Yesterday, April and I did a great camera study of Brittany, Christopher and Nicholas Martello in the living room of their parent's home in Trabuco Canyon. Ben and Jackie Martello's home has incredible natural light, and we created some great portraits of the kids together as well as individually. I was so anxious to look over the work that I got on it this morning, and thought I would share a few of my favorites with you.

The Martello's son, Chris, plays football for Santa Margarita Catholic High School, and back in the fall of 2007, the school had a football fundraising auction to which we donated. The Martellos wanted to update their portrait of the kids since Brittany is now off at USC, so at the auction they chose our studio to create the new portrait.















Don't you love the feeling of these black and white portraits?



If you are going to the upcoming Santa Margarita "Valentasia 2008" fundraiser coming up on February 9th, be sure to see our work in the auction. If you aren't able to make it to the auction, and you would like to know more about a special offer we are making to "get Mark busy" in Orange County, please call us at 949.515.5140.

P.S. If we don't get back to you right away, it's because we are in Nashville for a few days doing a portrait for one of our past clients who shamelessly cashed out of California real estate, and headed East! More to come on that next week.

Friendships are so great, and should be celebrated...especially in portraits. This last week I had a wonderful session with Chloe Burleson and her friend Jessica Carlen, who have been friends for years. Chloe was celebrating her 13th birthday, and Jessica flew in from Huntersville, South Carolina to join in on the celebration! To honor the girl's relationship, Chloe's mom, Maria, asked me to create a portrait of the two girls together. What a memory this will be for the girls in years to come.

I've been playing with doing more work by natural light, and these portraits are a great sampling of that style of work. They have a softer look and feel to them that I'm really enjoying.



Maria took a quick shot of the three of us after the camera study was over...thought I'd include that as well. Oh, to be 13 again!