HAPPY BIRTHDAY BABY BOY! You and your sister are amazing. <3

We had perfect cloudy light, a nice fall day and lots of leaves for him to try and cram into his mouth before his mother stopped him. Doesn’t get much better than that!

Here’s some more faves, flickr set here.

Epic drool

SO, after a family shoot at the local park, I took 15 minutes to grab some photos of my son storming through the leaves. He hasn’t been to the park lately (again, slacker mom) and he was wearing his very serious seriousface.

Grant me this moment of annoying LOOKATMYKIDS parent bragging, will you?

And because it was Halloween, here is Aiden in his Link (from Zelda) costume!

Unfortunately, I didn’t get any of Zoe in her costume since she went to her dad’s house and didn’t even wear the costume home! I’m forcing her to re-dress up later…woe is the child of a photographer.

We had a nice cloudy morning, so these are all natural light. I had my flash on at 1/32 power and pointed up to (attempt to) grab baby’s attention and put some catch lights in, but the light itself is all natural.

Here’s some favorites, the full flickr set is here. (20 pictures)

I’m always looking to photograph kids…when did you have your kids’ pictures done last? *eyebrow waggle*

My two missions for the day were to get a black and white for The Hideout’s 20′s, 30′s and 40′s challenge and a nice picture of the kids. I also wanted a new headshot of myself for work purposes but my hair is ick right now. I have my moments of shallowness.

The selfie:

The kids:

Light was one Canon 430EX II shot through a brolly umbrella to camera right.

Laundry in the City

And the inescapable plague that is advertising.

And just to keep this post from being too cynical, my son in his first “big boy” bath. The sink can no longer contain his water-splashing fury. Or I can’t. Either or.

Madison, the beautiful daughter of old friends. The first image was all about her eyes and cropped in tight, but I wanted to try something that pulled the whole photo together…

BEFORE

AFTER

This is an image of my friend Erin. I love the photo but I realize not everyone goes for the “ghostly pale” look. That and I’ve learned to sharpen properly since the first process.

BEFORE

AFTER

I like both of those for different reasons.

I also had fun trying my hand at “saving” a junk shot. I saw a few articles online this week (which naturally I forgot to bookmark for my links post) on salvaging crap exposures with over-the-top processing and fun with drastic edits. I put this one together going for “silly photoshopping”.

I quite like it.

And here’s one last one, a re-edit of the photo of my son I processed after learning what the history brush did. It doesn’t take long to “get over” selective coloring so I re-processed this one with a more chocolaty tone.

BEFORE:

AFTER:

And now…THE LINKS!!

• Digital Photography School has a great tute on making a DIY ring flash. Not pretty enough for you? Craig White has a sleeker version.
• And 50 “Must Have” Wedding Shots.
• DIY Photography has compiled a list of 43 Photography hacks, mods and DIY projects.
• Here’s a sweet article on using v-cards (which is a term I attributed to something entirely different before I took up photography.)
• Miss the film darkroom? Me too. Here’s how to develop that film at home on the cheap. Now to find an enlarger…
• Want to try developing with coffee and vitamin C? I shit you not.
• Quite possibly my favorite Strobist post ever. Included: cute mouse.
• Ever have anyone ask you why professional photography is so expensive? Point them here.
• Has anyone ever demanded you remove a photo of them taken in a public place? Check this out.
• Picking up where Adobe dropped the ball, here’s a great tute on advanced watermarking in Lightroom 2.0.
• Want to try macro photography but don’t know how? Me either. DPS to the rescue, here’s macro photography for beginners part one and two.
• Fun? No. Necessary? Yes. Here’s an article on licensing your photography.
• Miss the Photoshop World Convention in Boston last weekend? Yep. So did I. Scott Kelby has some recaps up on his blog. Go there and pout with me, I had no babysitter.

ETA! I forgot to add this! Michelle Black and Jessica Price (two of my favorite photog e-buddies who also happen to be amazingly talented.) are hosting FLARE: A National Photography Contest. All entrants get some freebies so go check it out!

But since that seems to be light years away, I’m keeping busy with indoor photos, my 365 project and website updates. I’ve added (finally) the general portrait info packet to the Rates page. This applies to senior, couple, children, newborn, and any other portrait sessions. Exceptions being band promotion photos and model portfolio which I am still taking pro-bono sessions for.

I also finally got my Poverty Wizard flash triggers (or Cactus triggers if you want to be no fun about it). They’re pretty sweet for 40 bucks! I’d say they fire 8 out of 10 times. I can deal with that for now.

Their more expensive counterparts, Pocket Wizards have announced their new models for us poor photogs to drool over. Dave from Strobist has given a good run-down on them here.

For fans of photoshop actions and preset goodness, Michelle Black is offering some killer discounts in preparation of her upcoming flash website. Check em out here.

Well, I’ve got some wedding contracts to type up now, but here’s some of my favorite pictures from the last week or so.

Vintage with a runny nose.

My husband’s two faces (ISO 100, I set the shutter to 10 seconds, f/20 or something like that, and hand-popped my flash twice- once when he was up close to the lens and again when he backed up.)

Bath time!