Remodeling - day 3

Well, we didn't reach the halfway point, but we did make good progress when it came to installing the wood floors. The morning was spent at Walmart buying some needed tools and we didn't really get started until 11am. We began by cutting the end boards which went pretty well. Once we started to lay the planks, things went a bit more slowly. It isn't quite as easy as the directions make it sound, but we figured it out and made good progress.

I'd say we're about 1/3 of the way finished and that includes most of the hard cuts. We were even able to move the couch and armoire back to they usual spots, which helps free up a lot of space. The rest of the room will be pretty easy, at least until we get to the other wall, which will involve many, many cuts. I still think we can wrap this up tomorrow.

Here a snapshot of a bit of the new flooring.

Remodeling my studio

I almost never work inside the studio and actually quite dislike it. For the type of work I do, there's just nothing exciting about studio work. There's nothing natural about it. I like to capture the essence of who someone is in their photos, and trust me, no one looks natural sitting in front of a studio backdrop and beside a fake pillar (or worse yet, posing on a ladder!).

Because I don't like working in the studio, I never really bothered to design one. When I took formal photos, I simply draped a background from a large armoire, set up the lights and shot away. The setup worked well, but looked (for lack of a better word) ghetto. Since my senior photo work really took off last year, I figured I really needed a proper studio space and this week, the remodeling began.

I'm converting the den in my home into a dual purpose studio room/meeting area. Initially I'd planned on painting the old faux wood paneling but a quick test run of that yielded less than stellar results. So the walls are staying as is for now, and our first step is putting down wood flooring.

Last night, the work began. The first step was emptying out the armoire which aside from acting as a background stand served a more practical purpose as a storage unit for my books, albums, paperwork and assorted memorabilia. That alone took an hour and I ended up filling a trash bag with "junk" that I decided to get rid of.

Once that was emptied, I had to start moving furniture in order to get to the carpet. That didn't take long but was tiring. I never realized how much stuff was in that room until I had to move all of it. Finally, I started to tear up the old carpet, which came up much easier than I expected. Still, removing all of the carpet from a 16x20 foot room was a fair amount of work and after a few hours I was ready to pack it in for the night. Below are some photos of the process.

This morning, with the help of Sharon, I pulled up the rest of the carpet and padding and dragged all of it outside and into the snow so we'd have more room to work. With the carpet and padding up, we then had remove the tack strips that held the carpet down at the edges of the room. That was easily the hardest part yet as those strips were nailed to the subfloor every 4 inches. The only way we could get them up was to take a flat screwdriver and hammer it under the strip, then pry it up. The strip would then snap, releasing a section a few inches long and we'd move on to the next section. Prying up all of those sections took a few hours and resulted in countless splinters. During this process the furniture had to be moved twice and was then moved one final time to one side of the room. That was it for today.

Tomorrow we need to clean up all the mess and will then begin putting down the new flooring. I'm hoping we can finish half the room tomorrow but that might be overly optimistic. The cutting part is what worries me. I don't know why, it just does. I'll post more photos tomorrow, but for now here are some snapshots taken at the end of today's work.

Sweet 16

I tried to come up with a catchy title for today's blog but drew a blank. Oh well.

Last night I shot photos for Ashley's surprise Sweet 16 party and it was a blast! Ashley is such a great girl, very friendly and outgoing and I think her friends and family pulled off the surprise - at least for the most part. They had a great party, very casual and fun and DJ Crazy Jimmy and DJ Dusty kept the party going into the night.

Ashley's entire family is great, from her parents Scott (who as you'll see in the photos below is not a fan of rap music) and Missy to her younger brother Garrett who was on the dance floor almost the entire night. Her mom already told me that I'll be shooting her senior portraits next year and I can't wait!

I love shooting photos of people dancing and some of the guys at this party could move! I had a great time watching them wow the crowd and shot a ton of photos. Some of my favorites are below. I know there are a ton of pics but I had so much trouble narrowing it down and I didn't want to let anyone out. All of the photos from the event are viewable at my new Flickr Photo account. Besides, my blog has been pretty empty of photos for the past 2 weeks so this should make up for it.

Thanks again to Ashley and her incredible family for letting me be part of their celebration!

