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Homepage image by David Colvin Photography | http://www.dclvn.com/

Angela has had a love for makeup since her 12th birthday, when her mother took her to get her makeup done. An outing originally intended to find the correct shade for her skin tone and eyes ended up lighting a fire in Angela, causing her to discover an industry that she would later pursue as her career. Upon entering college, she spent two years at Baylor University, and eventually decided to pursue her dream of becoming an artist. She started by getting her esthetician license in Austin, TX and then moved to LA for a Certification at the Makeup Designory. After her education in LA and working there for three years for a leading cosmetic company, she returned home to Texas to be closer to family. You can currently find Angela working the bridal industry in Dallas, Houston and Waco. However, she loves how versatile her job is and can frequently be found on set for magazines, TV and video shoots.

Check out Angela’s beautiful new liveBooks8 site at angelakarr.com.

Q: How would you describe the aesthetic of your website in three words?

AK: Clean, fresh, and simple

Image: Bri Costello Photography | http://www.bricostello.com/

Q: How often do you typically update your website?

AK: I do not update it enough, but I am hoping with the new platform I will update it more often when I have new photos.

Q: How do you choose the photos that you display on your homepage?

AK: I try to select photos for my homepage that showcase my most recent work and a variety of clientele.

Image by David Colvin Photography | http://www.dclvn.com/

Q: What is your favorite new feature of liveBooks8?

AK: I was most excited to add a picture of my clients with their testimonials.

Q: What is one piece of advice you’d offer to someone designing their website?

AK: liveBooks makes the process very simple. I had to redesign my entire website because it was very over do. So, I decided to divide and conquer over a large cup of coffee. I was shocked at how quick and painless the process was. Not to mention, the customer service was always there to answer any questions that I had.

Image: Lindsay Davenport Photography | http://www.lindsaydavenportphotography.com/

Have a site you would like us to feature? Send us an email at social@livebooks.com.

We love an image with a story, and we are so excited to share the making of this stunning image by Anne-Marie Caruso with you.

Titled Bioluminesence, this image was originally shot with a Graflex Speed Graphic on Kodak Portra color film, ISO 400.

Anne-Marie Caruso is an editorial photographer, located in New Jersey. Though she spends much of her time photographing portraits, still life, food, products, fashion & home interiors, she also enjoys focusing on shooting personal projects on 4×5 film. See more of her enchanting work here.

I had an image stuck in my head of a woman collecting glowing creatures to use as a light source in her home. I come up with these elaborate ideas, and then I have to figure out how to make them happen.

The first step to making my vision a reality was finding a location. Luckily, my brother has this gorgeous stream a short walk from his home.

The next task was to find the right lights to put in the stream. I bought different colors, and narrowed it down to a bright white that looked blueish green under the water. I then ordered a bunch of the waterproof solar powered lights, but half of them were broken when they arrived. After a couple of weeks back and forth, I had enough lights to fill the frame. I did some lighting tests around the blue hour to get a rough idea of how long of an exposure I would need. If memory serves, it was about 30 seconds.

I already had my model in mind – we’ve been friends since the 7th grade. She did an amazing job! Even though she was getting attacked by mosquitos, she held still for 30 seconds at a time. She is dressed in an old nightgown that belonged to my grandmother.

I used an Alien Bees 400ws with battery pack to light the left bank, and one with a beauty dish to light the model. An SB-800 is diffused in the basket and is lighting her face. A couple SB-800’s are used to light the foliage behind the model. I didn’t want it to be jet-black behind here. And of course, there are all the underwater lights. They came on strands like Christmas lights. I had to weigh them down with rocks and tent stakes, so the currents wouldn’t wash them away.

I used a long exposure to get the blue in the sky behind the trees (I liked the way it mimicked the lights in the water), as well as giving more of a soft and dreamy look to the water. The tripod was set up in the middle of the stream with heavy duty garbage bags to keep the legs dry. I wore pair of waders to keep my legs dry.

I set everything up early in the day, with the help of my husband (it took a few hours), and then we had to wait for the sun to go down. The actual shooting part only lasted about 10 minutes. I shot a few frames on film, and some with a digital camera (God forbid anything ever happened with the film).

I am very happy with the way it turned out – exactly how I pictured it in my head. It was a lot of planning, but I think it was worth it in the end.

We are so excited to introduce Ioan, one of liveBooks’ outstanding support representatives! After originally being hired as a production designer, Ioan has been with the team for almost seven years and loves having the ability to learn new things through his position. When he’s not spending time with his wife, he can usually be found drawing, riding his home-built bike or playing video games on his PlayStation4.

Quick Facts:
Hometown: Brasov, Romania
Favorite liveBooks8 feature: Mosaic Grid
Favorite quote: “Impossible is nothing.” –Muhammad Ali
Favorite Brand: Adidas (More specifically, he loves Adidas Superstar Shoes!)
Favorite TV shows: Breaking Bad, The Big Bang Theory & Brooklyn Nine-Nine
You will never see Ioan without…..: a watch on his hand and a smile on his face

We are absolutely loving the new liveBooks8 platform, and we know that you will too! With endless new features, such as advanced SEO tools and options for customizations, we are excited to provide you and your business with a dynamic and easy-to-use web design platform.

liveBooks8 is an advanced yet intuitive website designer with in-line editing. Additional features include:

• Built in HTML5 – your responsive site will look stunning and uniform on any device. From desktop to tablet or mobile, you will no longer need to create a separate mobile version of your site! This will help improve your site’s search engine visibility and overall user experience.
• Unique gallery options – with a large variety of gallery options, you are sure to be able to fine a beautiful and interactive display that will make your portfolio look it’s best. Additionally, you are now able to add videos to your site with our new and improved software.
• SEO Everything – quickly add tags, descriptions, keywords, image alt text, and more to your your website so that your site is easily searchable and indexed properly.
• Template starting points – with liveBooks, our templates are just a place to start. With endless opportunities to customize your site’s appearance, you have the ability to easily build a space that matches your vision.
• Responsive Editor – update your website on the go with our easy-to-use, responsive editor.

Migration Quick Facts:

• Your site migration will take approximately two weeks to complete.
• Migration of your current site to the new platform will be done free of charge, unless you decide to go with the White Glove option. Once you are migrated to the new platform, we will evaluate where your website falls into the new pricing packages for liveBooks8.
• We will migrate the current SEO tags that you have on your site. However, liveBooks8 has additional SEO options/tags that we encourage you to enter on your own.
• If you select the As Is Migration option, we will send you a preview link before your site is published. You will be able to review and approve any slight differences that there may be with your website.

Click here to pick your current migration option now!

Note: there are still a few features that are not yet available on our new HTML5 platform. These include: client proofing, password protected pages, and splash animation.

If you are brand new to liveBooks and would like to start creating your interactive HTML5 site, sign up for our free 14-day trial by clicking here.