literature (I couldn't live without Shakespeare and literary discussions!)....as well as Photography, maybe?

I was in the Photo Club at school but I was certainly NOT the most talented. This one little guy dreamed of being a photographer and as a mere freshman he already had better pictures than mine. I never felt like I quite fit in, so photography for me was still a hobby, something for myself.

That's when the time finally came to apply to BYU and choose a major. I chose Humanities, but my consolation was that with 2 clicks I could change it to whatever I wanted. 

In the meantime I became more intrigued in Photography as an option. I felt a great urge to get to know my point-and-shoot that up until that time I didn't even know what "point-and-shoot" meant. I learned there was this thing called "slow flash" that brightened the scene a bit further. It was SUCH A DISCOVERY!

I knew I would be leaving home in a few months, so might as well use that money I had saved up to buy myself a nice "professional camera". Canon was my choice from the beginning, from the time my sister Paula took a photography class in HS and told me all about how those DSLR Canon cameras were just plain AWESOME. I found that the Canon website gave tips on how to use a camera, aperture, shutter speed, ISO, types of lenses and slowly I started getting acquainted with things that had never crossed my mind before.

There was something there that got me hooked.

I finally decided that for the price I was willing to pay and for the choices available, the new Canon Rebel T2i that had just come out a month before was the camera for me. 

That summer before starting BYU, I held a professional camera for the first time, and knew that I needed to get it down if I ever wanted to compete with 80+ other BYU students who would be applying in the end of the year to the limited-admission Photography program.

My first semester in college, I was able to register for all my pre-requisites, except one: drawing class. For that one class I didn't take, I was forced to wait an entire EXTRA year to apply to the program. Ultimately, that's what made me the fortunate woman I am now: I was able to get an whole EXTRA year to work on my portfolio. If it wasn't for that extra practice and extra self-learning time, I would have turned in photos of textures, dewdrops and lone trees. All the cliches any photographer should avoid. 

A year later, in December 2011, I was in LA, on my way to the Getty Museum with Diogo when I got the news I had been ACCEPTED into the Photo Program at BYU. It was the GREATEST feeling and confirmation that I had taken the right path and made the right choice.

Most of what I learned about photography was on my own, during my free time when all I wanted was to get better pictures. It was a long journey but it hasn't ended. I have yet much to learn and that's why I highly believe in higher education, even for a career that doesn't require a diploma and only wants to see your portfolio. But that's the exact reason why I am here today: to perfect my art, further develop my style and build a portfolio that will bring me self-fulfillment and professional success.

I didn't marry a potato farmer, though potatoes are my husband's favorite in a meal. I didn't become an interior designer even though I still love it, but for that I'm glad because when I finally took that drawing class I found out perspective drawing was A DREAD for me. Last but not least, I still haven't swam with dolphins, or built my dream house....When that day comes I will certainly be camera-ready to get the dolphin in focus. Or if that day never comes, no worries: I'll have Photoshop compositing skills under my sleeves. ;)