Happy Valentine’s Day

In the spirit of Cupid, the god of desire, affection and love, I spent an afternoon capturing the beauty, playfulness, and intimate looks of three beautiful models at Creative Concept Studios.

Happy Valentines Day

Happy Valentines Day

As of late I have been spending more and more time in the studio  and having a lot of fun working with both seasoned models and those who are hustling to increase their portfolio.  I have been working on not just getting my light source off the camera, but using it to create mood, feeling and emotion.

In doing so I have really come to love not only the interaction with the models and of course the photography, but also the post processing and the sharing with you guys.  In the past I had never really been a huge Photoshop user.  Not that I ever had anything against it, I just preferred to not edit my photos to the length and time that Photoshop can take.  But recently I have realized that Photoshop is just so much fun and offers endless possibilities in creativity.

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Back to the Afterglow Mausoleum

It never ceases to amaze me all the fascinating structures we came across while we were sailing around the Pacific North West. But by far the Afterglow Mausoleum ranks up there in the top 5 of these finds.

As the story goes McMillin had this built to honor his family.  The entire structure is symbolic.  The winding stairs, the number of pillars, the seats, etc.  My favorite would be the intentionally broken pillar which represents mans unfinished work.  According to literature the structure was intended to have a dome ceiling, but I can’t recall at the moment why it was left open.

Getting to the mausoleum is a short hike through the woods on a very well groomed  trail.  The trail head starts at a cemetery and ends at the mausoleum about a mile back through a very serene forest.  I have only had the opportunity to visit twice now, but would love to come back and photograph this amazing structure again.

Afterglow Mausoleum

Afterglow Mausoleum

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Springtime in January

It doesn’t seem to matter how long I live here, Texas weather just amazes me.  For the second time this month we have been blessed with a mid 70 degree day.  This time I made sure to take a couple hours for myself and go out to the park for some photography.  I have been wanting to shoot mountain bikers and climbers for some time now.  Fortunately for me I live near many bike trails.

River Legacy Mountain Biker

River Legacy Mountain Biker

Equipment: Nikon D700, Nikon 70-300
Post Processing: Aperture, Nik Color Efex Pro, Photoshop
 

My experience today taught me that like most other aspects of photography, when you think your close enough, get closer.  I got a few shots that I feel are all right, but I definitely picked up some knowledge and can’t wait to go back out and see if my next attempt brings home a few more keepers.  If it does what I think it will for the images I will write up a post on it.

River Legacy Mountain Biker

River Legacy Mountain Biker

Equipment: Nikon D700, Nikon 70-300
Post Processing: Aperture, Nik Color Efex Pro, Photoshop
 

The hardest part of the day was the battle within myself.  To take photos, or to ride.  I don’t get out on the trail nearly as much as I use to, and photographing these guys sure didn’t make that any easier.  :)

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New Years Resolutions

How many people do you know who make New Years resolutions?

I usually don’t simply because I know that for the most part they just don’t stick.

Nope, I am a list person.  And not just a beginning of the year list person, I make them all year long.  I create them and they usually become living documents that grow as one completed item regenerates into two or more.  But this year while listening to my family and coworkers discuss their resolutions I did a little soul searching, looking for what I may want for myself and my family so we may have an even better 2012 than 2011.

What I want is more vacations more events and just more time together.  These don’t have to be exotic or expensive.  Just not the normal sit at home honey do weekends.

Of course these thoughts of fun with family made me look through many of the photos I took on our vacation this last summer and find so many images that I haven’t yet shared with you.  So until I can go capture something new and cross another location off this list I wanted to share a few more from our last trip.

Roche Harbor Washington, I simply love this place.  There is so little to do that can take so much time at such a relaxing pace to get done.  I could easily sit on the dock for hours enjoying a hot cup of coffee and sharing stories with friends or family.  Peering down into the crystal clear ocean watching starfish and crabs searching for their lunch.  I’m not sure why, but I feel like I could just hang out in this little community for a month.  Our Lady of Good Voyage Chapel is a very small church located just a rocks throw up the street from the hotel and the few little shops that occupy Roche Harbor.  It is only open on Sundays and for special occasions.  It’s a very simple church that in some ways reminds me of my growing up.  Enjoy.

