In the past year or so, I have watched several close friends become new parents.  I get excited every single time.  Excited about the miracle of new life.  Excited to see them experience love and life in a whole new way.  Dan and Kelli welcomed beautiful Mara Lynn on April 18 (lots of exclamation points needed!!) and about a week later we met up for a few photos to help them remember these early days.  It was evident how quickly they fell in love with this little one and Kelli mentioned how everyday things take on new meaning…especially songs like this:

When the rain is blowing in your face
And the whole world is on your case
I could offer you a warm embrace
To make you feel my love

When the evening shadows and the stars appear
And there is no one there to dry your tears
I could hold you for a million years
To make you feel my love

I know you haven’t made your mind up yet
But I would never do you wrong
I’ve known it from the moment that we met
No doubt in my mind where you belong

I’d go hungry i’d go black and blue
I’d go crawling down the avenue
No there’s nothing that I wouldn’t do
To make you feel my love

The storms are raging on the rolling sea
And on the highway of regret
Though winds of change are blowing wild and free
You ain’t seen nothing like me yet
I could make you happy make your dreams come true
Nothing that I wouldn’t do
Go to the ends of the earth for you
To make you feel my love

Congratulations, dear friends on the birth of your beautiful, beautiful baby girl!

Birthdays are fun.  I had one on Sunday! Here’s a quick recap:

1.  Breakfast in bed.  Yup…cinnamon crunch bagel and coffee from Panera.
2.  A birthday note from Ike.  Something about I ruff you…
3.  Facebook has revolutionized birthdays.  I know it’s kind of impersonal but I still love it.  An overflowing wall of birthday wishes can’t help but make a girl smile.
4.  Handwritten notes and cute homemade gifts.
5.  Crazy beautiful flowers from my talented floral artist friend.  (See more of her flower designs in this post)
6.  Turning our closet into a darkroom to play with my gift from Justin!  It is the Stenoflex, a pinhole camera and darkroom in a box!  As you can see my darkroom skills are a little rusty but it sure was fun!
7.  Dinner with friends and random 40th birthday balloons that seemed appropriate to take a picture with.
8.  Mail and fun cards.
9.  Ike.
10.  Berry dessert from Chesters.  Y.U.M.
11.  More flowers from J.
12.  Family photo!

yup.  it’s april…

Alrighty, it’s my favorite time…yep, time to pawn my blogging off on someone else!  If you’ve been following the blog for awhile, chances are you’ll recognize Teri and her family (OK, mostly Kai!) from several shoots.  You might also notice that Kai has had newborn, 3, 6, 9, and soon to be 12 month photos taken.  This photo session schedule is part of my Newborn-First Year Collection which includes 5 photos sessions during the first year as well as a coffeetable book with images from each session.  But that’s not the point of this post….REDIRECTING!  Teri is a self proclaimed “Crazy Canvas Lady” and has the walls to prove it!

Here’s Teri (and Kai!)  Take it away!

I used to THINK I liked photos more than most.  I had photos in frames on my dresser, collages of photos on my walls, home made picture calendars for each year, photo albums, and I carried more pictures in my wallet than most put up in their house.

Now I KNOW I like photos more than most.  I still have frames on my dresser and on the shelves in my home, have currently 568 photos on my iphone, and I should purchase a terabyte hard drive for Emily to store all of the photos she’s taken of my family in the last 5 years!

Not only has she taken photos of my most treasured moment’s, (here and here and here) but she’s encouraged me to try new ways of displaying them.  Thus, bringing me to my canvas addiction…

We started with a few canvases of Moxy!

A 10 x 20 and three 6 x 6 cubes:

Then with a little nudge…. “are you sure it won’t be too big?!?”

…a 20 x 24 of my favorite engagement session photo with Mike:

Then I went a little bigger with a 30×40 of our favorite wedding photo.   A canvas of Kai at his 3 month photo shoot was added as a complement.  Both are taken on the same couch at the Rochester Art Center.

Then…. I needed something as breath taking as the photo taken on Fort Myers Beach for Kai’s 6 month shoot.  Well….this 40 x 60 canvas takes your breath away that’s for sure!

And then the latest 24 x 36 canvas to document Kai’s obsession with showers at his 9 month shoot.

I admit, I’m a canvas crazy…..the bigger the better!  I guarantee you’ll fall in love if you try one at your house!  What better way to decorate your home than with art you can call your very own!  I only hope I don’t run out of walls!

OH BABY!  Dan and Kelli are dear friends from our college days and we are so THRILLED and EXCITED and HAPPY for them as they get ready for their first baby, well first human baby….they already have 2 cats and a dog.  🙂  Kelli, you and your bump are BEAUTIFUL and we cannot wait to meet your newest family member.  My final guess is boy!  🙂

And here’s the big sister, Persey, the Great Dane

I love this series of 3…

Looks who’s 9 months old already!  And look who LOOOOOVES the water!

And not only does he love baths, he loves showers too!

He loves the water so much, he didn’t want to get out.  I couldn’t resist these:

A little more shop talk!  I took a few photos of my #1 model to demonstrate different lens focal lengths (or mm’s as I like to call them).  I sat in the same spot and simply used a different lens each time.

