Maternity is Beautiful

I've been wanting to do a Maternity Photo Session for a long time, even while being afraid to suggest the idea to potential customers. I just haven't known how it would be received ... or, for lack of experience, how it would even turn out.

Saturday was my first ever attempt at this sort of thing and I am so pleased with how it turned out that I had to ask Jennifer if she would allow me to post them publicly. She, without hesitation, said yes ... telling me that they turned out more beautiful than she could have hoped for.

And so here I am posting the images on my blog so that you, too, can see just how beautiful pregnancy can be.

A note to the photographers out there: All of these images were done with natural light coming through a bay window in her home. Some of the images used a reflector to bounce the window light.

Thanks go out to our wonderful model Jennifer and her beautiful family. And thanks again for allowing me to post these pictures.

Kristina Baskett - U of U Gymnastics

Confession time!

I don't know much about gymnastics other than I love to watch it during the Olympics. I don't know the rules, I don't know the traditions, I don't know what makes a good gymnast good. WHAT I DO KNOW is there are some people that are just FUN TO WATCH.

There are some gymnasts who, when they finish their routine, they may or may not get high scores, but I find I just don't care. There are others who, if I could watch them "all over again", they would totally make my day.

One such gymnast is Kristina Baskett. I saw her last night. I was touched. I can officially say, I love this girl! She has grace and style and an excellence that earns her top scores in one of the highest scoring teams in the nation. I could watch her all over again and enjoy the experience more and more each time.

Now admittedly, at some 30 rows up, we didn't have the best seats in the house (how I would love to be down on the floor!), but I had my trusty sports shooter Canon 1D Mark III with a long Canon 100-400 f/4-5.6L IS lens. It's a relative slow lens (which meant shooting higher ISO than I would have liked), but the length of the lens let me get some decent shots even from high above.

On to the pictures!


The very first thing that I noticed right off the bat watching Kristina was that I love her lines. My daughter asked what I meant by that. My answer is the way she holds her body. Everything seems to be on purpose. Fully extended, or bent whichever way, it's like poetry in motion.

Just ... take a look!


Even while her arm is fully extended (seemingly drawing attention to that part of her body), even her feet and toes are purposely posed.


Again, watch the fingers and toes.


And what a gymnast! Such grace AND power! Pardon me for not expecting her to leap so high that I cut off her fingers! (but again, fingers, toes, leg position)


And talk about fun to watch! :)


Wow, I would love to be where those photographers are sitting!


Well deserved hugs from her teammates!


Shoulders, hands, toes. I love watching her!








She won me over with her smile!


Super girl! She flies!!! :)


I could almost swear she caught me looking at her!


I'll say it again. I love her lines!


So much fun!






More well deserved hugs!


Top scoring gymnast of the evening!


Go Kristina! GO UTES!

Do you agree with me? I think she's definitely worth watching. I would love to see her again. I'll be routing for her!

Cool video link I found: Meet Kristina Baskett

More pictures of Kristina and many others can be found on my website.

Utah State Capitol - Before / After Lightroom

I love Adobe Lightroom and use it on all of my images. But most of the images I produce are probably closer to straight out of the camera with small tweaks rather than highly modified representations of the image.

Well, tonight I was playing around a little bit with the gradient adjustment layer in Lightroom and thought I'd show off the results of a before/after edit session. It's still nothing too fancy, but it's certainly different from the original:



Both of the above images are from a single raw image processed by Lightroom. The one on the left is just a standard conversion of the capture. The one on the right contains a few more tweaks:

- A couple of gradients were used to lighten the center and darken the top and bottom.

- Another gradient adds some blue to the sky

- Yet another gradient adds some yellow to center of the image (from the capitol building on down)

- While the first includes some Clarity and Saturation, the second uses a lot more Clarity and a little more Saturation.

The images were then brought into photoshop to resize and place them side by side.

Whatdya think? Do you prefer the more hazy picture on the left? Or the brighter, more well defined picture on the right?

LDS Draper Utah Temple at Sunrise

Two nights ago I visited the LDS (Mormon) Draper Utah Temple and took pictures at night. While I liked the pictures, I really missed having something, anything at all, up in the sky. So I returned back to the temple this morning, just before sunrise, and took these pictures:



















More pictures of the Draper Utah Temple.
Pictures of other LDS Temples.

LDS Draper Utah Temple

I had a chance to drive up to the LDS (Mormon) Draper Utah Temple this evening and take a few pictures. It was pitch black outside, perhaps not the most ideal time for picture taking. But I'll be sure to return for more pictures later. In the mean time, check out the ones I got:













Future images of the Draper Temple (and others) will be available on my website here:
LDS Temples

Working with a model - Shona Barnthouse

Standard portraiture from the point of the photographer, often involves providing a lot of direction ... look this way, chin up, face towards me, hands in your lap, etc. But working with a model, especially an experienced model, can be relaxing and often is just downright fun! The main difference being that both of you have some concept as to what is involved in "creating the image".

I recently had the privilege of working with a model. While her needs for this photo shoot were simple (nothing more than a head shot or two), we still had a bit of fun playing with a couple of different styles. Below is a collage of several of the head shots we came up with during this session:

Blowing a kiss

One of my favorite images from the photo shoot the other day is somewhat abstract in that the model's face is not in focus. Instead, the tips of her fingers as she was blowing a kiss were what I focused on. And using f/3.5 at that close range meant that very little was in focus beyond the tips of her fingers.

For this image, I used a Canon 580EX II on camera as master (but not contributing to the exposure). Another 580EX II on a light stand with an umbrella on it as my main light. And a third 580EX II with a green gel on it pointing at a white background.

Canon 5D Mark II plus Canon 85mm 1.2L Lens

Wow... what a combo!

I picked up the Canon 85mm 1.2L lens the other day. Yesterday was my first real chance to use it. And I must say... what a combo the 5D Mark II with it's 21mp resolution and the Canon 85mm 1.2L lens make. Just take a look at this image and the 100% crop below it and draw your own conclusions:


(21mp image - reduced size to fit here)


(100% crop)

All I can say is ... I'm in love with this combo. I've never had or played with a sharper lens.