Stuck inside and going stir crazy

It's been 2 weeks now that we've had either rain or snow every single day. I hate not being able to go outside and shoot every day and today I'd had enough. I broke out the camera and 70-200 zoom lens and started shooting through the windows. Taking photos through household windows is never an ideal situation (especially when they aren't squeaky clean) but I had no other option.

I started by staking out our bird-feeders and grabbed some shots of a tufted titmouse and a chickadee. Later on, a mourning dove showed up and then a cardinal. Unfortunately the cardinal insisted on staying on the backside of the feeder so I had to shoot him from a different window and had to really crop the image to show him off. But, I think it turned into an "okay" photo through post processing.

After a little while, the snow really started to fall and I happened to notice a young fellow pushing his bicycle out the road. I don't know what possessed him to go for a bike ride on a day like today, but I had to grab of photo of the poor lad's misfortune.

Once the snow started to blow and limited visibility to a few feet, I turned the camera on our dog Tobe. He's usually the subject that I break all my new cameras and lenses in on, and I don't think he likes having his photo taken, but I still got a few nice shots.

Below are some of my favorite photos from the days events.

Tomorrow I'm shooting photos for a surprise "Sweet 16" party. That should be different and fun and I can't wait!

New "About Me" section on my website

While my site is currently being redesigned, I finally got around to doing something I've wanted to do for a while - update my bio. My old bio said a lot about the technical aspects and training, but it said very little about why I am a photographer. I doubt many people care that I worked in the film industry for 9 years or that my mom gave me my first camera when I was six years old, but hopefully people do care about why I've become a professional photographer. So if you're bored, head over to the "About Me" page and read all about me.

Your own personal Wedding Map!

I recently discovered a Wedding Mapper online and I had to share the info here. The map works like Google Maps or similar services, but it allows you to enter the locations of the ceremony, reception, and even things like nearby airports and hotels. Once your map is made, you can share it with your wedding guests.

I personally loved the little images on the map. Hopefully this will be of use to some of my 2007 & 2008 couples!

New pricing for AsukaBook Wedding albums

Since I began offering Wedding Albums from AsukaBook last year, they've become extremely popular with my clients. The quality of the books is even better than that of photo art books you would buy at a book store and combined with a custom design unique to each wedding, I've found them to be great sellers.

Unfortunately, I've always found the albums hard to price. They're quite expensive for me to purchase and have printed and each album takes several days to design properly. I used to offer various sizes and styles and the prices were all over the place. I decided for 2007 that I'll be following the trend set by most other wedding photographers and charging per page. This keeps everything simple and simple is always good.

I'll be charging $50 per page for 10 x10 Hard Cover Book Bound EX Laminate Bridal Albums and $25 per page for 5x5 Hard Cover Book Bound EX Laminate Parent Albums. Clients can choose between books of 30, 40, 60 and 80 pages. I'm still carrying other AsukaBook products, but those will only be used for Signature Guestbooks and for Senior Portrait Albums.

In case you've never seen an AsukaBook, I'm posting a few photos from their website.

What I love about their books is that, unlike the wedding albums of years past, they are truly art books. Most other wedding albums are matted albums (which are simply photographs slid into the hard pages) or flush mount (which are photographs "glued" to the pages). With AsukaBook, you have a completely professional product which is not only beautiful, but one which will last for decades to come.

New Year, New Senior Portrait Sessions

I had an incredible time last year shooting senior portraits for dozens of young men and women throughout Southwestern Pennsylvania and I'm hoping 2007 will be just as much fun. One thing I noticed about last year's work was that no one wanted pre-designed packages. To help give clients what they want, I decided to follow that trend and abolish portrait packages for 2007. Instead I'm offering 3 different session types. They are Superstar, Best Friend and Basic and I have a feeling that they're going to be quite popular as it will allow the seniors and their parents to get exactly what they want. Even in the basic package, I give the seniors a 1 hour session, 2 outfits changes and 2 locations. I think that's a pretty good deal considering the quality of my work and the time and attention I give my clients.

