Tis the season

Tis' the season... To heat things up.. Nothing is more fun than giving a gift of yourself. Boudoir photography is an excelent gift for your husband who might be overseas, or away on a business trip this christmas, or even just opening presents with you on Christmas Eve/Day. A Boudoir, Glamour, Pinup session is a great personal gift to give. I don't know of any husband (self included) that would not love to get a litle black book filled with pictures of his lovely wife. Even those that have been married for years might find this brings back old emotions, and years from now, looking at them is sure to remind them why they fell in love with you.

Not all Boudoir images need to be revealing.. This one is from a recent shoot, this one is sure to bring a smile to his face as he looks at it and see the woman he loves, how he would actually see her if he as at home. One over the summer that I loved was wearing a long bathrobe, tied at the waist, just revealing a hint of cleavage.

Also there must be a lot of Christmas babies coming up, I've done several maternity shoots in the last month, and have some scheduled before Christmas. This is such a special time for Mom's to be, and a special moment to capture. The shoots are done in a classy fashion and we respect your desires and limits. We've had brides the totally keep their stomach covered. We also encourage your partner to join you for some of the photographs.

Parties

This is the season for family get togethers and Christmas Parties and like anyone else we have our own families and friends. We are not available the weekend of Thanksgiving nor the weekend of Christmas. We have had a lot of request for those times, however, we place our families first. We have some dates open the week after Christmas for those family portraits.

Babies... We are getting a lot of babies... and women ready to have them.. This is great and we love it.

Family Weddings

We had another family wedding this weekend, I enjoy shooting family weddings but I will admit they are more work than weddings where we don't know anyone. We had a great time though with this one, the hall where everything took place was great, and I had plenty of help.

We got some great pictures, The little ring bearer set a new world record for not only the speed in which he got down the isle, but also in the number of trips he made during the wedding. I love kids in wedding they are always fun and add lots of life.

Below is a picture of my #1 assistant and myself, he took his job very seriously. Although he did get distracted by a pretty little girl later in the evening, she came up to me and ask if she could marry him. I'm not quite ready to let him go yet, but I can see where he would be a good catch.

Wonderful weather - Red Tail hawk

It's been nice out during the week, this hawk was captured trying to have lunch while I was on my lunch. His prey, a little gray squirel, managed to tease him badly. This guy went after him 3 times before giving up the chase around and around the tree trunk. It was funny to watch, hopefully he found lunch somewhere else. You could just see the fustration in his eyes.

We have a family wedding this coming weekend, I'm actaully shooting it, something I normally tell people not to do, but it will be fun. We are handling it like anyother wedding, with a few exceptions, We will acutally have three photographers plus my son shooting (okay, so he may just be doing grab shots, but for a 5 year old thats a lot). My only hope is that he don't show us professionals up and get better pictures.

To by couples with upcomming weddings, Don't worry you won't have a 5 year old showing up at your wedding to take pictures, unless he is on your guest list.

We have a party this Thursday night as mentioned before, a Pure Romance, Mary Kay, and Glamour/boudoir portraits. This is a first for us and we are looking forward to having a good time and getting some great pictures. If you are attending see you there, if you are interested in perhaps doing one of your own let me know.

New Lightroom Beta Testing

Things Just get better and better.. I just god the new Lightroom 3.0 beta, it has a few nice features I like, their adjustment brush has some improvements, as seen above inside light room I was able to adjust the color of the leaves from a pale yellow to the red/oranges you see above with just a couple clicks. All this improvements in technology helps us to provide you with the best pictures that we can. I love the ability to easily improve a small thing in a picture without the overhead of running photoshop on each image, the time savings are amazing.

We are having a blast with the weather we have been having lately. Makes for some great photography. You can follow us on flickr at http://www.flickr.com/photos/georgestarrphotography as well as here on our blog. The Flickr page will have more not wedding stuff than the rest of our pages. Last week we got a few really nice pictures of ducks and fall colors. This week a lot of the leaves have already dropped and the sun has not been out as much.

Other things are changing with us, for the best I hope. I've got a new photographer in training right now and I'm excited about that. We are expanding a few services we are offering and things are growning quickly and we were in need of someone else to help out. We are also adding a few new products for our portrait customers, i.e. Christmas cards, mouse pads, puzzles, etc.

With Christmas coming up its a great time for fall portraits, and family portraits for your Christmas cards. We also offer Gallery Wraps and other large prints to hang above your mantle.

Out Shooting while the weather held out

I was out doing an engagement shoot this week on thursday, and wondered across some duck playing on the lake up at sharon woods. I wanted to just post something besides people so here are a couple pictures of a duck that I got a couple quicksnap shotd of. The color you see in the water was from the reflection of the leaves.


I was using my Canon 100-400 IS "L" lens which is a great lens for weddings and wildlife. It's a little long for most weddings, but does great on those ringshots for the pews..


We have our first Pure Romance - Mary Kay and photo shoot coming up on the 5th of November, should be a blast, I'm told it will be a full house. Hopefully there will be more of these to come. I do ask if you are coming for pictures that you also consider the fine products offered by Mary Kay and Pure Romance. Our host is being kind enough to provide a private room for individual sessions so there is complete privacy. Glamour to Boudoir setting, Albums and Print packages available.


If you are interested in setting up a Party of you own let us know. I don't control the other vendors but I'm sure they will work with you too.

