100 - At the "senior center"

Yesterday Sharon and I visited the Somerset Senior Center to shoot some portraits for 100. We had done some photography at the center before the holidays and had such a great time meeting the people and chatting with them, so when it came time to get some new portraits for 100, I knew exactly where we needed to go. We did portraits for several couples and individuals and I got some great shots for the project. Some of my favorites are below.

100 - literally

Today I had the great pleasure of photographing Ernie Trent, a "centarian" who I recently read about in the Tribune Democrat. Ernie made the news when he became the oldest person in the world to buy a Mini Cooper, buying the European sports car at age 100. Sharon called Ernie on my behalf and asked him if I could photograph him for "100". He quickly agreed and today we dropped by his home for the shoot. He was such a kind, friendly man and so nice to work with. My favorite portrait is below.

Spring Fever

In between long sessions of editing wedding photos, I've been enjoying the beautiful spring weather which has finally arrived in Western PA. We've been working to get the yard back in shape and Sharon was raking the leaves from the flower beds. As she did, she uncovered a few corcuses blooming their hearts out. She grabbed one of the cameras and snapped some shots of Spring's first flowers.

First Wedding of Spring

Yesterday was our first big event of the spring - Steve and Melissa's wedding. The day got off to a rocky start when the phone rang at 9am. I usually rent a car for Pittsburgh weddings so as to not rack up the mileage on my vehicles. Well, the phone call was from Enterprise Rent A Car and the agent said "You know that reservation you made? Sorry, but we don't have any cars." I reserved the car in December and they didn't have a single vehicle on the lot. Needless to say, I was a little peeved.

So, Sharon and I packed all our gear into one of our cars and began the drive to the city. We left Somerset early in the morning and it was pouring down rain. The forecast said there would be rain showers in Pittsburgh all day so the outlook for nice outdoor portraits looked positively dreary. To make matters worse, shortly after we got off the turnpike we hit a major traffic jam. It took us over 1 hour to drive 2 miles before entering the Squirrel Hill Tunnel. Why people have to stop before entering the tunnel, I'll never understand.

The day took a much needed turn for the better once we got to Sewickley. The rain finally stopped and we arrived on time despite the major traffic problems. Melissa's mother Martha met me at the door and welcomed me into their beautiful home. A few minutes later the flowers arrived and just as they did, Melissa was ready for photos. We got some great shots at the house with the bride and her bridesmaids as well as some very cool classic cars before heading to the church to get get ready for the ceremony.

The day continued to go great and after we did formals and photos outside the church, we headed into the city for the reception at Pittsburgh's Grand Hall at The Priory. I'd never shot there before and was blown away by what a gorgeous building it was, both inside and out. We got some great shots with the bridal party and the bride and groom and I had so much fun working with all of them. The reception went great with entertainment courtesy of Steven Vance - the Strolling Violinist and the party never waned. It was a fantastic way to kick off the season!

The trip back to Somerset was less exciting. Heavy construction on the expressway doubled our travel time, making an already long drive even longer and we didn't get home until well after midnight. I made up for that with a very sound night's sleep!

Below are a few of my favorite shots from yesterday's wedding. Congrats to Steve and Melissa and my thanks go out to them, their wedding party and their families for being so warm and welcoming.

Rainy day

Despite the fact that our driveway and front lawn look like a swamp, I'll still take a rainy day like today over the snow we had last week.

This evening I had the honor of shooting portraits of world-famous tattoo artist and museum curator Mike Skiver and his wife Mary who is an acclaimed tattoo artist in her own rite. Below are some of my favorites from the shoot.

Sorry today's blog is so short. Tomorrow we have a wedding and the day before is always a hectic one.

Spring has finally arrived!

While the first day of spring wasn't headache free (it's a long story but let's just say bringing my Mustang out of storage in the garage didn't go exactly as planned) I'm practically giddy with excitement that spring is finally here. The forecast is also good with the typical spring rains but there's no snow in the foreseeable future. Maybe winter is gone for good.

Later in the day, I broke down my "fear of approaching strangers" barrier. I was enjoying dinner at the Gourmet Buffet in Somerset (the best Chinese food - hands down) and I spotted a family which I immediately knew I wanted to photograph. I took the chance and asked the mother if I could photograph them and, although she was a little surprised, she agreed. After they finished their meal we went outside the restaurant and I shot away. They were such cool people and the boys were adorable. I had a lot of fun working with them and am posting some of my favorite photos below.

In search of a witty title

I just spent 20 minutes trying to think of a good title for today's blog but I can't think of anything. Maybe I'm tired, or maybe seeing Sanjaya rock it out to a Kink's song on American Idol has rendered me speechless.

This afternoon Joe and his wife Rhonda dropped by the studio to have their portraits shot for 100. Both are into "arty" things and I had a great time chatting with them. I was also really happy with their portraits and am posting a few of my favorites below.

