Photos, faces and medicine intrigue WVHS senior

WARWICK, NY Warwick Valley High School senior Nicole Kellan got her start in photography using her mother’s camera to shoot yearbook photos as a freshman in North Carolina. She’s been shooting for the WVHS yearbook for the past three years but recently started working on portrait photography.

“Portrait photography is my favorite,” Nicole said. “There’s just something about capturing emotions on the face that’s special. You can play around with an artistic view in portrait photography. I just love how you can take all different angles and there’s just so many ways to play around with portraits.”

Nicole has been trying to get out and learn different types of photography. She did a fashion shoot for a local boutique and plans to start dance photography with one of her friends soon.

“Nicole is a talented photographer who is not afraid to try new things,” WVHS art teacher Kristen Spano said. “She is constantly researching new techniques that she could apply to her photography. Just this past week, she experimented with gels to make her portraits dramatically lit with red and blue lighting.”

Nicole enjoys taking photos for the yearbook because being at events and games gives her a way to connect with the school community and to spend time with her friends. Seeing her photos published in the yearbook and getting people’s reactions to them is another benefit.

This year Nicole is the editor of the yearbook as well as secretary of the Interact Club and a member of the Warwick Valley Drama Club stage crew.

“As the lead editor, Nicole is in charge of designing pages, color schemes and layouts for the entire yearbook,” yearbook advisor Therese McLoughlin said. “In fact, she came up with this year’s theme.”

Nicole plans to minor in photography at High Point University in North Carolina. She’s going to major in exercise science and then hopefully become a physician assistant.

To prepare for that field, Nicole took Principles of Biomedical Science last year and is currently taking Human Body Systems, where she recently dissected a kidney.

“I’ve long been interested in the medical field and after doing an abundance of research, a physician’s assistant just seems like the perfect field for me,” said Nicole, who earned Magna Cum Laude honors for the first two marking periods. “But I hope to be able to do photography on the side while working in a hospital.”