Tag Archives: gouda

launching Images to Inspire Hope – let’s help Japan!

By Natalie | Published 25 March 2011

On 11 March 2011, an earthquake with a magnitude of 8.9 hit Japan, and devastation through the tsunami followed.

Along with fears of radiation; food, water and fuel are in short supply. The death toll has passed 10,000. More than 17,440 people are missing. Hundreds of thousands of people have been made homeless.

It’s heartbreaking.

Vinita and I are back! This time as a team filled with loads of ideas for an exciting new initiative!

Do you remember last year when we took part in Helping hearts for Haiti?

We’ve decided to go bigger and better, and are therefore, launching our own initiative so that we can help raise funds for Japan, and for future projects too.

Introducing… Images to Inspire Hope

We’ve got our mojo on! We have a brand new website (www.imagestoinspirehope.org), a logo and a big plan!!

But this plan cannot succeed until we have your cooperation or help.

Our chosen charity is Japan Earthquake Tsunami Children in Emergency Fund (Save the Children). As family and children photographers, this is our way of using photography to give back.

And this is how you can help…

You and your children could win a wonderful family photo session on-location in the heart of Den Haag, Gouda or Utrecht!

This session will be photographed by myself AND Vinita and will be held on Saturday 02 July 2011. Celebrate the start of the Summer holidays! This gives you plenty of time to shop for new outfits too, if need be ;-) If you are not available on this date, don’t worry, we can make alternative plans!
Session is for up to 5 members of the same immediate family and will last between 1-2 hours.
Winner will also receive all their proof images in medium resolution on CD. Print to your heart’s content!
Valued at €675!!

How to win:

Make a MINIMUM donation of $10 to the Japan Earthquake Tsunami Children in Emergency Fund
For every donation of $10 you will be entered into the prize draw. Increase your chance of winning; donate $30 and you’ll receive 3 entries!
Forward a copy of your donation confirmation email to help@imagestoinspirehope.org.
All entries must be RECEIVED by midnight (GMT+1) on Tuesday 31 May 2011.
Winner will be drawn at random and announced on Wednesday 01 June 2011.
You can enter as many times as you’d like, but each entry must be the minimum $10 donation.

Other details:

Session participants must sign a model release. This allows us to showcase our favourite images from your session on our blogs and on the Images to Inspire Hope website.
Session must be held in Den Haag, Gouda or Utrecht.
If the winner does not claim his/her prize by Friday 10 June 2011 or cannot claim the prize, then another winner will be drawn.
This program is not sponsored or promoted by Save the Children and we are not receiving anything in return for this effort.

But wait! There’s more!

Please feel free to blog, tweet or share the link to this blog post and the Images to Inspire Hope website! Together we can help those in need.

Thank you SO much!!

Best wishes,
~ Natalie and Vinita

Posted in giving back, news | Also tagged charity, den haag, devastation, disaster, earthquake, fund raising, giving back, help, hope, images to inspire hope, initiative, japan, launch, natalie carstens, portrait photographer, prize draw, professional photographer, the hague, tigs creations photography, tsunami, utrecht, vinita salome, win 2 Comments

and the winner is…

By Natalie | Published 1 February 2010

With your donations you give the people of Haiti hope for the future. Giro555.nl announced on Thursday that the Netherlands has raised 100.6 Million Euros – that’s incredible! And the donations still continue…

For Haiti, we’re hoping for another Kobe miracle. It’s been 15 years since the Kobe earthquake, in which Vinita’s family were part of. We’d like to share with you a video entitled “Dear 15-year-old. You’re the reason we worked so hard to rebuild our city.” This short video symbolises hope. It’s a commercial clip from an electric company addressing the youth – 15 year olds in particular – with the message that the city has been rebuilt for them. Vinita has seen this happen with her own eyes. This is why our appeal for Haiti is so dear to our hearts.

Seen on Lisa Takeuchi Cullen’s blog post: Kobe, 15 years after the quake

We are so very grateful to you all for supporting Helping Hearts for Haiti.

And the winner is…

Many congratulations to Ms Suzy Ogé and her sweetheart for winning the romantic photo session with Vinita and I! :-)

Thank you again for your kind generosity and support.

Have a great week everyone – and Suzy, we’ll see you soon!

Posted in giving back, news | Also tagged den haag, haiti, haiti earthquake, helping hearts, natalie carstens, portrait photographer, professional photographer, the hague, tigs creations photography, utrecht, winner Leave a comment

Let’s do something to help Haiti

By Natalie | Published 25 January 2010

On 13 January, an earthquake with a magnitude of 7 hit Haiti; the devastation is unimaginable. The death toll has risen above 150,000 people in the Port-au-Prince area alone. 1.5 million people have been left without a home, and more than 750,000 children have been left without parents. The numbers are growing. It brings tears to my eyes, I want to help.

I’m teaming up with my dear friend, Vinita Salomé of Vinita Salomé Photography, and together, we’ve joined the Helping Hearts initiative to try to do something to help. But, we need you, too! Please help us help the victims of Haiti’s earthquake.

