Studio
I joined Shannon and Andy for a special shoot for their daughter Ailish’s first birthday. We started outside, where she was the perfect little model, beaming that big smile at the camera.
Then it was inside for some more big smiles.
And then the big moment - the cake smash! Well… Cake gingerly pick at, anyway.
Either way, pretty cute.
(I’m on the road a lot this month, so here’s another throwback post, to an amazing series of shoots that produced one of my favorite - and only - diptychs of my career.)
Early on, I was looking for some fun and different ways to use my studio set-up, and my friend Amanda suggested doing some photos of her yoga practice.
She ran through a variety of positions as I used a couple of different lighting setups.
It was a ton of fun. And an extra cool detail - when I did her maternity photos the following year, we made sure she hit a few of the same poses so we could get side by side comparisons.
Pretty awesome! We got other excellent maternity photos as well. (Though I probably like the ones we did for her second child better...)
Two really fun shoots!
During my slow season, I like to try to fit in a few projects that are fun and let me try something new. A few weeks ago I drove down to NYC to visit my friend Sarah Smallwood Parsons and her comedic partner Brittany McDonald, who run Perfect Strangers: A Character Show. I thought it'd be interesting to photograph some of their characters, and they did not disappoint.
It was such a good time and hilarious watching these two hop in and out of characters.
Only two things I would do differently next time. First, use my crumpled grey backdrop rather than the bare wall we used. I think the added texture would be good and it would look better under the colored background light.
The other is the background colors themselves. I had intended to do a variety of colors, but on the day of the shoot I wasn't liking how the colors looked in camera. I decided to stick to green/blue, probably the least appealing colors to me, figuring I could alter them in post processing.
Well... When I got home and dug into the photos, the color looked fine, but altering it in post did not work half as well as I'd expected.
Kind of a shame. But then, that's exactly why I like doing these experiments once in a while. If I do a similar shoot again, I'll know how to use the background lights to get exactly the color I'm looking for.
In the meantime, I still love these photos, just on the strength of the subjects. They crack me up! If you're in NYC, visit their Facebook page and find a show you can go to. Or you can meet Mickey Nutello, one of Sarah's characters and the one who inspired this project, in this video. (Audio is a little NSFW.)
I haven't done a lot of maternity photos, but it's always so much fun when I do. I don't need to tell you, pregnancy is amazing, maybe the most amazing thing humans do.
It's even better if you get to see it with your friends and their adorable daughter.
We set up my pop-up studio in their living room, two lights, and played around.
Little Juliet was a good sport (once she had her pancakes) and is clearly ready for her new sister to arrive.
I'm so excited to see Amanda's family expand and to meet little Hailey.
