I asked you on Instagram what questions you have for Robin and holy moly – I think you guys submitted more questions for him than you did me! I picked 5 questions (edited a few for clarity) sat him down and had him write his second ever blog post for you (read his first one here!) I hope you enjoy getting to know my partner in crime better!
I love taking pictures and traveling! But I find it very difficult. How do you manage traveling and taking photos at the same time?
When we are traveling, we make a list of things we are pretty sure we want to shoot and will schedule in times to do those hero shots (like 7am at the hotel pool before anyone else arrives.) Kara is really great at keeping us on schedule and making sure what needs to get shot gets shot. We also build in time to just explore and have times with less pressure and if we find something cool that’s great but if not, that’s ok too. The key is to also bring your camera EVERYWHERE so you can take a photo if the moment arrises!
I struggled with separating taking photos and just enjoying our trips when I first started. It is hard going from being present and relaxing on a trip to having to first take care of work. But that’s the life of a travel blogger, merging the two! And sometimes we make these really big city guides that we take SO many photos for and it can be a lot to juggle! But over time I started to realize that I probably would miss out on a lot of experiences if I wasn’t looking for great photo opportunities and that has helped me.
For example, we were just in Hawaii and we heard seeing the sunrise on Haleakala, the volcano, was a popular thing to do. We had to wake up at 3am for it and I don’t think we would have done the sunrise if we didn’t have taking photos & writing about it as a goal. It turned out to be beautiful and so much fun so I’m glad we did it. I have discovered I am much more engaged with wherever we are when I am photographing it, and I learn so much while taking photos to share with everyone.
What was the translation like to work together? Is it an improvement from your last job? What was your last job?
The transition to working with Kara full time was pretty easy. Kara and I met while working together at a summer camp, so we’ve always had a good working relationship and it was pretty easy to start working together as a team professionally. Of course it’s not always smooth but for the most part, we compliment each other’s workplace skills.
Prior to working on Whimsy Soul full time, I was finishing up my degree in economics and had been working at a Target in the city a few hours a week. I am sooooo much happier taking photos, working and traveling with my wife each day, and enjoying more of life.
I really want to increase my Pinterest page. Kara said you do the pins – got any tips?
It starts with a photo you are super proud of. Pinterest is so visual. It is always important to do some keyword research and apply it to your pin captions. Make sure that your photo and caption do a good job of telling the user what your content is about. People want to be able to find what they are looking for with as little effort as possible, so I like to give them a little hand! My secret weapon is Tailwind, though.
If you want to be serious about Pinterest, you MUST use Tailwind! It has hands down been the best thing that has happened to our page. We went from getting ~100k monthly viewers to millions of monthly viewers and tons of blog traffic with the help of Tailwind.
How did you learn photography? I love your photos and wish mine looked like yours!
Kara has been doing photography professionally for over 10 years. It took me quite a while to get it down. Learning to pay attention to framing and learning how to adjust for different kinds of light were the keys for me growing as a photographer. I was lucky that it was almost all on the job training with someone who has as much experience as Kara does.
The key is to shoot as much as you can. Practice shooting on manual mode, it’s the only way to learn. Push yourself to find new places to photograph and play with angles and light settings and have fun. It took me about 1.5 years to feel comfortable behind the lens, so it may take you time, too!
What do you shoot with? How do you edit photos?
We get questions all the time about what camera we shoot with, so much that Kara actually wrote a really big blog post about our camera gear last year. You can read the whole guide and product breakdown here! She goes into what we use and some other models for options along with recommendations.
I take most of the photos for Whimsy Soul but Kara actually edits them. She’s SO fast at editing photos since she’s been doing it for almost a decade, it’s just easier and a better time management strategy for her to edit them all (I’ve seen her edit 20 photos in like, 3 minutes, she’s a pro.) My goal is to always make a really great image for her that she can build upon in Lightroom.
- Note from Kara: It’s on my never-ending list to write a big post about how I edit our photos and general photo editing tips. Sit tight friends!
I hope you enjoyed Robin’s first Q&A! If you have more questions you’d like for him to answer on the next one, leave them below or shoot him a DM on @ighusbandlife!
