San Francisco: The People That You Meet When You're Walking Down the Beach

Surfer from the Midwest

Lost in Thought

Waiting

Blonde


Pink

Diarama


See more of my photography from San Francisco, and around the world, at www.fritzphotographic.com.

The Birds

From the boardwalk at the Bay end of Golden Gate Park. Like notes on a sheet of music....

Night Portrait

Shannon's from San Francisco. I took her portrait after her boyfriend Ian played a gig at a restaurant, and we were waiting around afterward on the sidewalk. What a beautiful face. Love those freckles. All girls with freckles should be proud!

This was the genesis for my photo series Astra Velum.

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:



We love being a wedding photographers in Portland, San Francisco, and around the world!

Editorial and Advertising Photography

The editorial/advertising/photojournalism/documentary section of my photography website has needed an update for some time. I just completed it, keeping it simple, but including a lot of images not before seen on my site. You can visit the editorial photography page of FritzPhoto.

Photography at Oregon

"Fairy Smile" 2004
From the series Through the Shadow

I had the privilege of being invited to participate in an exhibit and auction this month at the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, in Eugene, Oregon. I'm honored to be in the show with such esteemed photographers at Ruth Bernhard, Steve Anchell, Stu Levy, Michael Kenna, and many others.

You can read the press release here.

I have 2 pieces in the show, selected from two different series. (I'll list them here, because, unfortunately, the reproductions on their website catalog are hideous. They also forgot to list me in the list of exhibitors, although you'll find me in the alphabetical listings....)

See more of my fine art portrait photography work at www.fritzliedtke.com.

"Sonja" 2002
From the series Welcome to Wonderland

Sophie Loves Leaves

How's this for a Fall Faerie? Sophie is the daughter of long-time (perhaps I should say, old?) friends Ben and Jessica. We photographed them in Laurelhurst Park with the lovely fall colors. I lay on the ground, on her blankie, photographing her eating leaves. It was great.

Homage to Jack McLarty

While I was talking with and photographing Portland artist Jack McLarty, he showed me a series of woodcuts he had in his studio. This series of mostly black and white prints were portraits of artists he had known over the years, most from the Northwest. Here is one he created of Gordon Gilkey, with his wife behind him:





I decided to create my own woodcut portrait of Jack, with his wife Barbara in the background, in a similar manner. And here it is:

Homage to Jack McLarty

Fritz Liedtke

Visit the PNCA website to see their cover story on Jack, using my images.

Creating environmental portraits like this is one of my very favorite jobs.  So meaningful.

Jack McLarty, Artist

"Jack McLarty in the Hand of God"
One of my portraits of him, in front of a self-portrait.

Artist Jack McLarty is a native son of Portland. He is a well-known artist both locally and nationally (you can find him in all the art encycolpedias on the web, and in many museum collections), with a long list of credits to his name. His paintings and prints are often described as 'independent, personal, and urban.'

Jack is a thoughtful, articulate man, whose work spans decades and continents. His travels have taken him from New York to France, Mexico to Japan, and yet Portland is still home. He taught for many years at the Museum Art School (now Pacific NW College of Art), co-founded Print Arts Northwest with George Johansen, ran the Image Gallery with his wife, and more.

I had the privilege of spending some time with Jack and his energetic wife Barbara, talking about their work, and photographing them.

Jack McLarty's studio is the one bedroom in their one bedroom apartment. Barely 8 feet by 10 feet, lit by a small window, it is filled with art supplies, books, memorabelia, print series, and paintings in progress. He talked me through 10 or 12 acrylic paintings in progress, many of which I wouldn't mind having even in their current, unfinished state.

This is the second time I have had the privilege of talking with and photographing a respected, aging artist in his studio. Last year I visited with sculptor and printmaker Manuel Izquierdo, and the portrait of him and his studio that resulted were some of my favorite work of the year. I hope to do more of this work, documenting the lives and spaces of venerable artists. Perhaps it is the influence of the work of one of my favorite photographers, Arnold Newman; or just that I also am an artist, and love to document others in their native habitat: the studio. It's inspiring work.

Jack has kept notebooks in his pocket for decades. Barbara showed me some of them, each dated on the cover with a year. They are compendia of his thoughts, quotes, and sketches. Though painting in his tiny studio, Jack tells me he paints from observation. He pays attention to life, remembers and records it, and paints from it.

The artist's hands.

