A couple of weeks ago, we had the incredible experience of making these portraits in the Chinese Gardens at the Huntington Library. Lindy Yow and her family were celebrating their parent's 50th wedding anniversary, and they went to great length to make sure their portraits were amazing. Lindy even had Chinese gowns custom made for the portrait. Theirs was the first formal Chinese portrait to ever have been created at the gardens, so it was quite an honor for me.

I love family portraiture. In every family I've ever worked with,
I've found that each person is completely unique, yet they all belong
together. It’s fun for me to help everyone feel confident, relaxed
and happy. In this portrait of Chris and Ann Moore and their four
children, I posed them a little further apart. Although their twin
daughters are just 15 years old, each of them is already beginning to
find their own unique life path. We had such a great time creating
their portraits at their beautiful home in Laguna Niguel, and I know
that the family will enjoy them for many years to come.

April and I just returned from Maui, where we had a great time mostly eating, looking for scenes of rural Hawaii (that we never found in spite of hours of driving) and sailing on the America II ... ex-America Cup boat. We spent one evening creating these portraits on the beach of newlyweds Andy and Jackie Zellman.

We were amazed at their thoughtfulness when they had a bottle of champagne sent to our room later that night as a special thank you gift. Classy, eh? Thanks guys ... it was appreciated on our "honeymoon" too.

Join up with me and a few friends in an experimental evening shoot this Friday.

I've gotten involved in the planning of The Branch ... a forward-thinking gathering at our church that's going to be quite artsy. We plan on using a lot of visuals in print as well as in web and video applications. Only problem is, we have no stockpile of images. This is where you come in.

This Friday nite, 3.14.08 from about 6:00 p.m. to whenever we get tired and hungry, we're going to have a "Locals Only" Photo Shoot to get our stock of images. This doesn't mean that you have to be a local, but we want your images to feel local.

We're not looking for "pretty" shots as much as graphicly interesting art shots! Nothing will be critiqued, and nothing will be ruled out. Consider this a visual scavenger hunt.

We're looking for grainy black and white stuff, movement, nite shots, anything that captures the Conejo and it's surroundings on a Friday nite. You just have to be cool with our group using your images (but hey, we want the stuff you probably deleted last week 'cuz you thought is was junk).

We're meeting at the studio, 2649 Townsgate Rd. Suite 600, Westlake Village at 6:00 p.m.

Questions? Call me at the studio...805-367-8100

"Locals Only"...it's all good!

Last Sunday, we had a special portrait event in partnership with the Strasburg Children store in Camarillo. The clothes that Strasburg sells are perfect for so many of the portrait styles that our studio creates. We photographed a number of young ladies that day, and I wanted to share some of the results with you. Don't you agree that a beautiful dress really makes a special statement?

We are also doing a number of camera studies here in the studio this next week, and when we have some samples I'll share those with you as well.

For more information on Strasburg Children, call Divina at 805.482.5804.