Loving the Colors

Another beautiful Weekend, I love this time of year. The fall colors are great this year. Sharon Woods in Sharonville Ohio (Northern Cincinnati area)is beautiful up by the lake, This weekend should be even better. It makes a great setting for Family Christmas portraits. Be sure to book your session early, be sure to also order your cards soon to avoid the rush that always happens right around Thanksgiving.

The last couple years it’s been a busy wedding season to boot, and this year is no different. We are getting request already for Next October, so booking quickly will ensure you get the date you desire.

We’ve added some new albums to our galleries over the last couple weeks, take a look and let us know what you think. http://starrphotos.net/galleries.htm


Okay, a little business, The Photoreflect web site we use for previewing pictures has been undergoing some upgrades and changes. As a reminder, when you submit your order directly to me, I need the image name and number, not just the order number from the web site, and I can not order for you from your favorite’s or albums. Proof prints are not selectable by you, these are to show you the images we think you are most likely to want for an album or to order for enlargements. We do a pretty good job of selecting them for you. Due to the large number that is included we can not let you select them. You are more than free to order 4x6’s as part of your package prints though, each 8x10 print is the same as four 4x6’s. In addition all your proofs are available for online viewing. This helps keep the price of our packages down, as hand selecting 200-300 proofs would add hours onto your order and I have no way of automating this process.

If you need a larger number of regular prints(proof prints excluded), we can meet and you can select them using our laptop or if you give me a list I can work from. Discounts are available for large orders.

Friendly Photographers

I heard on the radio today that the Recession is officially OVER! Hopefully everyone is in agreement on this and it really is and I’ve had the last person that wanted a full blown wedding package with Albums, Engagement sessions and a ton of prints to display call to inform me that they have decided to let their Uncle Fred (or a friend) take their pictures.

I’ve got more of those this year than I ever have, and I feel for these couples and Uncle Fred. He has a lot to live up to, first off, he might need to go buy equipment, chance are he doesn’t have a camera and lenses of the grade needed to shoot a wedding properly. Then there are lighting issues, does he have off camera flash, does he have extra lights for the formal portraits (you know those big light with the umbrellas). Well chances are some might, some might even have a second set of everything, but chances are not good that he does unless he does wedding photography. We also use a second photographer, not only backup equipment, but a backup photographer.

How well trained is Uncle Fred, We are constantly training and following advances in the field of photography. We like to take photographs, not just pictures, and for us weddings is something we love to do, not something we are just willing to do.

Lastly, while everyone is having a good time, enjoying the wedding, and dancing, poor Uncle Fred is having to be on alert for getting every memory on film (or digital media).

Another thing people don’t think of with using family and friends, is how do we get our pictures? On CD? From the grocery store mini-lab? Maybe a wholesale club because they are cheap? Well with a Professional photographer who makes his money on pleasing you, you will get Photographs that are printed at a professional lab on high quality paper. And that 39$ software for making a wedding album or scrapbook? Is that going to give you what you want your grand children looking at in 30 or 40 years?

If by chance you are forced into having someone that is not a professional take your wedding pictures have them read this first, then go online and look at some photography training tutorials. Even my blog that you can access from my site has some good tips for a beginner. There are a lot of resources out there to help someone. I still say hire someone, even the $300.00 starter photographer will be a better person to hate that your best friend or Uncle Fred when the pictures don’t turn out the way you dreamed.

Over the years if you paid $3495.00 for wedding photography needs, and you are married for 50 years, you have spent just 69.90 a year for your wedding photography, albums and prints and your Grandchildren and Great Grandchildren will have something nice to look back on.

Unpacked

I finally got my office totally unpacked at home so we should be back up to full speed. Fall is coming on soon.. Leaves are already falling in our new back yard for me to rake. This weekend was uneventful and the only pictures taken were a couple family portrait sessions. (Christmas card portrait season you know!)

I'm looking forward to our wedding this weekend. While we do have fun doing portraits our true calling is with weddings.

We are still offering a free 8x10 and portrait session to members of the armed forces, see our web site for other specials. We have also started offering training for photographers or beginners, we've got a lot of request from people wanting to know more and even for photography jobs. I'm pretty well covered for people to work we me and we don't let people shadow our weddings, even if you are willing to work for free, which I get a lot of offers.

Busy! BUSY! And more BUSY!!!!

This was a very busy weekend, it started out with a shoot Friday, a Wedding on Saturday, and moving on Sunday. The wedding Saturday was a small wedding, but it was a nice time for the guest, the DJ was great and played exactly the music the party requested, a lot of Pearl Jam. The reception was held at the Mill Race Banquet Center, a really nice place for a small reception or party, the food they served looked really good, the lighting was good for the candid’s and we did formals outside. All in all it was a pretty good day and location for a wedding.

I’d like to mention a few services we offer that people don’t always know that we offer. We offer Family, Christmas, Maternity, Glamour, Maternity, and Boudoir (pin-up) photography in addition to or Wedding Photography services. We also are available for Senior Portraits and parties.

I’m going to keep it short this week, I’ve got a lot of other stuff to get done this week. Getting ready for a couple Halloween Parties and themed portraits sessions.

