On the Beach in Florida

I spent the last week in Florida, photographing alligators and models. Never together, mind you. Which is a disappointment.

Nonetheless, it was an interesting time. I love lifestyle photography!  The light on the beach was fantastic. And the resulting photographs have a wonderful glow.

Working with a model that can handle strange weather patterns, flying sand, high winds, and a bit of a chill, and still keep her cool and look great, sure makes my job a lot easier. Shannon did a great job on all fronts, and we're all pleased with the results.

One other interesting note: Neither Shannon nor I are based in Florida; we converged from very different places for this shoot. She's from frigid Toronto, Canada, while my photography business is based in Portland, Oregon. So we made a neat little triangle, coming from 2 different countries, to merge for a job in sunny Florida.

Choices, Choices

The other day I had a photo shoot on the beach here in Portland. After completing the work I was there to do, I shot a few more images, just for fun. Play is often the best way to learn and grow as an artist. Sometimes I create portraits just to have some new images to play with, to try things on in post-processing. It's like a painter making sketches, toying with ideas and colors and lines. You refine your ideas, you test your pallette, you learn some things. And sometimes they're good.

Here are a few that I have been playing with. Sometimes it's hard to choose which ones to show, so I thought I'd show a bunch.

















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The Golden Gate Bridge, Engagement Portraits, and a Nudist Beach

I received an email from a customer this week, whose wedding I will be photographing next summer at Youngberg Hill Vineyard, in Yamhill County, Oregon. She and her fiance just moved to the Bay Area, and she was asking in her email if I had any suggestions regarding who might be a good photographer to do their engagement portraits in San Francisco. I emailed her back and said, in short, I'm in San Francisco right now; let's do them while I'm here. And so we did.

At a friend's suggestion, we went to Baker Beach in the late afternoon, and the view was stunning.





We had heard that some part of Baker Beach is often used as a male nudist beach. We were walking in the direction we thought was the opposite of this area, to take portraits. It wasn't until we were climbing up on the rocks past a gentleman (who appeared to be working on some sort of rock/driftwood scultpure) that we noticed he was wearing only his shirt. Nothing else.

I couldn't resist; I took this engagement portrait discreetly, with some of the unclad company in the background. And no, it won't be included in their final set of images:



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