Revisiting Maternity Favorites with Chenisse

I am looking forward to new photo sessions and opportunities to provide beautiful photos to new clients. One of my personal favorite subjects to photograph is maternity. Whether it is fine-art or a photo-journalistic style, capturing the moments in a woman's life as she is transforms into a mother is a pleasure and an honor to be made a part. I like to capture the emotional interaction between a woman and her unborn baby.

As an artist, I am a trained observer who gently directs classic poses which help her be more natural without feeling self-conscious or awkward. My goal is to create images that go beyond snapshots and would not feel out of place in a coffee-table book. For anyone who is seeking a photographer to document her pregnancy, please contact me through the link at the bottom of this post.

In the mean time, I am revisiting my work from a progression series of maternity photos with re-edits and new favorites. Every now and then I go back through sessions from years ago and I am drawn to different images than I had initially culled into my favorites. I continue to learn about and experiment with new editing techniques. In my revisits I find images that fit well into these new, varied techniques and am able to apply them. This brings to light new and expanded perspectives within my portfolio.

Below are many newly edited selections I have added to my portfolio. Enjoy!

JC Penney Spring Fashion Show

JC Penney hosted a fashion show for their Spring collection at the Animas Valley Mall on Saturday, April 11, 2015. I volunteered my time and my photography skills to document and share this event. In total, I shot over 300 images from start to finish. I have chosen two images of each volunteer model to share with you here.

There was a great turn out for both the volunteer models, and support from the public who gathered at center court to watch the fashion show. The photos posted are low-resolution, but may be shared with friends and family. For high resolution images or prints please contact me to purchase.

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Thank You for visiting and click below for the photos:

Fire Spinning

 

My brother, Joe, has recently taken up the hobby of fire spinning. To get these photos, I brought two strobes with me and put an orange colored filter over them to keep them from contaminating the orange glow of the fire with the traditional white light of a flash. I slowed down my shutter speed to allow the spinning of the ring of fire to show up in the exposure. A tripod is an absolute must for a session like this. I triggered my camera with a remote to eliminate any shake I might have caused by pressing the shutter manually. The spinning fire was exposed first, followed quickly by the flash to freeze his movements and so you can see who is doing the fire spinning. There were a few shots where the flash did not fire because I did not allow it enough time to fully recycle/recharge before the next shot. In those images, the flame is clearly visible, but his face is shrouded in darkness. I anticipated this effect, and like the effect it offers. I just wouldn't want an entire session shot this way.

Before we started shooting with fire (and before we lost daylight) I set the lights and adjusted the power on each unit to allow for the lighting effect that I wanted. I used a small strobe with a grid and orange filter above and behind where Joe would be standing. My second light was set inside my DIY strip light and placed to the right of my camera position. With the orange gel and the size of the light modifier, I had to push this flash up to full power. This also is what kept some of the shots from getting a full exposure. When the flash is set this bright, it takes longer for it to recycle. I also wanted to get the shutter speed right before we started playing with fire. Joe owns a double ended light saber replica, so we started spinning it and adjusting the shutter speed faster and slower to get different levels of light blur. We ended up in the range of 1/3 to 2/3 of a second. While that doesn't sound like its long enough, with the staff spinning it is long enough to create a full circle light blur.

Check out my favorites below including a bonus animation at the very bottom of the page: 

Bizzell Family Portraits

Family portraits can be difficult to get for anyone, but when you have a special needs adult child, it takes more preparation and careful timing. It has been years since this family have had a portrait including each family member. I was more than happy to come to them and photograph their family.

For this session I was able to set up in the basement. I prepared the backdrop and lights and brought in the dad and other children to be ready before the mom brought in the adult daughter. I stood at the far end of the room away from the family, and used my zoom lens to get up close. I started snapping away with my camera and it was about ten seconds before the daughter realized what was happening and started to shy away. She may only be in a few photos with her family, but that is an accomplishment we could only have hoped for going in to this session. Once the family photos were done, we continued to take individual portraits and combinations of the children and parents. I have added a few composites in the mix as well.