Size and Effects

It was a little wet Sunday, but Saturday was a great day for a wedding. Over the weekend I heard an interesting collection of wedding songs. The one that I heard that I had to laugh at was “The Big Bopper’s Wedding” You have to be a little older to really know who I’m talking about, and remember “Chantilly Lace” but if you get the chance check out the song. Before you ask, it was not played at a wedding, but I could see it being played at one with a real sense of humor. I’ll have to blog sometime on a few other funny songs, and serious ones that we’ve heard. Being in the wedding party (sort in it at least) we hear things, and one of the father/daughter dances we heard this season the father composed the song for, which we thought was really neat.

We just took a large order for prints and got asked the old age question. How Big is an 8x10, now before you laugh, you would be surprised how may times I get asked that question. To set the record straight, one side of the print is eight (8) inches long and the other is ten (10) inches long. Another thing I get asked is about cropping, All the images we take are in format you are used to seeing that dates from the 35 mm film days, you can call it 2:3 ratio or a 4x6 size for this example. An 8x10 no matter how you will not perfectly fit into this ratio, the math would mean you would have to go to a 8x12 size print to have a full frame print. This is where cropping comes into play. You have to lose 2 inches to fit onto an 8x10 sheet. If you look at a lot of our proofs you will notice that there is extra room at the top and bottom, this is why. Same goes for 11x14’s and 5x7’s, the math just does not equal up. Every now and then a picture will just not crop to a different ratio and fit the way someone would like onto the page.

Okay now for another fun thing which we like to do is meet with you to show you your pictures before you order, now we can’t always do this, and the web is a good thing for that. But what we can do in person is actually show you how the pictures will crop, and some of the effect we can offer. If you look through our galleries you can get an idea of this. If you can’t meet up again that is fine, we will do the best we can to select the best cropping for your images. One thing people ask, do we charge extra for effects, the answer is no, however we ask that you do accept the fact that we only do those effect on 5x7 or larger images only because they don’t show up as well. Collages are only available on 8x10’s or larger and limited to 3 images on one sheet for this same reason.

I love it that people are reading my blog, I would like to take this chance to ask you to make a comment or two about what you read so I can get a little input about what you like.

The above images is an album page taken from a wedding where the young daughter or the bride was given a ring along with a set of vows pledging to be a good father and to cherish her like she was his own. A very touching scene to witness, she was so excited!!

To DVD or NOT to DVD

Had a busy weekend with a shoot Saturday evening, and spent Sunday preparing for a move, I wasn’t going to do a blog entry this week but I got a few minutes between jobs and thought why not.

During one of my relaxing moments this weekend I was going through some older photography magazines from the PPA (professional Photographers of America) they had an article on brides that get just a CD or DVD of their wedding shoots. Well the short of the article was that if you get just the DVD you never wind up getting any prints. This is one of the reasons but not the real reason that all of our packages included prints. I want my couples to have a professionally done product, it might not be all their pictures, or an album but I want them to have something to hold and to show to others. I also don’t want the only photographs they get to be printed at a grocery store or super-department store.

On our packages that include albums and a lot of proof prints we INCLUDE a DVD copy of the entire wedding. I don’t think this distracts from the prints, and I would hope it is really just used as an archive or to email the images to friends and family and not their finished prints.

I take pride in the images we make for our clients, and would hope that they see the value in professionally printed prints. The debate has been brought to me before not to offer a DVD set of images in my packages, which I feel is not the best solution for us. What I did do, which some people have had issues with is remove the ability to get the DVD on my lower end packages. Simply upgrading to the next package up will get you the ability to get a DVD set of images plus the upgrade gets you a lot more to boot, for instance 100 proofs and an engagement/boudoir session plus extra time at the wedding. Also our price for prints is very fair if you choose not to get one.

Labor Day - Festivals and All

This is a great time of the year with Labor Day, Festivals, Halloween, and Fall Leaves.. Of course we plan on getting in our share of these between the fall weddings and events we are scheduled to shoot. I love the fall colors for weddings, I'm not sure what I like better, the new life of Spring or the wonderful fall colors.

I have to admit I also love the fun of the summer time, and the bright holiday light of winter. Maybe it's just LIFE that leaves me with the urge to take more and more pictures.

I've added some galleries to our web site today, be sure to check them out.

• http://starrphotos.net/airshowslide/
• http://starrphotos.net/packslide
• http://starrphotos.net/parkslide/
• http://starrphotos.net/zooslide/

Waiting!!

It was a busy weekend with an early afternoon wedding on Saturday. A great time was had by all. We had a lovely couple and attendants to photograph, The chocolate fountain was GREAT, and the food was good. Above is a picture we captured of our lovely bride being nervous right before her walk down the isle. She hid her shakey knees well!

Last week I devoted some time on another blog for brides to be, more so than a what this blog is this new one is meant to give tips to brides/grooms to be. Although I still suggest reading through this one a little just to see what we have been up to. There might be a Photography TIP blog in the future if there is any interest in it. What spawned the wedding tip blog is a few of our brides requesting more and more information about what other couples are doing and what other vendors offer.

I am working on a Book or booklet to hand out to couples that are looking for photographers and other vendors, in order to get the most out of their pictures. It's not going to be a sales pitch for us, but more a resource for brides looking for vendors and photographers. I know not everyone that gets it will even be able to consider us for their photographer and that is fine, it will be packed with what to look for and ask your photographer, your DJ, your minister, and so on. Plus it till have a section for suggestions for different and unique twists to your wedding and reception. If you are in a hurry and can't wait I could use a few proofreaders, and test readers. It's getting enough info that it could be a book to publish someday.