14-24mm : In the upper left photo, I used my 14-24mm lens which is a very wide lens.  This is great to show the environment or when you need to be physically close to your subjects.  I use this lens a lot at wedding dances so I can be in the midst of all the dancing action and show what’s actually going on and not just an up close view of peoples’ nostrils.  This is usually not a great portrait lens.  Because it is so wide, faces get distorted easily and typically, that’s not so flattering.  I do love this lens a lot and use it to get photos like this:

50mm : I love the 50mm because it has an aperture of 1.4 whereas most of my other lenses are 2.8.  That extra f-stop is SO NICE when the gray MN winter days seemingly lack any bits of light.  I also am a sucker for shallow depth of field, especially with little kids’ eyes.  After the 24-70mm, this is probably the lens I use the most.  Though it’s not as fast as some of my other lenses, I do love it and think it is a GREAT lens for the price.  Here’s Aria on the 50mm:

24-70mm : The 70mm shot was taken on my 24-70mm lens which is my “go to” lens.  I use this lens A LOT.  Fast moving kids, bride and groom portraits, group shots at weddings, dogs, pretty much anything.  It is fast, sharp and versatile.  Many of the photos you see on my website and blog were taken with this lens.

70-200mm : The 200mm shot was taken on my 70-200m lens.  I use this for almost all wedding ceremonies so I can stay far away and not be disruptive.  Sometimes I will use it at the beginning of engagement sessions or high school senior sessions when people aren’t quite comfortable with me being right up in their face yet!  🙂  I generally like to be closer to my subjects so I don’t use this much for portrait work and find that it is nearly impossible to use this lens with kids because I always find myself pretty close to them.  Plus, it’s really heavy and I get kinda wimpy after awhile.  🙂

There’s the 2 cents I have on focal lengths!  Let me know if you have questions!  🙂

I’m guilty.  Of having big ideas, crazy dreams, and lofty goals and intending to do them but then not.  The excuses range from not enough time, more important work to do, etc, etc.  Which was the case for my idea to post more technical photo talk stuff here.  I got overwhelmed with where to begin and starting doubting that I actually had any useful info to share!  But I figure the best way to start is at the beginning and equipment seems like a good beginning so here we go.

“A year from now, you will wish you had started today.” –Karen Lamb

This is where I began:  I took a film photography class in college and started learning about aperture, shutter speed, focus and depth of field, film speed, developing my own black and white film, printing my own pictures, and how to start noticing light, texture, repetition, space, etc. through a viewfinder.  At this point, I was totally confused and frustrated with the aperture numbers and all technical stuff but I loved shooting, spending time in the darkroom and seeing the end result.  That excitement was enough to keep me going and after A LOT of shooting, the technical stuff started making sense.  I cannot imagine learning photography on a digital camera with all those buttons and options and knobs.  Overwhelming!  In my opinion, a basic film camera is the best place to start.  You are forced to focus on the basics and cannot be distracted by the option to shoot on auto or push a button and get a cool effect.

Photography class notes and homework:

The contact sheet from my very first roll of film that I shot, developed and printed myself.  Pretty sure I thought they were amazing.   

My binder full of contact sheets and rolls of film:

Though film is a beautiful thing, I know digital is typically the more practical option now, especially for those of you who just want to take better pictures of your kids or for your own personal use.  Darkroom access is not widely available and after the initial investment of a camera body, lens and computer, there are not many additional costs as there is with film.  So naturally, that is the way I progressed.  The first digital camera I bought was a Nikon D70 with a 18-70mm lens.  SA-WEET!  I thought it was the greatest camera EVER.  This was the camera that I shot my very first wedding on with my friend Molly.  I think we made $75 each!  🙂  After about 2 years I upgraded to the Nikon D200 and the 85mm 1.8 lens and I felt like I had a whole new lease on life.  It was during the life of this camera where I really became serious about being a photographer.  About a year and a half after the D200 purchase, I upgraded to the Nikon D3 and have been shooting that for about 3ish years.  Here is what the inside of my camera bag looks like today:

And here the outside of my bag!  I actually have 2 bags:  A rolling suitcase as well as a shoulder bag.  This is is the rolling suitcase, which I love.  It is a Think Tank Airport Security V 2.0 and it is perfect for traveling or when I want to take pretty much all of my gear.  My only complaint is that I can’t fit my laptop in it but then it probably would be too big for a carry on airplane bag.

And the shoulder bag I have is the Tamrac Pro 12:

I take this to most of my portrait sessions and Ike is always suspicious of what I’ve been up to when I get home, especially when I’ve been photographing a family with a dog:

I’m talking about my equipment because it is a small piece of me and it is necessary to have in order to be a photographer.  However, it’s only a tool and if you don’t know how to use the tool, it won’t work well for you.  So, I want to stress the importance of learning the basics about photography before getting wrapped up in having the best camera.  I am a huge advocate for starting with the most basic equipment and upgrading only after you feel that you are being limited by your gear.

So, what camera would I recommend for a beginner?  I, of course, will always recommend a Nikon because that is what I learned on and what I am most familiar with.  The Canon and Nikon debate is sort of fun to have but really, they both are great products that basically do the same thing so it pretty much comes down to your own preference.  If you like graphs and charts and number things, Flickr has a handy little camera finder resource here. I think getting a basic body with a better lens is a great place to start.  The guys at West Photo in Minneapolis are really great and know waaaay more than I do about all the options out there.

So there you have it, my equipment timeline and a small part of my journey into the photo world.  I certainly would argue that other experiences (non equipment related) were far more important and perhaps I’ll touch on those later on.  Now THAT, is a LONG story.  🙂

After the Bahamas wedding, I couldn’t bring myself to post anything that had to do with snow so I went back to the summer archives.  We did these photos of this adorable family at Lake Harriet on a beautiful late summer day…sigh.  How many days until spring??

Greg and Kayla’s closest friends and family gathered on a beautiful beach in the Bahamas to celebrate with them as they tied the knot!  Needless to say, it was gorgeous.  I think everyone should get married in the Bahamas!  Do you agree?

The view from the “getting ready” room:

Greg, you may NOT see the bride yet!

Now you can see her!  : )

Dang, you’re cute.

Time to get married!

Greg’s nephews wrote a message for them in the sand.  Cutest thing ever!

Congratulations, guys!  Can we go back to celebrate your one month anniversary!?