My favorites are included below: 

Wyatt at Six Months - Location Studio Setup

I photographed Wyatt and his parents when he was about one month old last year. Now he is over six months old and sitting on his own. I brought my lights and backdrop with me and set up in a living room space with hardwood floors and a lot of windows. I had a few hiccups with my lighting, but I was able to tweak the settings and pull out some great images. Wyatt sat very well for nearly twenty minutes just watching all the fuss that was going on around him. He needed a few breaks in between his outfit changes, and after a nose-dive into the floor. I moved between sitting and laying down on the floor to be at his level in order to better interact with him. I was able to capture a wide variety of expressions from him with the help of his family, who were all doing their best to get him to smile; so I have to thank them for making my job so much easier.

Below are my favorites from this session:

Family Room Studio Setup for Angela & Hank

I have shared several times about closing my studio and working with whatever space is available to shoot photos. Today was another example of how not having a studio does not reduce the quality of portraits I can make. A studio is nothing more than a space to take pictures, and today it was in a family room with low ceilings. I brought my studio kit, complete with backdrop and lights and had a working studio setup within fifteen minutes of arriving.

In order to get the best expressions from the kids, we had to work quickly. Shooting a few individual shots of them, and rotating them in and out of the room to be photographed with the parents, grandparents, and auntie. I used two large umbrellas for the entire session, and brought in a third light for some of the smaller group shots to add a little more contrast to the portraits.

Kahlan: Model Portraits

Its always great when a model will help you realize a creative concept.

Kahlan is a wonderful model to work with, and makes selecting favorites a challenge because of the sheer number of good poses she is able to achieve. I came to her with several different ideas in poses and lighting and she was happy to help.

Introducing Kahlan

 

I met Kahlan through Model Mayhem. You can find more about her here. We both wanted to improve our portfolios, but without a studio, it proved difficult to find a suitable location. We were able to use a small bed and breakfast for our shoot, and made use of the decor as our backdrop. She brought several outfits, and we also used items from my kit to achieve different looks and combinations during our session. She has a large tattoo of angel wings across her back which made for some very cool looking images.

JC Penney Fashion Show

JC Penney hosted a fashion show for their fall collection at the Animas Valley Mall in Farmington, New Mexico on Saturday, October 18, 2014. Photos may be purchased for $25 for two 5x7 prints by contacting me through my facebook page via private message.  And feel free to tag friends and family you know and recognize in the photos. The photos posted are low-resolution, but may be shared with friends and family. For high resolution images or prints please contact me to purchase.

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Thank You for visiting and click below for the photos:

Product Photography for a Local Etsy Shop

Handmade jewelry, candles, scrying mirrors, and soaps. These are some of the products I photographed recently for Rocky Mountain Witch, a small company who sells "Magickal Items for the Modern Day Witch" Please take the time to check out her page, and support her business.

Family Photos At The Park

For baby's first photo session, we arranged to set up at a local park using the natural surroundings and weathered bridge as our backdrop. I brought two battery-operated flashes to use as we walked around the park to take advantage of the beautiful scenery. We started with some seated family shots, and moved on to some poses of just the mom and dad, then we laid a blanket over a park bench and focused on taking baby portraits. I was able to balance the natural light with my flashes to create depth without washing out the background, or having the portraits turn to silhouette.

As with all of my portrait sessions, I have trouble choosing favorites to share because there are so many fantastic images to choose from. I am never satisfied with just a few snapshots during a photo session, during this session I shot over 200 images. The first part of every session is used to get the jitters out and help everyone relax and let their natural expressions come out. Although I pick favorites, and edit those images; I provide every image from my photo sessions to my clients. I would rather you have them all to cherish than let those images sit unused on my computer. My clients are free to share the beautiful shots with friends and family, laugh over the funny ones, and scrapbook the rest. I allow them the freedom to choose how to preserve their memories.