Here’s how:

You and your sweetheart could win a romantic photo session on-location in the heart of Den Haag, Gouda or Utrecht!

This session will be photographed by myself AND Vinita and will be held in the late-afternoon/evening of Saturday 17th April 2010. This gives you plenty of time to shop and find a babysitter, if need be ;-)
Session is for up to 2 adults and will last between 1-2 hours.
Winner will also receive 25 fully processed, high resolution images on CD. Print to your heart’s content!

How to win:

Make a MINIMUM donation of €25 to Giro555. Please do this online via e-cumlaude so that you receive a receipt for your donation.
If you pay by iDeal, be sure to check the box for “Stuur de betaalbevestiging naar mijn e-mailadres” and enter your email address to ensure you receive a receipt for your payment. Then, forward a copy of your receipt to haiti@tigscreations.com.
All entries must be RECEIVED by midnight (GMT+1) on 31st January 2010.
Winner will be drawn at random and announced on Monday 1st February 2010.
You can enter as many times as you’d like, but each entry must be the minimum €25 donation.

Other details:

Session participants must sign a model release.
Session must be held in Den Haag, Gouda or Utrecht on 17 April 2010.
If the winner does not claim his/her prize by Wednesday 3rd February 2010 or cannot claim the prize, then another winner will be drawn.
This program is not sponsored or promoted by Giro555.nl and we are not receiving anything in return for this effort.

Are you a photographer and want to help?

This fabulous initiative is thanks to two inspiring photographers, Michele of Pinkletoes Photography and Lyndsay of Life in Motion Photography. If you are a photographer and would like to hold your own Helping Hearts event to help Haiti, please contact Helping Hearts ASAP so they can send you everything you need to get started!

But wait! There’s more!

PLEASE blog, Tweet or share the link to this blog post on Facebook! You can also follow Helping Hearts on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook. Together we can help those in need.

it’s Vini’s family :)

By Natalie | Published 4 August 2009

After several days of gorgeous sunshine and warm weather, it was suddenly a very wet morning in The Hague… the sky was grey in all directions, and not the slightest hint of sun or blue sky in sight… should we reschedule, should we not… we decided to go ahead anyway but with a change of location, so I headed off to Gouda (where it was a little less rainy) to meet Vinita, JK, and their son, Vivaan :-)

Vinita is one of my closest friends and a great photographer, I’m sure many of you will have seen photos of her on my blog before – we have a lot of fun on our photo days ;-) I am truly honored that she chose me to photograph her family :-)

Vini… I hope you enjoy your sneak peek :-)

Our first stop was the park and there was a children’s play area there… Vivaan was too cute, he wanted to play on EVERYTHING! His lovely white shirt didn’t stay white for long!! ;-)

(clickety click on the image above to see the three pics bigger ;) I soooo need to upgrade my blog to allow for bigger pics! hopefully soon…)

Tigs Creations Photography

I looooove this one.. you’re both so happy and smiley, this is really how I know you :-))

Tigs Creations Photography

I think Vivaan was getting tired.. oh no… wait…. ;)

Tigs Creations Photography

haha! so FUN! I sure would like to know where Vivaan gets all his energy from..!! ;-)

Vini and JK – it really was a blast to spend the morning with you and to capture all those images that are rare in a photographer’s family.. I’m so glad we went out and braved the rain! Hope you love your sneak peek, I can’t wait to share all the images with you :-)

Posted in family, sneak peek | Also tagged den haag, family, lifestyle, natalie carstens, park, portrait photographer, portrait session, portraits, professional photographer, sneak peek, the hague 14 Comments

cheese and laughs for vin, tin, tigs and sandra!

By Natalie | Published 13 July 2009

It’s always great to get together with others that share the same passion – and in this case, our passion is most definitely photography, and you will see from the photos in this post, that we (Vinita, Tineke, Sandra, and me… Tigs!) like to combine photography with lots of fun and laughter! Do you remember when Vin, Tin and Tigs went to Utrecht?

Btw. I love the way that sounds – Vin, Tin and Tigs – thanks to Sandra for that, since I pinched it from her blog post title ;) I also pinched ‘cheese and laughs’ from Tin’s blog post title, because that sums our day up quite nicely! Hope they don’t mind!

Tigs Creations Photography

So, where to start… well, this time we all met up in Gouda to visit the cheese market. Whilst wandering the old parts of the city we managed to stumble upon a ‘secret garden’ where we had much fun creating self-portraits and pulling silly faces to each other – we’re all big kids at heart! After our play in the secret garden we stopped for lunch at a fabulous bagel shop to feast on delicious bagels and unfortunately we ran out of time to taste their incredibly delicious cheeeeeeesecake that Vinita had been tempting us with for so long, lucky for us, we got it all packed up nicely for us to enjoy back at Vinita’s home :-) yum! I’ve never tasted cheesecake soooo gooooood!

Tigs Creations Photography