Gratuitous use of f/1.4

Last weekend my friend Trevor and I headed down south to Savannah to visit David.  After a Friday night out until 5:30am (including late night sushi at 4am), we decided to spend all day Saturday hanging out at his house cooking, eating, and drinking.  I originally brought my camera for historic downtown Savannah shots, but it was much easier to just be lazy and take pictures around his place instead.  I intentionally brought only my 50mm f/1.4 and left my 15mm, 24-70mm, and 70-200 at home.  I figured it would force me to use my new fixed 50mm lens.  Photographers (myself included) get caught in the lazy trap of only shooting with zooms because they're so convenient, even when prime lenses can capture some great shots (especially in low light).

Zoo Atlanta

Keri has been working her butt off lately, so a couple of weeks ago we both decided to take a day off and do Atlanta-y things.  The weather was perfect, so we rode bikes around Decatur, took a stroll through Oakland Cemetery (much more interesting and educational than it sounds), and ate at Sun in my Belly, Six Feet Under, and Caroll Street Cafe.  We also figured we'd go somewhere that we haven't been since elementary school- the Zoo. All in all a fun filled day that included french toast, graves, and pandas... very few days incorporate all of these things.

Keri and I experienced a very Hitchcock moment at the bird exhibit.  If you've ever been, you know all the bright colorful birds in the first few photos below are in a big netted and gated area that you can walk through.  We were with a bunch of other people for the first few minutes watching the birds and hearing all the cacophonous chirping.  However, as soon as the other people left Keri and I alone in there, all of the chirping stopped for about 10 seconds.... we thought were were about to be attacked.  Luckily the chirping started again as the birds knew they wouldn't get away with it.  :)

And of course, the baby panda. 

Furtah / Lindbloom Wedding

Sometimes I wonder if I pack my schedule too much. Three weeks ago I was in Denver for a business trip on a Monday. I flew from there to Seattle on Tuesday. I had meetings and building tours and flew back to Atlanta on Thursday afternoon. I landed in Atlanta with just enough time to get home and shower before I drove to Annes Furtah's rehearsal dinner for photos in Marietta. I woke up the next day, went to my day job, then left to go shoot the wedding. I had a ton of fun with Anne and Mike, took a bunch of photos, and as usual was tired as hell afterward!  Then woke up the next morning to drive to Birmingham with my band to play a show where we didn't go on stage until 11:30pm. I really can't complain because I love all of it, but let's just say I slept very well that Sunday night.

Now, enough about my life- let's talk about the photos! Alexis at the Whitlock Inn does a great job with the venue and arrangements and helped make Anne and Mike's wedding a great success. Not only did I get to have fun at the wedding with everyone, but I was also lucky enough to be part of Anne and Mike's rehearsal dinner, which gave me a chance to meet the families and friends in a much more relaxed setting than the craziness of a wedding. I'll let the photos tell the story for you. Be sure to click the "continue reading" link below the first photo for more!

The flower girls referred to me as "the Paparazzi."

The reveal.  Always a fun moment for those not afraid to break tradition.

The ring bearer (a.k.a. James Bond)

New Wedding Book Widget

Neat-o!  For those unfamiliar with what a widget is, it's really just a neat little toy that bloggers use on their site.  And this little guy displays books that I've designed!  See below for a preview of the book I did for Celina and Jesse Campion last fall.  I don't have any orders for more books as of right now, but when I do I'll show them off here.  :)

Celina and Jesse 2

Natalie Perry and Keri Mercer (the younger one)

The weather last weekend was amazing here in Atlanta.  Though fall is my official favorite season, Spring is a close second...

And starting off this spring was Natalie Perry's baptism on Sunday.  You may remember this beautiful baby from this post last fall.  These photos were taken from the second row at the Clairmont Presbyterian Church as we were considered "VIPs" for the occasion.  Though we didn't get backstage passes, Natalie was definitely a rock star (if you can say that about someone in church). 

Apparently Natalie loves bath time and was intruigued by the holy water. 

Later in the day Keri and I went to her niece's birthday party.   I think it would be an awesome goal in life to have someone name their baby after me- and my girlfriend already has that.  Keri's niece is Keri ("baby Keri" as she is referred to, though I can't imagine she'll like that nickname in her teenage years).  She turned 6 on Sunday and had a massive cake that looked like it was straight out of Fern Gully:

mmmmm cupcakes....

