First Look: Baby Keller!

Wedding: Daphne and Johnny, Admiral Kidd Club, October 28, 2011

Gorgeous blue skies graced Daphne and Johnny's beautiful wedding at the Admiral Kidd Club next to the San Diego Bay. I was incredibly touched by how much devotion and tenderness these two people showed for each other, as well as the outpouring of love from all the gathered friends and family.

The Bride's niece takes a quick peak in the mirror as Daphne adjusts her veil.

I set up a bit of off-camera flash to really make the blue sky pop out on their portraits. What a beautiful day!
I just love how much warmth Daphne has in her smile. :)

A distinguished picture of Johnny next to the evening sky.

Portraits: Steve

Took this awesome portrait of Steve earlier this week, whole setup was crowded in the corner of our living room after we got the baby to bed. The crystal skull is actually a bottle of Crystal Head Vodka (with the top removed in post-processing), an awesome gift from Steve's sister. Apparently the vodka is filtered three times through Herkimer diamonds before being bottled in order to infuse it with the same spiritual qualities as the original crystal heads. Steve is, of course, a gentleman and a scholar, so it had to be included to help push the portrait a bit more over the top. :)

First Look: Daphne and Johnny, October 28th 2011

Portraits: Kev, Balboa Park

hew! I know it's a been a while in between postings. I've been working on writing/illustrating a children's book as part of a personal project and am finally finished! Now back to photos and all that fun. :)

Took some portraits of Steve's friend Kev a few weeks ago in Balboa park. Steve and Gwinna came along and we had a blast!

Ah yes, very dramatic :)
This shot uses a cool post-processing technique I recently saw in Scott Kelby's seminar Light It, Shoot It, Retouch It, LIVE. Can't get over Kev's guns in this shot.

Gwinna, One Year

My baby turned one year old today. It's so hard to believe that already a year has passed, and that she's walking around and exploring her world with more joy and excitement than I'd ever thought possible. As other parents all knew would happen before she arrived, this year has been an incredible whirlwind for Steve and myself. We soon realized that between the exhaustion of day-to-day tasks, a ten-fold increase in family visits, and the occasional sleepless night that our previous hobbies and interests were set upon the back burner, or perhaps taken completely out of the kitchen and unceremoniously dumped onto the back porch along with a somewhat neglected cat. But on the other hand, we have a tremendously happy and healthy child who wakes up each morning with a huge smile, ready to start her day. I really can't ask for any better inspiration or reward than that. :)

More family visits!

This week we had several visitors from my mom's side of the family. I took the opportunity to do a couple of portraits while they were in town, excepting for my cousin Kendall who refused to pose. Since I am a nice person I am choosing not to post the photo of him cowering on the couch with his face hidden from the camera. ;)

But first, the obligatory photo of Gwinna with her first pair of shoes, looking a bit sunburned after spending several hours at the park.

I told my uncle I wanted a couple of serious shots of him, probably because my family has a really difficult time taking serious shots (most of the time we're beating each other up or sticking fingers up each other's noses while posing for the camera). He kindly humored me while I dragged him down to the bottom of my mom's canyon and set up my flash through an umbrella to get the different lighting effects. :) My cousin Christina, posing with the same umbrella but inside the house. We've done a fun photoshoot during each of her visits during the last couple of years, but between chasing after a toddler and the short nature of their visit this time we just did a few portraits with dramatic directional light instead.