Jack has a collection of tin wind-up toys, dating back to his childrens' childhoods and perhaps earlier. Most of them, he tells me, are broken; his art students used to come over and play with them, winding them far too tightly, until the springs broke....

Visit the PNCA website to see their cover story on Jack, using my images.

Photographing portraits of Portland artists is one of my very favorite photo assignments.  And visit my fine art photography website to see more of my own artwork!

Receive My Blog in Your Email!

I've just added a new feature to my blog: the ability to receive these posts via email, whenever I make a new post. If you look to the right, you'll see the box where you can enter your email address. It's not for spam, it's just for subscribing to this blog. And why wouldn't you? Beautiful photographs and interesting stories, delivered every so often straight to your email inbox.

If you're more technically hip, of course, you can subscribe to my rss feed. (If you have no idea what an rss feed is, don't worry about it; just enter your email address!) You know who you are.

Either way about it, it's easier than navigating over here every once in a while to see what's up. With subscription, it's like receiving free candy every time I make a post, hand delivered to your desktop....

The Catcher

Heritage High School in Vancouver is new, and massive. In the early morning light, the 3 baseball fields glisten with the dew on the grass and the fine layer of spiderwebs that cover every inch of the ground. Our breath glows in front of our faces as if we were smoke-breathing dragons.

Into this scene steps James, varsity baseball catcher for the Timberwolves. We fire away, imagining this photograph reproduced one day in Sports Illustrated, when James has his own trading cards, screaming fans, and pennants.

As one of the premier Vancouver senior portrait photographers, I love portrait sessions like this!

Grace's Portland Portrait Photographer

I've known Grace since she was in the 7th grade. She was going to DaVinci Arts Middle School while I was there working on a photographic project on adolescence. One day I looked out the classroom window and saw Grace down on the swingset, wearing a pearl necklace and jeans and Converse, looking a little melancholy under the gray skies. I told her to stay there, while I grabbed my big wooden field camera, and raced out to photograph her. Later that day I discovered that Grace and her friend were supposed to have been in class at that time, and they spent a little time in the principal's office as a result.

On the upside, the portrait I took of Grace on the swingset made the final cut, and was published last January in LensWork Magazine.

So it was a delight to have opportunity to take some new portraits of Grace yesterday at Mt Tabor park. Here's a favorite:


I'm pleased to say that, in spite of her time in the principal's office in middle school, Grace is now the student body president at Franklin High School. Pretty cool.

View more of my Portland portrait photographer portraits at www.fritzphoto.com!

Amanda the Cellist--Portland Senior Portrait Photographer

Well, I've only included one photo of Amanda with her cello here, but she does play one...

We photographed Amanda's Portland senior portrait photography at the amazing Leach Botanical Garden.  
 
Such a gorgeous venue for her senior portrait photography!

Steve and Darla - McMenamins Cornelius Pass Roadhouse Wedding Photography

Steve Baliko is quite a guy. Two years ago, he dressed up as his favorite poet/author, Wendell Berry, to go to a costume party. This means he dressed up as a farmer, because that's what Wendell Berry is, overalls and all. In fact, Berry still farms with a mule team on his family's farm in Kentucky.

When Steve first told me this story, my ears perked up. Anytime you meet a Wendell Berry fan, you know you've met a brother (or sister). Berry writes novels (my favorite: Jayber Crow), short stories (Fidelity), the most insightful essays (Sex, Economy, Freedom, Community), and poetry (Collected Poems). He's written a wagonload of books, most of which I've read. In fact, before I ever met my eventually-wife Shannon, I had perused her bookshelf and discovered Wendell Berry. I was intrigued.

Well, Steve Baliko was intrigued when he met this girl at the costume party, because when asked to guess who he was, she said, "Wendell Berry?"

You can guess the rest.

They were married this past Saturday, and I had the privilege of being their Portland wedding photographer. Obviously, I go to a lot of weddings, but it's rare that I am as excited to see two people together as I was this weekend. What a gracious, real, joyful, beautiful couple. Darla glowed, and she made everyone around her glow, as well.



Steve's brothers tried to make him glow, also, but it wasn't quite the same:




This young lady is a sweetheart. I loved the way she gnawed at her apple. Check out those teeth.



We love being some of the most experienced McMenamin's Cornelius Pass Roadhouse wedding photographers!