Sidewalk chalk is always a messy, dirty, pant ruining  fun bday present.

The birthday girl:

Bianca:

Brevard, NC with Keri and Mimi

Two weekends ago, Keri and I drove to Brevard, NC to visit my grandmother.   Brevard has recently become a vacation destination for "leaf lookers" in the fall as it is nestled in a valley in the Appalachian mountains.  In addition to getting to see Brevard and Mimi, Keri and I also had just enough time on the way home to go on a 2 hour hike in the DuPont national forest.  It's pretty amazing to be able to see 3 very impressive waterfalls in a just a couple of hours. I brought my new (used) camera along with a  plan to test it out along with my new (new) 50mm f/1.4.  Overall, very happy with the performance of the camera and lens, but still wishing I had a better eye for landascape and night photography.   I'll let you judge for yourself (all 4 readers).  I think the waterfall pix would have looked better at sunrise, but I'm too in love with sleeping to go see something at the crack of dawn that I can see at the crack of 2pm...

Also found that my fisheye lens is a real fisheye on the full frame 5d.   Here's Looking Glass falls in Brevard:

Don't know why, but I found this random streetlight and snowpile to be interesting...

One of the life-sized toy soldiers through the window at O.P. Taylor's Toystore in downtown.

Photos of Rocky's soda shop after hours.  This is one of the places Mimi would hang out after school.

The stars above Mimi's house (click on photo for larger view):

Triple Falls in the DuPont National Forest:

And of course, yet another "please don't take a photo of me" photo of Keri.  She loves these:

Studio Shoot with Lou

Two weekends ago I had the pleasure of shooting a good friend in a makeshift studio in his living room.  Though Lou and I work together at Wells Real Estate Funds, we both have outside endeavors and passions that just happen to involve blogs.  My blog of course is all about photography and his is an inspirational site based on self betterment.  As he puts it, the Lou Davis blog is about "becoming the best version of himself" through various life challenges and goals. Lou was looking for some new photos for his blog and I was recently inspired by Zack Arais' blog about white seamless backgrounds, so I figured I should give it a try to push myself beyod my usual "available light" photography bounds.   Lou and I met for brunch at Ria's Bluebird Cafe and from there went to PPR to pick up the background.  I usually do my local Atlanta shopping at Showcase, but for some reason PPR was $25 cheaper for the exact same background.  From there we went to Lowe's to pick up a sheet of tileboard and (very poorly) secured it to the roof of my car.  Luckily we were only headed half a mile.

Lou was a good sport as I spent so much time screwing around with settings that I neglected to give him good direction.  Luckily he was a natural model, even if he needed a little direction from the peanut gallery (a few friends drinking and playing poker in the kitchen).

Here's a shot of the setup in Lou's living room.  White seamless on my background stand with one softbox on the right loaded with my Canon 580EX.  Also had a Vivitar 285 flash on a chair aimed at the background (though it's hidden by blue cardboard as to not spill light onto Lou).  Ideally I would have had 2 flashes aimed at the background, but the Canon 420 EX I borrowed from a friend unfortunately didn't have any manual settings, so it was of no use firing only at full power.

Here are some of the final photos, starting with my favorite:

Hi- I'm a Mac:

...And I'm a PC:

Photo Booth!

Our good friend Greg turned 28 last weekend and his wife was clever enough to come up with the gift that involves snorkeling or scuba diving at the Georgia Aquarium with sharks, stingrays, and the like.  It's a pretty awesome idea and I know he's excited.   To celebrate this surprise gift, we threw him an ocean themed birthday party. I just happened to have purchased a new Westcott Apollo Softbox and black muslin backdrop recently, so I figured we'd try a photo booth out.  People at the party were weary at first, but with a few blue punch drinks and some water-themed props, they loosened up quickly.  Here are the best of's starting with our good friend, Curt:

Erin:

Greta:

Chris and Greta:

And Keri and I (not ocean-themed).

Happy New Year!