Coffee Table Albums on sale through 2007

After a tremendous response from clients, I've decided to keep the current sale on AsukaBook coffee table art albums in place throughout 2007. In case you missed the sale on the pricing page, here's a refresher:

You can get One 30 page 10x10 Bridal album and Two 5x5 Parent albums for $2495. Additionally, if you order and pay for an album or albums before your wedding day, you can get an additional 10% off the total album price.

If you want to read more about the beautiful albums which are printed by AsukaBook and custom designed for you by Tony Urban Studios, then check out my previous blog post by clicking the following link.

New pricing for AsukaBook Wedding albums

I'm also posting a few sample album spreads below. You can click on the images to view larger versions of the photos but keep in mind that these photos are highly compressed and at a low resolution for easy web viewing.

More snow

Let me just say that I hate this guy:

I've never hated a winter as much as this year. Earlier this week we had 60 degree temperatures, the flowers were pushing through the soil, the robins were chirping, it felt like Spring. I was ready to bring my Mustang out of the garage. Most importantly, I was ready to get outside and start shooting. Now they're calling for a foot of snow. For a lack of a more eloquent phrasing, this sucks.

For something completely random, while I was searching the internet for a cartoon of old man winter, I found a photo of a featherless chicken. It just might be the strangest thing I have ever seen. Needless to say, I had to share the pic.

That's all for today. Time to shovel snow.

100 Women, 100 Men

After a week of shooting for 100, I feel confident enough in the progression of the project to make another mini-announcement. The project will now be two separate series, one featuring 100 men and one featuring 100 women. This was actually my goal from the beginning, but I wanted to make sure I was able to generate enough interest to make that goal attainable before announcing it.
Now we'll be able to see the progression of 100 year through each gender. I feel, by splitting the project in two, that it will be even more powerful and will give a more cohesive view to the collections of photos when viewed as a collection.

Hopefully I'll have some more shots from 100 this week. It's been hectic in Western PA and wedding season is right around the corner.

I'm annoyed, with myself

Since I began shooting 100, I make a special point to take one of my cameras and a stack of image releases with me everywhere I go. After all, I never know when I'm going to see someone who is perfect for the project.

Today I saw two gentlemen who had great looks. One was exiting a mini-mart and the other was getting on his motorcycle outside of Wal-Mart. As soon as I saw them I knew I wanted to shoot their portraits but I just couldn't work up the nerve to approach them. In an instance like that, I have 5 or 10 seconds to make my move, but I choked.

Ugh, I'm so annoyed with myself.

100 - Family style

Yesterday I went to visit my grandmother at the nursing home. She's in Stage 7 of Alzheimer's disease, the final stage of that horrible, horrible illness.

When I got there, I was pleasantly surprised to see my great aunt and uncle who were also there to visit her (my grandmother is my great-uncle's sister - if that makes sense). We chatted a bit and I asked if I could make portraits of them and they willingly obliged. My favorites of each are below.

After they left, I decided I wanted to photograph my grandmother. It's hard to even look at the photos as she's just a shell of who she was even as recently as 3 years ago. What made her "her" is entirely gone, but I wanted to document her as she is now at age 83. I tried some regular portraits but she is very "fidgety" and she has also become very slouched from being in a wheelchair all of the time, so none turned out satisfactory.

Near the end of the visit, I pulled out the camera again and just waited for her to look in my direction and make "eye contact" with the camera. Eventually she did and I took the photo. It's actually much better than anything I tried to pose and more accurately captures her as she is now.

I've had several people email me about 100 and ask about my intentions behind the portraits. My primary goal is to show the the aging processes through 100 different people of 100 different ages. I want to document how our lives are captured in our faces and bodies, how life's highs and lows become a part of us.

As a photographer, I have lots of experience shooting "pretty" people and in many cases, making them even prettier though a bit of Photoshop magic. But I want the portraits in this project to capture who the subjects really are, both in appearance and in personality. I want my subject to look into the lens thinking "This is who I am." To me, they are all beautiful in a way that doesn't need Photoshop or soft focus filters or skin smoothing to exist. That beauty comes from them being true to themselves. And as the person capturing their image, I want to be true to them as well.

I'm running out of memory!

Well, not my actual memory - thank goodness. But I am running out of computer memory. My first computer had a hard drive that was less than 1 GB and I never came close to maxing it out. My current computer came with an 80 gig drive which now has 78 gigs filled. I installed a 60 gig internal HD and that now has over 59 gigs filled. Last summer, I bought a 200 gig external drive which already has 193 gigs filled. I'm at the point where I have to delete old files off of my computer to import new photos and that is not a good thing.

Fortunately, my memory problems should end this week as I ordered a 500 gig external drive from Best Buy. It was even $60 off so in the end it's only twenty dollars more expensive than a 250 gig drive I was going to buy at Wal-Mart (the evil empire). I wonder how long it'll take me to fill the 500 gig drive. In theory, it should take a long time but I have a funny feeling that I'll be in the same position this time next year.

