K: Headshots

There is a little park down the street from my house that is just perfect for taking a few quick shots when we don't have time for a full-out session. I went out there last week with this handsome guy so that he could get a few head shot images for his modeling portfolio.






And this is K with his mom, Gina. Can you see where he gets his good looks?


Thanks guys! That was tons of fun.

Peace,
L

Funny Face

Me: "D, why do you look so sad? You should cheer up, nothing can be that bad."

D:


Me: That is the most pitiful face I've ever seen.

D:


Me: Well, you can sit here and make ugly faces all day all by yourself, or you can give me a smile so that we can go get ice cream with the littles. It's up to you.

D:


That's my girl!

Sharp & Co.

I ran down to my mom's flower shop this morning to do some quick shots of a few arrangements that she was working on. I only had about five minutes to do them because they were going into the delivery truck when I arrived.

My mom has a refrigerated display case, which is painted black on the side. I used that as the backdrop for this arrangement but I couldn't back up far enough to get the whole thing. Still, I think it looks pretty good:


This one was so pretty-I hope whoever received it likes it as much as I do:


This one would look great in my house:


I LOVE how this one turned out. This is just a shot I grabbed right before I left the shop of an arrangement that sits in front of the cash register. It looks almost like the painting I have over my sofa, but better. Now I'm beginning to think of printing and framing this puppy:


I think they all turned out quite nice- hopefully I'll find a spot for the images on the flower shop website once I've got it all laid out.

Every once in a while, I get the urge to head out the to the park to photograph my kids and their friends. My thinking is that it gives me the opportunity to practice my technique a bit without any pressure and I get to spend time with my friends at the same time. A while back, I did exactly that-well, sorta. I went with my MOMS Club to Landa Park for some duck feeding and playground playing, armed with a loaf of bread and a camera and psyched for awsome images of the kids.

Why doesn't anything seem to go as planned? As I've said before, I have a very hard time watching my kids and photographing at the same time. My mind just can't go in both places at once. So I got home, downloaded the images and, not being thrilled with them, forgot all about them until today.

For the last couple of days I've been cleaning up my hard drive-getting rid of images that I don't intend to keep, and so I took a second glace at the images from that day. Well hey-some of them aren't too bad.

This curly-haired little beauty is quickly becoming one of my daughter M's BFFs.


This is her mom, preparing to take a picture of her on the slide:

This is my version of the picture:

There is this little chair at the park which uses gravity and (I think) centrifugal force to spin. M thought is was so much fun because all you have to do is sit there, and it spins on its own. But it keeps going faster and faster. Just a few moments after this image was taken she was spinning out of control and screaming in terror-I think if I hadn't caught her in time she would have catapulted 10 feet, at least!

Of course, T had to try the chair from hell, with the hope of "flying like superman" but boring mom kept stopping him before he took flight. I think this image was taken as he was repeating "Mom, just let me go. I promise I won't get hurt." Yeah, right.

This one is a little dark, I could brighten it in Photoshop, but I usually reserve that step for photos that get printed.

So I'll continue to delete and move images, and maybe I'll come across a few more gems that I can post here.

Peace!
~L

Christina: Quinceanera

This past weekend I photographed a much anticipated event, anticipated both by me and one of my favorite mother/daughter duos of all time-Christina and Marie. Ladies, I think your bash was amazing in every way-the details, the love, the fun! Thank you from the bottom of my heart for allowing me to capture it for you. I cried a few tears, laughed a lot and had the best time, and I could tell by the looks on the faces of all of your guests that they had an amazing time too.

Enjoy your show!



Oh, and by the way, I know there are bunches of you watching Christina's show-she'd love to get some comments from you!

Baby G: Slideshow

I've been re-working the way I process my images after a shoot so that I can get through them faster than before, but it has taken me FOREVER to nail down the process and poor Casey has been patiently waiting for her slideshow all this time.

So Casey, I am so happy to finally release this to you. Enjoy!

Home

The following images are for my sister Andie, who lives far, far away and can't visit often enough.

My mom puts so much time and thought into her house, with decorator touches in every nook and cranny. I have a new lens (yea me!), and so I walked around yesterday testing it out and capturing all of the gorgeous little details.

I hope you like you like it Andie!

I have a WINNER

Oh my gosh, this contest was so hard to judge. I had so many fantastic enteries! The challange I gave was to come up with a creative Lifestyle session involving your family, and I had to pick the one that I most want to shoot.

You people did not disappiont me. Holy cow, I was blown away and I wish I could photograph them all at no charge. But there can only be one winner, so I'm thrilled to award Marilyn Peebles with the Grand Prize of a free session, plus all of the images on CD.

Here is Marilyn's winning entry:

We love Gruene, Texas. Prior to having kids, Jonah and I spent many weekends there listenting to live music and staying at the Gruene Mansion Inn for a mini-getaway. It is still a place we love to take the boys on Friday afternoons to listen to the sound checks at Gruene Hall or have a frosty beverage at the Grist Mill while the boys play in the open field. The kids love to get a scoop of ice cream or a candy stick from the General Store. So, I thought it would be fun to have a "Tour of Gruene" session, with pictures doing our favorite things there: dipping our toes in the river, eating ice cream on the stools at the General Store, playing pool with the boys and listening/dancing to music at the Gruene Hall, spinning under the stars in the open field by the Grist Mill, etc. I think it would be fun to celebrate our Texas roots with pictures with the boys in Gruene.

What I love about Marilyn's session idea is that absolutely everything I was looking for is here: a beautiful and interesting setting (its Gruene, for pete's sake!), various things to do that involve the entire family, and it is something that has history and meaning to the family. I can't wait to have these images for myself, can you imagine how special they'll be for Marilyn?

I want to give a huge THANKS to everyone that entered. There wasn't a single idea that I didn't want to photograph, so if anyone would like me to do their session I will give you a BIG discount. Huge. The only ones I can't do are those who requested a Halloween session, and that is because, well, I'll be photographing my own kids that night.

Congratulations Marilyn, I'll see you soon from behind my camera!

Walker: Lifestyle Session

I think I've photographed Casey 6 times now, and each time it gets better and better. Her baby girl is growing like a weed, a perfect flower really, and even though she started out a bit cranky, she really perked up after her bath.

Casey, here is a sneak peak. I'll have a slideshow posted very soon!

There is one day left to enter my Free Lifestyle Session contest. I've had some incredible entries so far, very imaginative and some of the session suggestions have brought tears to my eyes.

Keep 'em coming! The deadline is Friday, Sept. 5th at midnight.