Cousins!! Childrens' Portrait Photography in the Bay Area

Hi Everyone!

Wow... it was a BUSY month of May and June is shaping up to be just as crazy. We were all sick around here, with Malin getting pneumonia and Eiley an ear infection that ruptured her eardrum. I also attended a 3 day lighting workshop at the Golden Gate School with a fantastic instructor, Andre Constantini (it deserves a post of it's own so I'll have more on the workshop later!) And there has been a ton portrait work going on around here so let me update you on all the cute kids and families I've been working with.

So in this post, let's take a look at what's more fun than a barrel of monkeys... 4 little girls between the ages of 2-5.. 2 with bright purple twirly skirts and 2 with ringlets and Aussie accents. I had sooo much fun photographing these brothers' families at the park yesterday. Check them out!

First... our family visiting from down under...



the tongue sticking out thing was really popular yesterday.





And our local family of 4..



this little one is a total mini-me of her mom



and this little monkey totally reminded me of Eiley... a total spitfire..



and the award for 'face of the day'... well I think it's pretty obvious who won that one...

testing color space

Childrens and Babies Studio Portraits in San Francisco

Last week, I had the pleasure of doing a fabulous shoot at the Appel and Frank 'Babes and Babies' event with Kim at Mill Cottage Kids Photography. We photographed 22 families and had the best time! I can't wait until the next show. Here are just a taste of the images...

San Francisco engagement portraits!

it's been forever! but i think i have plenty of excuses... the top 2 being we spent a week at disneyland and i'm recovering from pneumonia (i'm on my 4th round of antibiotics!)... yuck... but at least it meant we went to front of the lines at the mouse's house since i was stuck in one of those electric buggies the entire time...

so i have lots and lots of images to post in the coming days. but first, let me introduce you to julie and bobby. i had such a wonderful time with them out near the golden gate bridge at sunset doing their 'engagement' session (they're already married since they eloped a few months ago!). here's a little sneak peak of the happy couple!

studio portraits

tonight, we had a BLAST in the studio. taylor and her roommate from college, brooke, came home for the weekend and they were gracious enough to volunteer their time while i tried out some new lighting set ups. sooo much fun and there were WAY too many good images! i seriously could post 50+. on the first pass, the images SCREAMED for black and white (i'll post some color images over the next few days as well). these girls are just so darn beautiful, not to mention sweet and funny. and they tolerated (and maybe even enjoyed) the 80's music i played!

Nikon D300 - DSLR Camera Review

So I've had the D300 for about 8 months now and I thought I'd share with you guys a few of the things I like about it. I seriously love the camera. the highlights...

- great great color. when i've properly exposed an image, the color is really quite fabulous, even in RAW
- the automatic white balance feature is almost always right on. i very very rarely have to tweak it and if so, it's just a taste issue and not a real issue with the WB.
- with the battery grip and second battery, it seems like the battery lasts forever. i can go days and days and days without charging the batteries. and because of this, i often have to remind myself to do so. definitely better battery life than my old d70.
- i like that it doesn't have all the preset modes (portrait, action, landscape, etc). since i purchased the camera, i have only shot in manual. however, because of this, i wouldn't recommend this camera to a casual user. i actually need to start working with the P and A modes more so i can become more comfortable with them.
- the LCD screen is huge and well illuminated. (though sometimes it's a bit brighter than the actual RAW image so i end up under exposing if i'm not careful)
- i love the histograph features that allow me to immediately see the hot spots and tweak my exposure. the d70's histograph is really limited and while it does have the highlight display, it doesn't have all of the color channels so some blowouts don't show up until post processing.
- i'm in love with nikon's off camera flash system. it is so freakin easy with the in camera control. yes, the d70 and some of the other lower end models have it as well, but i didn't use it until i started working with the d300. love it.
- not the d300 (and kim will argue with me on this) but i love nikon glass. just love it. once you get to the higher end lenses, they are just so freakin sharp. but even my little $100 50 mm is tack sharp.

like i said, i love this camera. and i think i'll probably write another review in a few more months after i've become even more familiar with all the features. and there are seriously way too many! i do wish that it was full frame. but you can't have everything and it's not like nikon doesn't offer full frame, it just costs more than my current budget. other than this, the rare annoyance i have with the d300 is almost always user error.... and no expensive camera is going fix that!

photographs from the san francisco zoo

today, kim convinced me to skip out on 'work' and meet her over at the san francisco zoo. thanks, kim for calling this morning! so i loaded the girls up and headed to the zoo. i almost didn't bring my camera, thinking kim would probably have hers. but i'm so glad i did. i didn't take a ton of pictures, but i did get a few of my favorite animals... giraffes, zebras, and lions. so enjoy something a little different!