It's been a while since I've posted, which means I've been a lazy photographer.  I brought my camera to all of the holiday festivities but it never left the bag.  I'm so ashamed...  but it's a new year and there are new goals for 2010!  One of which is to shoot more photos just for fun.  In fact, tonight my plan is to meet a wedding client, head home, bundle up, and grab my camera and tripod for some evening/night and snow photos.   It's going to be really cold, but I bet I can get a few good shots before I freeze to death.  If you're in the Decatur area and see a guy with icicles forming from his tripod, please come bring me a hot chocolate. I did have time for a few holiday-ish photos for some friends.  The first few are from Piedmont park a few weekends ago with the Rosetti's.  The next few are of the Browns and their new "kids."

And as a bonus here's a holiday card one of my clients designed on my proof website from a shoot we did in the summer.  I think it turned out pretty cool.  :)

Boston Globe - 2009's Best Of "The Big Picture"

If I didn't like my family & friends as much as I do, I would have loved to become a photojournalist right out of college working for AP/Getty/NatGeo/Reuters.   These photographers travel the world and take a whole crapload of photos.   Not just photos, but photos that are truly breathtaking- sometimes because of the photo itself, but oftentimes because of a subject that people don't see in their everyday world.  In reality, I wouldn't have been able to pull it off due to lack of skills, low pay, constant travelling to 3rd world countries, and the possibility of losing a foot (see Part 1 below). However, not all of the photos on these lists were taken by professionals.  In fact, one of the shots was taken by a girl who normally does party pix here in Atlanta (see the canoe photo in Part 3).  I know if I'm ever going to be on this list I really need to get out and shoot more.  I need to stop waiting on photo "gigs" and just look for photos.   I need to carry my camera with me more often.  I need to be ready to get my hands dirty and take pictures of anything interesting- or really anything that I can make interesting.  Maybe a good New Years resolution?  Who's with me?!

Enjoy:

The Big Picture- Part 1

The Big Picture- Part 2

The Big Picture- Part 3

And a bonus- the best news photos of the decade.

Help-Portrait Today!

Today is Help-Portrait! I'm blogging on-site to give all 3 readers of my blog an update. Things here are going great! I'm at the post-processing table for a while working in Lightroom. It's been so much fun getting to meet and talk with photogs from all over Atlanta.

Most of the families we're taking pix of are associated with Families First Midtown. Families First is an organization that helps families with everything including foster child adoption, family counseling, helping homeless new mothers, and a number of other issues. It's a really awesome organization that helps all over Atlanta.

We've had a bunch of families through here getting their pix done. Overall the Atlanta Help-Portrait is expecting.400+ families at the 5 locations. There are definitely some cute kiddies around here.

That's all for now. Hope to have some behind the scenes shots up next week!

My Cousin's Wedding

Over Thanksgiving, my family and I had the opportunity to  stay a condo on the beach in Florida for the whole week.....  Needless to say we had a lot of fun with countless parties (and countless rum drinks). In addition to Thankgiving with the family, we were excited to be there and take part in my cousin Ceci's wedding.  Though I wasn't the official photog, I was able to snap a few shots of "getting ready."  I also snapped a few from my seat at the wedding.   Here's what I got that day:

Adita & Luis:

Mariana & Tina:

The ring and dress detail:

Help Portrait - December 12th

I'm on my way to Amelia Island right now with Keri and her dad.  Kind of neato that I can do a blog post in the car (I know I'm so out of touch thinking this is a new concept). I wanted to post about my recent news that I've signed up for Help-Portrait Families First in Midtown Atlanta.  Help-Portrait is a way for photographers to give back to their communities.  On December 12th a number of photogs all over the world will be participating in finding families in need, taking their photos, printing them for free, then delivering them.  I think it'll be a really fun way to brighten these families' lives around the holidays.

Check out the video below.   You can see more info at www.help-portrait.com and it's not too late to sign up to help!  I think Atlanta alone is host to 5 Help-Portrait locations.

Also, if you have any interest in sponsoring a family for $10 (to cover the cost of prints), here is the link.

http://www.help-portrait-atlanta.com/donate/

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Ar8IxUsxR8

Baby Nattie- 3 Months

We were able to get this shoot done in an hour on my lunch break last week.   She was such a beautiful model!   :)  Here is baby Natalie.  Enjoy! Remember to click "Continue Reading" for more photos!