More 100

This morning Sharleen and her daughter Raven stopped by the studio. Sharleen had read the article on 100 in the Tribune Democrat and wanted to bring Raven in for a sitting. She told me on the phone that Raven was beautiful, but I was still surprised when I saw her in person. She's such an adorable girl and is a complete natural in front of the camera. I wouldn't be at all shocked to see this girl show up in magazines some day! I'm posting a color portrait and one of the b&w shots I'm considering using for 100.

Later in the day I went on location to shoot another portrait for the series and my first male subject. Ken is a family friend and I've been bugging him for weeks to come in for a sitting but our schedules never worked out until today. I love the portrait we shot and I'm posting it below.

Finally, 100 begins

It seems like it's been forever since I announced 100 and at times I wondered when I would ever begin shooting. That day was today.

This afternoon I had my first official shoot for the project and I was extremely happy with how it went. I was a little nervous when Trudy brought her daughters Brittany and Emily by the studio. I don't have much experience photographing children, so I didn't know how the shoot would go, especially since my intentions aren't to shoot "standard" portraits. Everything went very smoothly and I was able to get shots of both girls which I think will fit perfectly into the project.

Below are 2 fairly traditional, color portraits of each of the girls and after those are the b&w shots which fit my vision for 100. Be sure to post a comment and let me know what you think.

I'm trying to decide whether I should start a Flickr gallery for 100. I don't know if I want to "give away" all of the best shots as the series progresses. I think I'll have to save at least a few until the project is finished. :)

Bored

After waking up to a fresh 8 inches of snow yesterday morning, I'm not in the midst of yet another unproductive week. The good news is that the weather is supposed to improve dramatically over the weekend and next week it's supposed to be in the 50's. If that holds true, the snow should be gone and maybe then I'll be able to go out and shoot.

Yesterday I took my camera with me as I visited The Crafter's Nook, a great shop owned by my friends Jan & Woody. They both obliged when I asked to take their photos so I snapped away.

Small hiccup in moving the website

I realized today that about 1/2 of my blog photos are showing up as corrupted images. I'm not quite sure why but I'm working on a solution and the new host is checking into it. Hopefully it'll be remedied soon.

Edit: The problem seems to be fixed. Email me if you see anything else behaving strangely. :)

New Webhost

Well, after over a week of endless problems with my previous webhost, I've moved www.tonyurbanstudios.com to a new host and I can already see the load speed is much faster. Now let's hope it's more reliable!

While I was moving the site, I added new photos to the Senior Portrait Gallery and the Wedding Photo Gallery so be sure to check them out. I currently have music playing with the flash gallery but it gives a false start and then starts again once the page is fully loaded. That's a little annoying, but it's certainly no big deal. When my new site is finished, it'll be changed anyway.

We had another 3 inches of snow today. Is winter ever going to end?

I hate my webhost

As I'm sure frequent visitors to my website and blog have noticed, my site has been down frequently for more than a week now. After endless excuses and empty promises from my webhost, I've decided that I have to move the site to a new host, one that hopefully can honor it's promise of 99.9% uptime. I'll be moving the site as quickly as possible but it will still likely take a few days until the transfers go through. Until then, I'm sure my site will be experiencing difficulties but hopefully that will be a thing of the past soon.

This afternoon Sharon and I visited North Star High School in Boswell, PA to shoot the weekly wrestling tournament. It'll likely be the last one we'll be able to attend this year as wedding season kicks into gear in just a few weeks and then my weekends will get really crazy. Below are some of my favorites from the photos we took today. I tried to get as many close-ups as possible while Sharon focused on the action and I think we got a nice mix. You can view all of the photos from today at my Flickr site.

100 Frustrations

No, that's not literally "100" different frustrations, but rather frustrations with "100". I was really hoping to have the project well underway by this point but I haven't been able to get a single person into the studio for a shoot. I do have some people scheduled so hopefully things will pick up this week, but so far I feel like I've been banging my head against a wall. Everyone says they think it's a great idea, but getting them into the studio is proving to be much more challenging than I anticipated.

The delay has already got me second guessing myself. I'm wondering if I made a mistake by decided that all of the portraits in the series need to be shot against the white backdrop. After all, I'm sure it would be easier to find willing participants if I didn't need to get them into the studio. But at the same time, I want the photos to have a uniform look. I do have lots of fast glass so I could shoot portraits in any environment and throw the background out of focus. I suppose, as long as I was careful about positioning and avoided anything distracting that could work... I really wish someone could give me a definitive answer about what to do. Anyone want to lend their advice?

Do you want to be a Team Member?

I recently started an incentive program to help high school juniors/seniors earn cash, print credits and other cool stuff in exchange for referring their friends and classmates for senior portraits. I'm accepting only one Team Member from each school in the area. Team Members can earn up to $1000 in cash and $1000 in print credits. Send me an email to see if I'm still looking for a Team Member from your school!