I got some good response from last weeks picture on my blog for Maternity portraits and looking forward to meeting a couple mothers to be.

Exciting stuff in the works!

This weekend we did some networking and formed a little bit of a partnership with a Mary Kay Reprehensive. It really isn’t a partnership as you would think of it, just a more help for each other’s clients. She is offering some very nice gifts along with training you how to put on your makeup for you and your girls/mothers and friends.

Being a photographer we see a lot of need for a few tips, especially in the area we covered in out last week’s photo tip section. Learning how to stay dry, and keeping reflections down is something everyone really needs to know. Don’t ask me any questions about make up, you can contact her directly at (859) 866-6514 or her web site at www.marykay.com/cbleier her name is Catherine Bleir If you call her tell her I sent you. If you book a party with her and are one of our wedding clients I’ll give you a 50$ credit towards prints.

This is a selfish thing for me to do, I want to see your pictures turn out their best.

I would love to find a wedding planner or two that would like to trade referrals, working with a planner can help a bride maintain sanity on her wedding day, and help a lot with getting people where they need to be.

The image above is an image from the past. A fun image from one of our past brides.. Funny thing with weddings is the fact that we get these shoots a year or better down the road, and then we get to photography the babies. I love watching our wedding families grow. This one was taken in their home where they were comfortable, using our backdrops and lights for the Studio look and feel.

We have clients that start their photography with us with and Engagement session, some do a Boudoir session, then their wedding, maternity, baby portraits and family portraits with us. It's great to become a small part of their family in this way and watch them grow.

A blur of a weekend - Parties and more...

We had an interesting weekend, Started out with a Birthday party Friday Night, and then it was Monday morning 10 minutes later. We had a some good shooting all weekend and got some great pictures I’m sure our clients will appreciate. The above images in from a shoot about 2 weeks ago at Ault Park, I posted one ohter image from it, This images was taken in under a shade arc in the garden, I used a little fill flash to take out the shadows and make the couple stand out. I could see cropping in a little more although I like this image as is.

I got a chance to play around myself with some lighting Saturday morning. Tried out some new wireless flash triggers that worked great. My model for the morning still had breakfast on is face, but it wasn’t worth the fight to wash his face, and I was very lucky that he fit me into his very tight schedule during a commercial break of Phines and Pherb (I probably slaughtered the spelling) but this is what you expect with a 5 year old on a Saturday morning the weekend before school starts up.

Okay as promised I’m taking a little time to go over a little of the lighting techniques that we find useful. One of the toughest areas of lighting that we encounter are mirrors and shiny alters. Like anyone that has shot any pictures around these, you know that you are very likely to get a BRIGHT ball of light reflected back at you from a shiny surface, it could be polished wood, brass, a mirror or even a sweaty forehead. Well the forehead you can wipe off, and even apply a little make up to make it NOT SHINE. But what do you do for a mirrored surface?

A couple things come to mind, short of not using a flash there are still things you can do. If you think of the light striking your subject and the reflective surface, your on camera flash is a really small spot of light, and being small, it tends to reflect brightly off of surfaces. If the light was as big as your subject it would be a very even light, completely flooding the entire scene. One thing we do is try to make the light source bigger. This doesn’t mean getting a huge light, sometimes it is a simple as an umbrella in front of our flash. Other times we reflect the light off of something. Maybe we will use a reflector, but more commonly a ceiling or wall. If we prevent the flash from directly hitting the reflective surface it won’t be as bright of a reflection. Now simply aiming our flash a the ceiling works wonders, but will cause some issues in it’s self. The eye sockets are the most noticeable, they will be dark, so when aiming at the ceiling we use a little reflector mounted on our flash. On the Canon 580IIex there is a built in little card for this. This will not fix the whole issue and might cause a reflection from your subject.

This is going to take some experimentation on your part to get it working the way you expect it. Something we do, is not just bouncing off a ceiling. Think about direction the light is traveling. If you bounce off a wall to light the subject and there is a mirror behind them, your flash will not hit the reflective surface but will light up your subject. Also think about the wall behind you.

I know this is not a lot of help to our point and shoot fans as you can’t do a lot to control the direction of your flash. Although there are things you can try, you can put a piece of tissue over the flash part of the camera (thin) and experiment with that effect to defuse the light some and make it softer.

Also besides bouncing flash to move it, you can take your flash off camera to change the direction of lighting, but that is beyond what a short tip can do for you.

Gearing up for a fun weekend

Birtday parties, a couple shoots lined up, and just relaxing for a few minutes before the weekend starts and I was in a blogging mood. I got all the images done from last weekend, posted up and waiting on the couple to choose what they want.

The image above is a fun image from the reception, this little girl was trying so hard to ride on his neck. This almost looks like she is floating. I like the effect. Most of the lighting was bounce off the ceiling with a little fill flash added.

Next week I want to touch on some tips on lighting.

Wonderfull weekend

Had a wonderful time at a wedding out in Goshen this Saturday afternoon and into the evening. Sure it was a little on the warm side, but that is to be expected this time of the year. When we got to the wedding location I was worried a little, it was in bright sunlight which any photographer will tell you can be really harsh for pictures. Well by the time the actual cermony came around the sun moved just enough to shade the area and provide a wonderful light.

