Beautiful Morning!

Orange County is beautiful and it's a wonderful place to live. We have everything from the beach, to hiking. It has a ton of shopping and entertainment and its surrounded by art. Orange County is the home of Disneyland and Knott's Berry Farm. There's so much to do here you could be busy all the time. However, for those of us who live here busy is not always what we want.

The great thing for those of us who live here is there is always a place to go to find some peace and quiet. There are places all around to go and get away from the crazy 100 mph lifestyle. One of my favorites is my morning walk through the neighborhood. All the kids are in school and the morning rush hour is passed and I just get to walk along the path and smell all the plants and flowers. The morning light here is so fabulous I sometimes forget I'm supposed to be walking and stop to stare at the tiny pieces of light everywhere and feel the warm sun on my face.

I wanted to share some of these sweet spots of beauty that I enjoy on my morning walks. I also want to remind everyone that the wonderful thing about light is that its everywhere! So when you go out and remember to smell the roses don't forget to look for the light too!

Enjoy what it is you do to regroup and find your happy place and take a peek at mine.

The path, seriously how could one miss that?

Light even makes the back of a road sign look beautiful.

Each little piece of light matters.

The last two spots wait for me in my own backyard.

The Invisible Black Backdrop

One of my favorite past times is to play on Twitter. I could sit for hours and hours following the maze through websites, blogs, and facebook pages of a gazillion wonderful and creative people. I don't follow anyone that posts their play by play activities. However, I do follow some of the most creative and professional people from all over the world. I follow people from my cousin, Ryan to folks in Delhi, India and the UK.

Now, the UK brings me to a photographer I follow named Glyn Dewis. Glyn lives in Buckinghamshire, UK and he was one of the first photographers I followed. Somehow I saw a photo he had taken from his morning walk. It was an image of where he was walking and it was dark and cloudy and wonderful. I thought to myself how amazing it was to peek into another part of the world at such a quiet moment. I was hooked when I saw his work and his blog. Glyn's site is on my list of pages to check everyday.

Clearly a teacher at heart, Glyn Dewis posts many tutorials, how to's, and how I did's on his blog. After reading his tutorial about The Invisible Black Backdrop, I was truly amazed! Now, I understood this concept in the studio but never realized it could be done out and about in the real world. It made perfect sense and I couldn't wait to put it in my tool bag.

This setup makes it possible to have a studio portrait at any shoot. Thanks Glyn for the new tool and for the constant inspiration from across the big sea.

The set up outside on a rainy day

Kim and Emma.

I have glass walls so we threw a towel over the reflection.

perfect model

Bringing the light down and hanging the towel

And tah-dah, lovely image with lovely light

Kim took this last image and we printed it out on gallery quality paper and it was just fabulous. In about twenty minutes time, she had a beautiful portrait for her portfolio and Emma had a fun time of playing on her plastic house in the back yard.

Engagement of Ashley and Gary

This weekend my girlfriend, Kim (Kimberly Foster Photography) and I spent the afternoon taking pictures of a darling couple getting ready to start a life together. Ashley and Gary are getting married in June. They are both very sweet and very much in love, we could see that during the shoot. Their personalities were so fun to be around and both Kim and I are really looking forward to capturing pictures of their wedding day.
We spent our time with them at the Armory in Carlsbad which was a great location. There are several historical buildings that are super interesting and the place is surrounded by beautiful flowering bushes and old trees.

It was great fun!