Picnic in the Park

These photos were also taken before my camera busted.  As an update, a repair shop called Camera Repair Japan is currently replacing the shutter and mirror mechanisms in my camera and should have it ready in a week or two (and SquareTrade will reimburse me).  Until then, still using my lenses on others' cameras. Here are Keri's nieces and nephew Hali, Maya, and Sean in Piedmont Park a few Sundays ago.    Just shooting around for fun because Sundays in the park in the fall are just so amazing...  fall is by far my favorite season.

Be sure to click "Continue Reading" below for more photos!

The whole gang:

With beautiful subjects, you really only need a few minutes.

Of course my typical portrait session is 1 to 2 hours and I enjoy every moment of photo taking.   However, this one was cut to just 15 minutes due to technical difficulties... as in my camera died 15 minutes into the shoot.  "ERROR99" is never a message you want to see on your pride and joy (I have no kids, so my camera holds the title of "pride and joy."  However if any of my kids ever get a tattoo that says "ERROR99" I'll have bigger problems). This is why I endorse (but get no endorsement commissions) SquareTrade.  They offer warranties for all types of electronics, including many used ones at 25% of the price other retailers offer.  I never thought I'd have to use a warranty, but now I'm really glad I got it.  SquareTrade says they'll have it for me in 5 business day.

But like I said, with beautiful subjects, you really only need a few minutes.  Here is the Giles Family.  Stephen, Kathy, Norah, and Caroline.  Enjoy!

Celina & Jesse - Married!

A good friend of mine from college was in town a few months ago.  We went out to dinner with his sister and I heard about how she was planning a wedding in Marietta.  The way I understood the story, her and her husband were recently married but due to his deployment in the middle-east, they were unable to have a true ceremony at the time.  Times are tough when your hubby is committed to his country.  To make matters worse, two days after our dinner she lost her job at Skirt Magazine.  So, needless to say they were on a budget.  And what better budget photographer than Alex the Photo Guy!  .....actually there are probably plenty of others, but I was delighted to be the chosen one.  ;) Despite the rain pushing the ceremony and photos inside the Whitlock Inn, we had a great time.  Celina was such a beautiful bride and the couple had a wonderful time at their wedding.   Plus- Celina found a great new job!  At www.getmarried.com of all places!  I think Celina and Alex the Photo Guy are going to become great friends.  :)

The beautiful bride (my favorite photo of the day):

The Don (Jesse) and his mafia:

A small scuffle broke out beforehand, but a beer bottle quickly ended it:

Hands down the coolest groom's cake I've ever seen.  Apparently this is what Jesse did in the military (click for more detail):

The groom and his best man (his brother):

Of course I had to put the older brother here checking on his sister:

The Bride and Groom table.  Despite people making plates of food for them, they never sat to eat.

The beautiful bridesmaids:

A tired couple off to their honeymoon in a fine Rolls Royce:

Evelyn

These were taken months ago and I just got around to finishing them up.  Evelyn is a co-worker of Keri and I.  She was approached by a friend of hers asking if she'd like to get into modeling.  Evi, being as modest as she is beautiful, was very reluctant to do it but after some convincing from friends and her husband she decided to look into head shots. This is where I came in.  I had never done true headshots before- just kid portraits (this shoot happened before the "Glow Atl" photos you can see a few entries down), so this was a freebie for a good friend.

In fact, I think I was paid in taco bell and asthma attacks.  An odd combination I know, but we did the shoot at Evi and Nathan's house in Buford.  I can usually control my allergies to her cats by taking Claratin and staying away, but when I get into "photographer mode" I move quick.  Moving quick leads to sweating, hightened heart rate, and increased breathing... which leads to increased allergies apparently.  Had to take a few breaks throughout the day- one of which for taco bell.

Without further ado, here is Evelyn.   Remember to click on the individual photos to get the full effect.  And don't worry, she's fully clothed in all of the photos-  just some creative angles.  :)

Corvette Museum

Nothing ground breaking here, just wanted to post some of my favorite photos from 4th of July weekend in Bowling Green KY.  It's late, I know, but I want the world (or my 3 friends) to see them.  :) These are from the world famous Corvette Museum.  AKA: The only thing in Bowling Green, KY.