We've shot a lot of wedding cermonies and very few warm the heart the way this one did, There was a little bridesmaid (daughter of the bride) and right after the cermony she was given her own ring by the groom and the hug she gave him could melt anyones heart.

I'm working on a new project for the new brides (and grooms) out there, it will be a small book on selecting a photographer and then getting the most from your pictures. No, I don't mean the most pictures, I mean the best quality, and the images you really want. It started out to be a flyer for out customers but I determined that brides to be would like it also, It will be made available to out customers as well as to new brides. It should be ready in a few weeks. It is my first attempt at writing something this complex, so be kind.

It's been a busy week, and I had a nice long tip typed up and then the internet ate it. Next week look for a really good tip on lighting when there are mirrors and shiney surfaces around.

On a really sad note... Next week our son starts Kindergarten... He is growing up way too fast. I think his first wedding to shoot will be this fall if he has his way. Actually, I'd perfer him to be at least in the first grade before he shoot a wedding with me.

Back in the swing of things

Well we are back in the swing of things again.. This weekend had an engagement shoot early Saturday morning that. The couple was fun to work with and open to ideas.. This shot wasn't what I intended but I like it a lot. It will be interesting to see what the couple chooses, they have several to choose from so their work is cut out.

The evening events went well as well although no pictures to post from them this time..

Okay.. I'll admit I'm still in a summer mood.. and this picture of my son just screams summer time..

Our Summer special upgrade is gone.. It'll be missed but don't dispare.

Back to school special for Senior Portraits (No sitting fee plus if you spend 300$ or more you get a free portfolio) and a little gift for weddings booked in the month of August, Book a Wedding totaling over 1000$ in August and receive a free Pressbook style album, Book a package over 2500$ and receive a free 16x20 Canvas print.

Photo Tip: Revisited: I have talked about this before and I preach it to everyone, but I've seen pictures from some people taken at the beach and they are just DARK!! the sky behing them is bright and the beach is bright but you see dark people. I don't mean tanned dark, I mean featureless dark. Simply learning how to turn your flash onto fill mode or just flash always on some cameras will make your picture look a lot better. Try it, you will be impressed if you are not already doing it.

Back in town

Back from out time off.. We had a blast. Above is an infrared image taken from the beach front room we stayed in.

We had a lot of request for our special Upgrade package, so we have extended the upgrade until the end of July.. It does have to end though and when it is gone it is gone for good. This deal is as good as it gets. You must book your wedding before the end of the month and pay your deposit in order to receive this deal.

We are ready getting ready for our August weddings and looking forward to them very much.

This week our blog entry is going to be short and sweet, I might chime in later in the week again though.

Shooting Tips, Time off, and shout out's

The weekend was another great time, a little wet but nothing too bad.

This week I’m going to talk a little business. Our special of getting a free upgrade with any package booked has been a success, but it’ll be over come Thursday and won’t be back for a long time. Our regular price are a great deal, with this special some of our brides got a super great deal.

Its been a great summer so far. We are taking a little time off over the next couple weeks. All the orders we have received so far are completed, any new orders will be delayed by about a week, but shouldn’t be a real issue since those brides have all asked for more time to select their pictures. If you order from the web site your orders will be processed automatically.

Photo Tip: Since a little over a week ago when we were forced indoors at a wedding and not really a lot of time to set up the lights and all, I thought I would mention what we did to compensate for it. For some of the portraits we did we bounced our on camera (actually on a bracket that it and the camera are mounted to) off the ceiling and walls. Yes walls, one of my favorite photographs was taken with the flash pointed behind me, and bouncing off a white wall and ceiling. Using the wall like that was like using a huge soft box to provide a really soft flattering light to our bride. For some of the photographs where we bounced off the wall we also used the small white reflector that is standard on our Canon 580II flash. This little reflector also helped a lot while shooting under the tents where we were bouncing off the top of the tent. We were even forced to shoot straight on for a lot of the pictures but they turned out good. Something else I insist on for my photographers (self included) is shooting in RAW mode, that way I can use Abobe Lightroom and set a custom white balance with ease. Shooting in JPG mode does not even come close in giving me the latitude of changes we can do to the images that RAW mode does.

I’d like to take the time to compliment my team of second photographers.

Rose my wife who is a big help and someone I depend on for a lot of help at weddings and had become a great photographer know exactly what shots we need as well as a great assistant knowing what shots we need to get and making sure we don’t forget any shots. I wouldn’t call her an assistant photographer but a CO-Lead photographer.

Jeni and Terri who some of you may have meet at your wedding or may meet. They are great photographers, hard working women who both go beyond what can be expected of a photographer.

Good team members are hard to find, and harder to keep because they are good. I wouldn’t be able to provide the quality of service that we do without them. Also I’d probably be embarrassed a little going into the bridal party’s changing room.

A Wet Wedding but a GREAT TIME

The wedding this weekend was RAINED on but not rained out. It was a great time, there was great food, great music, and dancing in the rain. The couple had a great time, we had a great time, granted it was a lot of extra work keeping the equipmennt dry with three tents but it was fun. Photography wise it was a challange, granted there was no harsh sunlight to deal with, but the rain affected things to some degree. I just finished the editing on the pictures, and they turned out great, I'm sure the couple will love them. Of course not all the pictures were taken outdoors, the one above is of the bride looking out watching guests arrive.