Natalie's Portland Senior Portrait Photographer

On Wednesday I had a portrait session scheduled with a young lady who is the younger sister of someone I had photographed a few years back. I waited at the Washington Park Rose Gardens for her to show up, enjoying the warm sunlight and the scent of the roses. After a while, her mom walks up to me, and asks if they might reschedule their portrait session for a few days later. It turns out that there was a little relationship trouble that day in her daughter's life, and she just wasn't up for it. So I went over to the car to talk to the daughter.

I wish I could have photographed her right then, with tears streaming down her face, dripping onto her shirt. It's hard to concoct a good crying picture, and this was the real thing. But, even though I'm a guy, I do have enough working radar to be able to detect when is a good time to ask for such things, and when not to. This was a definite 'not to'. So we rescheduled for today.

And it was worth doing so. Natalie is about as easy to photograph as they come. Here are some favorites:







Natalie is such a beautiful high school senior!  Hailing from Jefferson High School in Portland, she made for some stunning Portland high school senior portraits!

Meg's Portland Senior Portrait Photographer

High school senior portrait photos in Portland are just an excuse for me to take some really cool photos of cool young people, such as this young lady from Lake Oswego. That's how I look at them, anyhow. Instead of me having to go and find models/subjects to shoot, they come to me....

Alaina

Even though her sister had chicken pox, I had opportunity to photograph some portraits of Alaina in her yard. What a cutie.

Hoop Dreams

I love photographing kids.

Alleeya

A guest at the party....

LensWork Magazine

If you love fine photography, especially black and white, you should know about LensWork Magazine. It is, without much competition, one of the finest photography magazines out there, for several reasons.

First, the award-winning duotone reproductions are magnificent. Each issue, which comes in its own cardboard envelope, is like a fine art book unto itself.

Second, it's all about photography as a fine art. There's nothing commercial about it or its articles or portfolios. The only ads are for LensWork's own products, which are excellent. The essays and interviews are thoughtful reflections on the creative process, as pertains to photography.

Third, they only feature the work of 3 photographers per issue, including an introduction to the photographer, a brief essay about the work, and a portfolio of usually 15-20 images.

Fourth, Brooks Jensen has a lot of innovative ideas, and runs with them. They produce an extended CD of each issue, including more images from each photographer's portfolio, audio interviews with the photographers, printable images, extra essays, and other goodies. They publish a few books on photography (I've read "On Being a Photographer" by David Hurn and Bill Jay, twice). At one time, they had a Special Editions fine art print series, whereby they would faithfully reproduce, on silver gelatin paper, master prints from master photographers. I own one, an image by Wynn Bullock, and it's magnificent.

Fifth, and most important, they published one of my portfolios ("Welcome to Wonderland") in the Jan/Feb 2006 issue (20 pages, including the cover, above). It's beautiful.

I'd encourage you to browse their site, and even subscribe.

See Welcome to Wonderland on my fine art photography site at www.fritzliedtke.com.

My Own Fan Club

Ever since LensWork Magazine published a portfolio of my work in January (issue #62), I've discovered, here and there, that other people like my work. They link to it in their blogs. They purchase fine art prints from me. They steal my pictures to use on their websites. And they start discussion groups about my work.

One of these is on Flickr. It's called the Spirit of Fritz Liedtke, and here's their theme:

"If you are interested in child photography in the least, and don't know who Fritz Lidtke is, you should! There's a couple of us that love his style of work (selective DOF of adolescence, of course it's not limited to that, in my opinion). :)"

While my work, of course, is not all child photography, it is an honor to me to see people congregating around an interest in my photographs. One woman's work I find especially engaging, as she photographs her own children in haunting, beautiful ways: 'sweet disten'.

Here's the link. Check it out for yourself. I really do have fans.

Now, if they'd just start sending me money, I'd really have it made.

See more of my fine art photographs at www.fritzliedtke.com.

Au Revoir, Petit Soeur...

Today marks a sad day for me. For the past 4 years, Evie Webb--who happens also to be my youngest sister--has been my main assistant and second shooter when photographing weddings in Portland, New York, etc. She is always cheerful, bright, and fun to work with. I love her, customers love her. We'd spend hours together at weddings, shooting, running, covering each other. When one of us shot something we were particularly proud of, we'd show the other our LCD screen and laugh together. She was great to travel with too, because, being my sister, we could share a hotel room and it wouldn't be inappropriate.

This morning, bright and early, Evie and her husband James loaded a van with their belongings, and headed to Denver to find their fortune there.

We'll miss you Evie. Your smile will be hard to replace.

See our amazing lineup of Portland wedding photographers at www.fritzphoto.com!