Posted in: Lake Tahoe | Weddings, Engagements and Anniversaries

Last weekend was a very special weekend for me and my family.  My brother got married.  He married the beautiful Eileen on Emerald Bay in South Lake Tahoe, CA.  I got to photograph it and my husband got to cook for it.  It was a gorgeous day and the boat was a lot of fun.   We left the dock from a beach on the Nevada side of the lake between Nevada Beach and Zephyr Point and were in Emerald Bay within the hour.  The ceremony took about 20 minutes and then it was back to the dock.  We found a pretty cool place to take some bridal portraits after the boat ride and I hauled my off camera flash system with me.  It was worth it (see above).

The wedding party consisted of my brother (the groom), his adorable wife, her daughter, Keely and my brother’s son, Cameron.  The colors were red and white which was stunning with the blue water of Lake Tahoe, the blue of the sky and the green pines on the nearby mountains.

After the boat ride, everyone headed back to our cabin for the reception, which was held in our back yard.  Above is a picture of my darling family (sans me and my husband).  Note the formal posing.  Living with a photographer must be tedious for my family because they take every chance they can to give me a hard time.  Fingers and hands are always an issue because if you aren’t careful they can either look like claws or sausages in a picture.  So, I’m always reminding my subjects to watch the way they pose their hands.  So, here they all yelled “Claws and sausage fingers” and gave me their best poses.  Sigh.

It was a great wedding and a fun day.  We did have a tiny incident that could have ruined the day.  There was this small speedboat that almost hit us as we were exiting Emerald Bay.  How you can not see the huge yacht that we were on is beyond me.  I think the couple that were in the speedboat were pretty drunk.  Anyway, the captain of our boat hit the horn and made a hard right and the speedboat saw us and swerved off just in time.  But, other than that, the wedding went off without a hitch.  Hat tip to my husband:  the food was amazing.  I’ll post some pics of the details later.

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Posted in: Old Town Sacramento | portraits

A couple of weeks ago I attended a photo shoot and workshop in one of my favorite locations, Old Town Sacramento.  I never get tired of shooting there because there is so much excellent background.  For example, the above photo.  The sky didn’t quite look like this, so I tweeked it a little to match more of what was in my imagination when I took the shot.  The light was still beautiful because the sun was on it’s way down.  The bride was gorgeous and extremely cooperative.  This is one of my favorite shots from the day.

Here’s another shot with a model in front of the same pyramid building as above.  Shasta is one of my all-time favorite models to shoot because she is innovative, always interesting and gorgeous.

Two models I have never worked with before are in the next two shots.  Naomi, the redhead, has wonderful red hair and a great look.  I especially enjoyed shooting her with the light coming from behind her.

Another new model (above)  with a great unique and sweet look.  Her hair and skin tones were gorgeous with the yellow.

Beautiful redheads seemed to be in abundance at this shoot.  I especially liked this gal’s eyes and hair color with the wonderful tones of the background.

All in all, it was a great day.  I took quite a few shots and there were many other models.  I’ll try to put up  a few more on another post.

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Posted in: Weddings, Engagements and Anniversaries

Did I mention that I shot a wedding at the end of July?  Did I mention that it was a photographer’s dream wedding?  Did I mention that the couple was madly in love and wonderful to work with and that the bride was beautiful? No?  Well, take a look for yourself.

The groom was equally fun and dashing.  (And so were his Groomsmen.)

The wedding and reception were held at a wonderful Placerville, CA restaurant, Sequoia Restaurant.  The restaurant was originally a beautiful old Victorian Home that was been wonderfully restored.  The light coming through those old windows was a photographer’s dream.

A wonderful time was had by all who attended, including me.  Thanks, Jesse and Jackie, for letting me be a part of your wedding.

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Posted in: Old Town Sacramento | Photo Walk | Published, Publicity and Gallery Showings

well, the Sacramento Scott Kelby Worldwide Photo Walk competition, that is. (Sacramento, CA USA (Old Sacramento & Railway Museum)) Now…on to the Worldwide competition.

This shot was a last minute edit and entry.  I saw and photographed this train early on in my walk through the museum. I saw lots of other photogs taking pics of this train from all sorts of different angles.  So, I tried my hand at an HDR (3 exposures) of this beauty.

Here’s the original after combining exposures and editing:

Not very dramatic.  Its an okay train photo.

So, I jazzed it up a bit, added some motion, submitted and crossed my fingers.

Now, my photo gets submitted to the Worldwide competition where the other 1100 winners will be submitted.  Some of the world’s best photographers have submitted their photos of the day. The prizes are pretty good:

“…leaders will have one week to choose the winning image from their walk. All of those winning images will then be posted in the People’s Choice gallery where you can vote for the shot you think is the best. The People’s Choice winner will receive a $750 Adorama gift card and a 1-year Kelby Training Online subscription.

While that’s going on, Scott will also be narrowing all of the winning images down to the best of the best to select the top 11 images from the whole event. Those will be the 10 Honorable Mentions (who will receive a $250 Adorama gift card) and the Grand Prize Winner (who will receive a $1000 Adorama gift card and a 1-year Kelby Training Online subscription).”

Somebody tell me to “break a leg”.

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  • August 14, 2010 - 11:54 am

    Lesley - Yay! I’m excited that your pic of “my dad’s” engine won! Wooo! And maybe we should wish you to “break a lens”…or not…I tried to get the term “break a hip” to catch on in the belly dance community but no one else thought it was that great except me. Oh well.

Posted in: Fine Art | Old Town Sacramento | Photo Walk

On Saturday I participated in Scott Kelby’s Third Annual Photo Walk in Old Town Sacramento.  Worldwide there were over 33,000 photowalkers at over 1,100 locations.  Our groups was allowed into the Sacramento Railroad Museum before it was open so that we could use our tripods and not have to deal with tourists.  So, I got up at 4:30 a.m. to be in Old Sacramento by 6;15. There were about 50 photographers who were able to roust themselves out of bed in time to be there.  It was well worth the effort.

We were lead into a large auditorium and given the rules of the museum.  Then, the drama began.  Dave Henry, the leader of our walk (on the right above), called for our attention to be drawn to the solid wall behind him.  As it began to rise we could see that there was a large window behind it.  Unfortunately they forgot to turn off the lights in the auditorium, so all we saw was…ourselves and a fain outline of a large locomotive. Always having my camera ready, I snapped this picture.  The quality is not so good, but you can see the walkers superimposed over the locomotive.

We only had about 2 1/2 hours in the museum before it would open to the general public.  At that point we would no longer be allowed to use our tripods.  Since the lighting was very dim in the museum, a tripod is a must in order to get a nice crisp photo. I wandered around with my friend, a wonderful photographer, Roger Aylstock, for some of the time.  But, as photographers do, our interests lead us in different directions.  I found this wonderful gentleman (above) who was willing to let me take his photo in front of this beautiful train.  (Keep in mind that I know nothing about trains…my brother, Andy Thomas, is the train person in my family.)

Here are some of the shots I took.

At the very end, they took us outside where they had fired up the steam engine for us to photograph.  What a treat.

Now to decide which one to submit for the contest…

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  • July 28, 2010 - 1:11 pm

    Debbie - That’s a tough one to decide Karen. They are all lovely images. For me it’s a toss up between #1 and #5. The 5th one seems more unusual because of the reflection IMO. Good luck with your submission!

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