Dancing in the rain and having a blast at a July 4th Wedding..

Going into the Weekend - NEW WEB SITE IS UP

We just installed out new web site.. I think it is a little bit easier to use, I would love to hear your comments on it.

Thanks,
George

Attending a wedding

Had a blast attending a wedding.. as a guest this time.. It was hard not getting all the shots I normally would get.. I did give in and take a camera (minus my brackets and other toys), took way too many pictures at the reception. Not as many at the wedding, It was really hard not to be able to move around any. Especially when their photographer got right in front of me blocking my view of the first kiss. I know we have had to do it to someone before, but still.. I had to remind myself it wasn't my wedding and he HAD to get the shot. I also missed doing the formals, I assume they did great, they shot Canon cameras like we do, and really looked like they knew what they were doing.

Wedding are something we do because we enjoy them and it was enjoyable no to have the stress of getting all the pictures and enjoy the party.. I have seen something already I don't ever see in our wedding pictures, A picture of my wife and I on the dance floor! All in all we had a great time being guest that brought our cameras along.. We didn't try to compete with the photographers and stayed out of thier way and all had a blast.

We have a forth of july wedding that we are looking forward to, it should be a blast. Looking forward to shooting an outdoor wedding, and SPARKLERS and FIRE WORKS are in the works!!

Images - Albums

Talk about HOT... This weekend was HOT. Got some albums designs done.. Which made me think about some questions we get. How do we choose our album is a big one. Well We have done lots of albums in the past and we generally get pretty close to what you would like. Normally we have 2 or 3 pictures you might not like in your album, and we change those. We always allow you to preview your album before you place your final order.

People are amazed sometime the images we capture from their weddings to use for the albums, Stained glass, the outdoor view of the church, the Unity Candle, etc.. We try to, as we are photographing your wedding, capture as many detail images as we can. You might even see a few "Blurry" images in your previews, that while they are not good pictures they make great backgrounds when edited (changing contrast, brightness, etc). Images that are blurry are not accidents all the time, We call them SOFT FOCUS.. and they are a useful part of wedding albums. We even do some that have intentional streaks in them at receptions. We are not sure how your album will be designed until we see the images.. We have a pretty good idea, but always leave the creativity options open.

We also will accept a few images from you to put in your album, We do reserve the right not to use any of your images though if they do not meet our standards.

This coming weekend we are doing something rare.. We are atending a WEDDING as a GUEST.. It happens, and it is nice to leave the camera's home and enjoy the party. It would be unfair to the couple and us to shoot their wedding. I will be honest from the weddings we have attended as guests, it is hard to not to be involved with the pictures, suggesting poses, etc.. But they have professionals and they can handle their job. My job is to find a nice location to sit, close to the food and bar (okay I don't drink anything harder than Diet Pepsi but still nice to be close) with a good view of the dance floor, and just relax and enjoy our friends and family.

Playing Around a Little

As part of my on going training I'm always learning something new, This picture was from a couple weeks ago and was just handy.. The effect is called "stepping out of the frame" I'm a little rough with it yet so be kind.

I missed the car show this weekend, but that happens. It's been really busy lately and Just needed the day to relax.. Our son got up at 8am and climbed in bed with us and we slept until 10, got up and I made breakfest and the three of us just enjoyed the day.

Got an interesting question today about weddings, that does come up from time to time. What if we have to move the date? Generally we will work with you to move your date, provided we have your alternate date open. If you let us know as soon as you can then chances are good we can work with you. We have a backup team for weddings in case something happens and we can use them if all else fails. Also Sunday's are better for alternate dates. If you think it might change, for a small fee we can hold the second date for a while.

I'm going to start a section for Tips for Brides where I can share some questions I've got over the years. How to select a Photographer, or DJ or floist, etc.. one of the best ways I can say on any of these is look at the work of the PERSON you are hiring, not just the company. When you hire us, you get GEORGE STARR, not a photographer that just happens to be around and able to go to your wedding. You see my work here, some of my Second Photographer's work might appear in the albums, but in general you see the work I produce personally. If you see flower designs ask the florist, did YOU do these, or of a DJ ask him, are you the one that is going to be at my reception.

Now I will say there is the posibilty for a substitute lead photographer if something would happen with me. Generally it would be my wife or another well qualified Lead photographer. This has NEVER happened, but I am human so I won't say that it never will.

Next Time around I'll post up a little something on thing to remember.. You will be suprised what people forget.

Okay this Blog is titled Playing around a little, Here we see a Groomsmen doing what a Groomsmen does best on the day of a wedding.. KILL time..

On a kinda sad note: With rising prices everything goes up, and the same is with Wedding photography. Our price have been and always will be very reasonable, but there had been a slight increase in our package rates. Nothing earth shaking, and some of the packages have been updated to add more features. We have added Press Printed books, and guest books, even Canvas Gallery Wraps into some of our packages. We have also added Social Media Sized files of some of your favorite images so you can share your images on all the Social Networks out there like Linkedin, Facebook and MySpace. If we quoted you already don't worry we will honor our quoted prices for a few months. The new prices are on our web site http://starrphotos.net/weddingrates.htm It not all bad... some nice things have been added.