I remember when I had my senior portraits taken 10 years ago. My family wasn't wealthy so we opted for one of the more reasonably priced packages. Well, the experience was an eye opener. Instead of going to the photographers studio, we went to the high school. The photographer had set up lights and a backdrop in the music room and was shooting portraits there during the summer. He scheduled a different senior every 10 minutes. Needless to say, you were limited to one outfit. I walked in and was greeted with "sit on that stool". The photographer took 4 photos, each was pretty much identical except for the way I tilted my head. About 4 months later, the studio called to say the proofs were ready and they scheduled an appointment with us to view the proofs. The 4 photos were completely unedited/un-retouched (that was another huge fee), and my mom was given 5 minutes to place her order. She spent nearly $300 and I remember being so upset because in my mind she had been ripped off.

Now it's 10 years later and I have my own photography business. While I understand the costs involved in running a successful studio, I also know that every client deserves to be treated with respect and given options and that doesn't change if they're spending $200 or $2000.

Happy Birthday, Woody!

A few weeks ago I was contacted by my friend Jan who informed me that she was planning a surprise birthday party for her husband, Woody. He was turning 70 and since you only turn 70 once, she wanted some photos to document the day. I'm also friends with Woody, so I happily agreed.

Saturday afternoon we dodged raindrops as we headed to the local social hall in anticipation of the party. About 15 minutes after we arrived, in walked Jan & Woody. She was able to keep the party a secret until almost the second they stepped in the door. Not an easy feat considering that about 75 of his family members and closest friends were invited!

The party was terrific and Woody had a great time. I'm happy that we could help him celebrate his big day and to capture some photos to help preserve the memories.

Rain, rain, go away

After conquering last weeks' nasty case of the stomach flu, I was ready to head outdoors to start shooting photos again. I had all intentions of covering the annual Fire and Ice Festival and then wanted to scout out a back road where I remembered seeing a cool abandoned car.

Well, you know what they say about the best laid plans. Thursday the rain began and it quite literally hasn't quit. Between the constant rain and warm temperatures, the Fire and Ice Festival was quickly snuffed and the beautiful ice sculptures melted in hours. I didn't get a single photo at the event and am pretty disappointed with how things turned out. Oh well, it's January in Western Pennsylvania and it is not snowing, so I can't really complain.

This afternoon I was going stir crazy so Sharon and I headed to Johnstown to see "Primeval" at the Richland Cinemas. I'm a big fan of nature gone awry horror movies so I was pretty interested in seeing this one. Overall, I was fairly underwhelmed. It was too much "Hotel Rwanda" and not enough rampaging crocodile for my tastes, but it wasn't a terrible way to kill 90 minutes. Tonight is the season premiere for "24". I can't wait to see how Jack Bauer escaped from the clutches of the Chinese. And Tuesday begins the new season of "American Idol". Good times.

I'm hoping this week will be more productive. Maybe the rain will finally end, the flu germs will vanish and I'll finally be able to do some cool work again.

Sick as a dog

Since I woke up at 5am Monday morning, I've been sick as a proverbial dog. I came down with a really nasty case of the stomach flu and today's the first day I've been able to eat solid foods. Ugh, what a waste of a week!

Today I feel pretty good though. This weekend I'm hoping to check out uptown Somerset for the annual Fire and Ice Festival. As always, I'll be sure to post some photos.

There's no wedding like a Fogie wedding

Yesterday I had my first wedding of 2007 and there couldn't have been any better way to kick off the new year than by working with the Fogie family. I first met the Fogie's in October 2005 when I shot the video for their daughter Danielle's wedding. It was easily one of the most fun weddings I've ever worked and I quickly became friends with the entire family. When their daughter Sheena became engaged in February of '06, they quickly booked me to shoot the video and while I've been doing more photography and less videography over the past year, I happily obliged.

Sheena and her new husband Ben are quite simply one of the cutest couples I've ever worked with. The entire bridal party was warm and welcoming, as was Ben's family. Between the wedding in Somerset and the reception at the beautiful Antiochian Village in Ligonier, PA, I spent over 12 hours with them yesterday and there was never a dull moment. Even though I was busy shooting video most of the day, I still managed to break out the Nikon for some photojournalistic coverage. Here are a few of my favorite shots from Ben & Sheena's wedding day.