Brealyn Farr
Astro Totz Cheer Performance:
First Time Jitters
Lillee Beardsley, a first-time Astro Totz cheerleader, stretches at the Cheer Skillz Academy as she prepares to rehearse cheer moves with her mom a few hours before her first cheer performance on Sunday, November 20, 2022. Her mom, Danielle Beardsley, said she was nervous, so we arrived early to review her routine.
By: Brealyn Farr
Camera: Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens: 18-55 mm
Settings: f/8, 1/125 sec., ISO-6400
Beardsley looks for approval from mom on the proper way to cup her fist and outward face her wrist while standing in the high v stance. One of the most popular cheer moves that should extend 45 degrees. Danielle said that solid arms are sometimes tricky for little kids to enforce in cheer, so they go over it often to ensure she gets the basics down.
Beardsley practices every Monday for two hours after school. One hour of gymnastics and one hour with the Astro Totz competition squad.
Photo By: Brealyn Farr
Canon EOS T6
Lens: 18-55 mm
Settings: f/5.6, 1/125 sec., ISO-6400
"You got this," Danielle shouts as Beardsley executes a front rollover mid-performance of the cheer routine. A few weeks ago, Beardsley and another cheerleader collided, causing a slight injury to her wrist, and now she "hesitates" to quickly roll and pop up. "I think it scared her more than anything, and now I have to remind her that she will be ok constantly, Danielle said.
Photo by: Brealyn Farr
Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens: 18-55 mm
Settings: f/5.6, 1/125 sec., ISO 6400
Beardsley grabs her wrists after the front rollover and tells her mom that she is afraid to get hurt again. She expresses that she is nervous and worried that another collision will happen. Danielle said several practices have happened since then, and she has continued to express her "fear" of getting hurt again.
Photo By: Brealyn Farr
Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens: 18-55 mm
Settings: f/5.6, 1/125 sec., ISO-6400
Beardsley listens intensely to her mom as she holds her once-injured wrist. Danielle offers Beardsley encouraging words explaining that she is a great cheerleader and needs to believe in herself.
Photo By: Brealyn Farr
Canon EOS T6
Lens: 18-55 mm
Setting: f/5.6, 1/125 sec., ISO-6400
Beardsley's first Astro Totz cheerleading outfit layed out by Danielle to make sure all essential items were not forgotten at home. Danielle mentions that there are numerous required pieces that can not be left such as cheer shoes, pom poms, uniform, bows, eye shadow, and lip stick.
Photo By: Brealyn Farr
Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens:18-55 mm
Settings: f/5.6, 1/125 sec., ISO-6400
Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens: 18-55 mm
Settings: f/5.6, 1/125 sec., ISO-6400
Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens: 18-55 mm
Settings: f/5.6, 1/125 sec., ISO-6400
Beardsley gets glammed up twenty minutes before the performance with the required makeup assigned to all Astro Totz cheerleaders. Danielle says that they were told to over-apply the makeup. The more the makeup, the more visible it is to the judges.
Both Photos By: Brealyn Farr
Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens: 18-55 mm
Settings: f/5.6, 1/125 sec., ISO-6400
Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens: 18-55 mm
Settings: f/5.6, 1/125 sec., ISO-6400
Obligatory pictures before the performance, and Beardsley is not interested. She smiles as she sees her friends walking in. Beardsley said she is not as nervous anymore because her mom made her feel better, and she has friends with her.
She sits with the other cheerleaders and listens to her coach’s instructions.
Photo By: Brealyn Farr
Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens:
Settings:
Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens: 18-55 mm
Settings: f/5.6, 1/60 sec., ISO-6400
Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens: 75-300 mm
Settings: f/5.6, 1/125 sec., ISO-6400
Beardsley is greeted with flowers by her father, Michael Beardsley following the performance. He told her he was extremely proud of how brave and focused she was.
Photo By: Brealyn Farr
Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens: 18- 55 mm
Settings: f/5, 1/60 sec., ISO-6400
Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens: 18-55 mm
Settings: f/5, 1/60 sec., ISO-6400
Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens: 18-55 mm
Settings: f/5.6, 1/60 sec., ISO-6400
Beardsley smells the flowers she received from her father and then posed with them in front of a Cheer Skillz picture wall. She said that she couldn’t wait to perform again.
Photos By: Brealyn Farr
Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens: 75-300mm
Settings: f/5.6, 1/125 sec., ISO-6400
Beardsley performs for her first time as an Astro Totz cheerleader. There were no collisions.
They performed four times with a combination of cheering, stunts, and dancing for an audience of family and friends.
Photos By: Brealyn Farr
Beardsley poses with her family, brothers, Ryan and Jacob, sister, Oaklee, and her parents. Her older brothers expressed how proud they were of her along with other family members who came to watch her first performance as an Astro Totz cheerleader.
Photo By: Brealyn Farr
Canon EOS Rebel T6
Lens: 18-55 mm
Settings: f/5, 1/60 sec., ISO-6400
This assignment was for a photography course at Colorado State University. This was my first photo essay and I was nervously apprehensive that I would not be able to accomplish or meet my professor's expectations.
The first step in the photo essay process was to create a storyboard; where the brainstorming begins. Although I had been preparing for this assignment; I had already had an idea what my topic and who my subject for the photo essay would be. I had a plot of the storyline prior to reaching this assignment but this was more of a calculated response that I had noted. I didn't start jotting my ideas down on the storyboard form provided by the professor until the week prior.
The requirements and expectation of the finished photo essay was that it would have a beginning, middle, and an end. There needed to be a conflict and a resolution.
One of the things I learned about photography, in the assignments leading up the photo essay, was that no plan is ever fully accomplished successfully. I knew that I needed a visual variety of images: wide, high and low angles, close-ups, medium shot and in order capture these, I would need to play with positioning, angles, lighting, background and movement of the subject and environment. I was open to experimenting and playing with these options when the time came.
Another aspect of photography that I discovered was that each photography session usually required adjustments, slight alterations of plans, and revisions to ideas. It was completely normal to improvise and promptly develop new plans. So, naturally, I anticipated these occurrences happening.
Propitiously my storyboard, although slightly amended, helped in the guidance of the photo essay process. I captured over 100 images knowing that I only needed a maximum of 10.
Following the capturing process, it was time to narrow down the images to help illustrate a story that closely resembled the one I planned for in the storyboard. I was fully prepared to remove over 50 images due to bad lighting, blurriness, poor aesthetics or unfavorable angles which is not unusual; this is why it is essential to capture an over abundance of imagery.
After finally narrowing down to 20, I began the editing process in Adobe photoshop and lightroom. I had no plans on overediting and some images required extensive help due to graininess, or light issues. Eventually there were 17 images left and I was able to piece them together to bring my photo essay to life with a visual variety and compelling captions.