Great Weekend - Ault Park Car Show

Had a great weekend, Saturday morning my son and I went to Ault Park and had a generally great time. We ran into a preview of a Car Show... If you get a chance please show up next Sunday for a great car show, I was told there will be more than 250 cars there, in support of Juvenile Arthritis. A great group of people were previewing for the show, and even offered us Ice Cream, and one kind gentleman even let him sit in the rumble seat of his Packard.

Donovan Took a lot of pictures, If you want to see some check out our myspace page at
http://www.myspace.com/georgestarrphotography He's got a few sections of his photos on there... Guess it is time to make him is own web site.. He took the picture below, which I posted just to show the date and time. I'm not ready for him to assist me at a wedding yet, maybe when he turned 5 in a few months.. Just kidding.

Stormy Weekend

It was a stormy weekend but we stayed dry *MOSTLY* Our wedding on Saturday went well, when we were doing pictures outside we got ran back in when it started pouring rain. We got all but the wedding party formals whre they the bridemaids and Groomsmen were together outdoors, and we finished those up in front of the alter of the church. They all turned out great and are already posted for the couple and their guests.

It was really a busy month in May and we kept up pretty good. All the wedding photographs were up for display withing 3-4 days of the weddings which is well before our contract goal or 2 weeks!! We had a lot of great weddings last month and like always people are having a rough time narrowing down the pictures they want.

It's nice to finally have some warm weather for a change too...

Photo Tip: When you take a picture, any picture, divide the frame up into 4 sections and check the four sections to see what is in them, v/s your main subject. Look for things like Trash cans, bottles, trash, outlets, or other unsightly things. This simple step will become second nature after you've taken 20 or 30 thousand pictures... (okay, you might catch on before that)

Busy but Very fun Weekend

Two weddings over this holiday weekend, Both were very fun, and we got a lot of good pictures. Plus my don had his graduation from preschool last Friday. I've been busy working on the pictures from the weddings, trying to get both done before this coming weekend when we have another wedding. Got some great pictures from a country club, even more from a church wedding! Above is one taken from the Beckett Ridge Country club. The weather both days were just fantastic for weddings. We were pretty uneventful this weekend compared to last weekend, no flat tires or any other events to hold things up.

One note: We were asked about something that I really don't get asked much, Another photographer did a wedding for one of our brides sisters, and they didn't get their album and the pictures were so-so, I was asked if we could help with the pictures and to create an album. The answere is Of course we can.. We don't market to that field, but when it is needed by one of our clients we are glad to help out.

Pre-School graduation was cute.. My son did wonderful, with their performances.. Some of the kids you just wanted to go hug.. one little boy sit in the front row in his cap and gown with the cap pulled down over his eyes.. I guess it was "If I can't see you then you can't see me". Now on to kindergarten in the fall.

Of course we had some rain on Monday, that cause a party to have to be moved, but the rain quit and the grilling and games worked out great.

We've added a few options for prints, We've added Canvas Gallery Wraps, and Press Printed books. More info to come.

Something to Remember

Had a great time this weekend, a tad stressfull wedding Saturday night, but it all turned out okay. The Bride and Groom came out of the church after their wedding to find their car had a flat tire. One of the groomsmen went and got a can of fix-a-flat as I was preparing to change the tire, I wound up helping out getting the tire inflated so they could make it to the reception, a little late, but not that bad. The reception went pretty good for them. The food was hot and very good. The Dj's did a great job, although they had a slight issue with the power (not their fault). All in all a good time was had by all..

PHOTO TIP: Bring Wet-One's with you when shooting, you never know when you will be changing a tire! It's all part of the service you might not be expected to provide, but do it anyway.

It’s been a busy week, meeting with new brides, delivering albums, ordering prints, and getting images ready for people to view. I got an 11x14 print of the Tiger on last weeks blog printed for myself; It looks sharp and will find a place on my walls. It’s not listed in or images for sale yet, but like most prints it is available to purchase.

I had a great Mother Day with my wife and son and a good weekend in general. I took the weekend off from any weddings or appointments and we just had a good time.

I’ve started some work on a website redesign. Redesigning the site is hard because I really like what I have now and replacing it will be like saying goodbye to a good friend.

We have 3 wedding in the next week so you might not see a blog next week, although, I wouldn’t bet on that. The blog is a fun part of the business for me and I love getting comments on it.

With the website redesign there will be some package changes coming along, We’ll be eliminating our low end package (no one ever buys it anyway) off the web site. Adding another tier of offerings. For examples, a Photo Guest book, Press Printed proof books, and Multiple Volume albums. Before you laugh about multiple albums think about the idea of having a separate album for family formals, the reception, Bride and groom, engagement photos, etc.) From my research it’s a growing trend, as is giving your mate a small album (little black book style) of Boudoir photographs.

PHOTO TIP:
This one isn’t really for everyone, more for the person doing a portrait. You’ve noticed portraits where the subject is in focus but the background is blurred. This is a nice effect and highlights the subject and not where they are. After all a portrait is a picture of a person, not the room or their surroundings. The best way of obtaining this is to have a decent lens in the telephoto or slightly telephoto ranges (80mm + lens), you will need to step back from your subject so you can get a good composition, zooming in, you will notice that the background blurs out. This is caused the Depth of Field, which I won’t go into too much here, but basically it defines the area of a picture that is in focus. If you have any control over your shutter speed and aperture, use the largest aperture you can and set the shutter accordingly, (or use AV mode and let the camera do it). Main thing is to play with it, find out what works, what doesn’t.. the same principle applies in Macro Photography, just on another scale.