Our Lady of Good Voyage Chapel

Our Lady of Good Voyage Chapel

Equipment: Nikon D700, Nikon 24 – 70
Post Processing: Aperture, Nik HDR Efex Pro, Nik Color Efex Pro, Photoshop
 

Additional shots from Washington can be seen in my gallery.

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Wooing Wed Widing Hood

This last weekend my daughter performed in her first school play.  As is the norm I was as close as I could be with my camera in hand.  And as is also the norm my youngest only gave me about 10 minutes of shooting before making it well known that he was no longer happy to be sitting in his stroller watching this soon to be summoned to Broadway play.

Since I was only able to grab a handful of shots I decided I would process them with the newly released Topaz Adjust and have a little fun with it.  Having adjustment brushes built into the new app was definitely handy.  But I did find myself still going to Photoshop for some of the clean up.

Wooing Wed Riding Hood

Wooing Wed Riding Hood

I chose to push the edgy look a little more on the guys while leaving the girls a little softer.  I really like the look and it was really super easy using the Topaz software.  I still believe this is one of the best plug ins you can by for the price.

Wooing Wed Riding Hood

Wooing Wed Riding Hood

You can check out the rest of the images in my gallery.

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A Thanksgiving to be Festive

What a wonderful holiday Thanksgiving is.  A time to reflect on everything in your life to be thankful for.  For me I am most thankful for my family and the time I get to be with them.  After having the traditional Thanksgiving dinner at home last year with hours of cooking and an equal number of hours watching football Christmas specials I pitched the idea that we consider using our four day weekend next year to take a trip.  As we came closer and closer to this day of thanks we began making our preparations to attend the Texas Renaissance Festival for their Celtic Christmas Celebration.

The whole family loves Ren Fests and this looked to be an optimal scenario to travel down to south Texas  to partake.  We began our Journey on Thursday at a leisurely pace stopping frequently as there was absolutely no need for us to rush.  The only discouraging factor in our travels was the very limited number of options we had for Thanksgiving Dinner.

The Texas Renaissance Festival was absolutely fantastic.  In so many ways it dwarfed Scarby to the extent that it is going to be difficult to not expect more when we return this spring.  The number of shops alone was awesome and so very time consuming to muddle through.  But the increased number also provided a huge selection in both quality and price.

I didn’t fire off as many exposures as I had wanted and with the very wet, windy and cold weather that fell upon us on Saturday I opted to just leave the camera in the car.  It was nice being able to just enjoy the fest and spend time with the kids.

Texas Renaissance Festival Joust

Texas Renaissance Festival Joust

Additional photos can be seen in my portfolio.  More to be added shortly.

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A Celebration of Harvest

This year was so busy that we just didn’t have time to get the kids out to a pumpkin patch.  This was a bit unfortunate as we all wanted to spend a relaxing day goofing off, finding a nice pumpkin for carving, wandering through a corn maze.  But with the planning of a killer 13th Birthday Party for Ariana, a Boo Bash school dance, Band performances, Halloween and the planning for Brady’s second birthday bounce house celebration the time just seemed to escape us.

So while most people are working on their Christmas sets I have spent my time throwing together a quick harvest theme to get some shots of the little ones.  Well the littlest one anyway.  Must be the age but the 13 year old didn’t seem as interested as she use to.

My fear was that Brady would only give me his normal thirty to sixty second of attention before he would lose interest and want to take off.  To my surprise he seemed to actually enjoy this set.  Might have been the joy of throwing gourds at the photographer.

Brady Harvest

Brady Harvest Photo

Equipment: Nikon D700, Nikon 24 – 70
Post Processing: Aperture, Nik Color Efex Pro, Photoshop, OnOne Perfect Photo Suite 6
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