Family Time

Okay - Here's the deal... Weekends are family time.. Weddings are on the weekends.. Well When I'm out doing a wedding, or other shoots I always make time to do something my Son wants on the weekend days I have off. Well this Saturday morning (Wedding in the evening) We went to tothe Zoo for about 2-3 hours (at 4 and a half thats about all he wants of the zoo) We both normally take a camera this time around we shared one. After riding the Merry-go-round, and the train and a short detour to the play area in the childrens zoo where he met a cute little girl and they ran and played together for a while. Well we made it around to where the Tigers was and he didn't want to go there, he wanted to go see the elephants, so we compromised and after taking a few shots like this one it was off to see the elephants, and of course the garaffes.

We both really love the zoo and as far as number of pictures we took it was rather lacking.. but this one shot made it worth carrying the camera around for a little while. Now you might say, whats the big deal, well remember, I'm a photographer and BIG lenses are a standard thing to carry around, The lens I really love for this is my canon 100-400L with IS, the only drawback is it alone weighs three pounds, add to that a camera body and a monopod and the weight adds up quickly.

Anyway, got some great pictures that evening(wedding) and everything went well for the rest of the weekend.. Sunday he enjoyed riding his bike for a while, playing with the computer, and he helped me cook breakfest and later grill out.

PHOTO TIP - People ask me what I do to process my images to get the great prints that I do. Well you would be suprised, the first step comes to getting the image right in the camera. I use Adobe lightroom for a little cropping and some adjustments if needed. I shoot only in RAW mode because the photographs just simply turn out better.

BUSY- and having a blast!

I’ve been having fun lately with photography projects, getting new prints, putting together albums (yes I said fun). I enjoy photography, and doing a nice album, nice prints, etc makes me feel good. I get to see the results as soon as I open up an order to check it for a customer. No matter how much I see on the screen, the prints are so much nicer. 11x14 size prints are a great way of showing off your photographs.

I’ve been getting a lot of people wanting to book wedding that are less than 2-3 months away, Some I have been able to help some I have referred to another wedding photographer, however, we’ve had to turn people down that might not have had to be if they booked early. People are booking right now into May of next year for us. We have a some dates open for the summer and fall, esp for Friday or Sunday weddings, feel free to ask us if your date is close, we might not have it open but can suggest someone to you.

Our preferred vendors list is growing, We added the DJ I mentioned last week to it, Young’s DJ Service – you can call Mike at 859-635-7716 Just tell him I sent you.

Also feel free to join us on www.Linkedin.com and network with us. And check out some of our work on Flicker at http://www.flickr.com/photos/georgestarrphotography On our regular website you can view a recent wedding album in our gallery section.

You can view our profile on the Professional Photographers of America web site at http://www.ppa.com/findaphotographer/9300/George-Starr.php

Fun Weekend... Lakes and Weddings

Thanks to a cancelation we had Friday off, so took the day off and went to Kincade lake and had a great time with my wife and son. The weather was great, and I took a camera a long with me and go several Birds of Prey (halks, etc). and just enjoyed sitting beside the lake for a while with the family.

Saturday we had a fun time out in California Kentucky with a really fun couple and their families. Tractors, shot guns, and a lake along with good food proved to be a good combo for a great time by all in attendance. We even had a DJ that we had worked with before who did a great job, I love the DJ's that work with the photographers and make sure we are ready for all the events of the evening. I'll post a link with his info on my web site later in the week because we'd love to work with him again.

The image above is a candid of the bride's mother taking a quick snapshot, and I just couldn't resist..

SPRING!!! Gotta love it!

Had a great weekend wedding down in Georgetown Kentucky, got the pictures all processed in record time. It was a great day for the weather, a little cool but not cold, but when you are working that’s always a good thing. We are geared up to handle an very busy spring wedding season, and the Senior Portraits and Boudoir sessions that are lining up.

Since we posted about the Boudoir sessions last week we’ve actually gotten a lot of interest in them from brides and others.

I’ve added a preferred vendor section onto the site also for local vendors that brides and others might find useful and there still is room for a few more to be added.

Business Notes:

This week due to a demand, we added a Store to our site where you can purchase some artistic prints. Right now it only has a few on it, but we’ll add more. Check it out at http://starrphotos.net/store Let us know what you think!!

Due to one person we have had a policy change in regards to personal checks, While we’ve always had a returned check policy we got our first bad check for a wedding since we’ve been doing weddings. It was for a deposit on a wedding date that was within 3 weeks of the booking on a Friday night. Looking at what other photographers are doing we have rethought our policy on personal checks, we are not going to penalize everyone for this one person, however, we would prefer a bank cashiers check or money order for the final balance but understand that does not work for everyone and we will continue to accept personal checks. For a wedding the is within a month (very rare) we will require the deposit to have cleared our bank. Just a side note, we do prosecute for bad checks plus fees. If you have issues let us know and we can work something out.


QUICK TIP:

This week I’m going to include a QUICK tip for taking photos in low light levels, We do this at weddings or even out and about when the light is not as bright as we would like. It’s great for shooting birds with a big zoom or flowers in the shade without a tri-pod. What you do if your camera allows it for it is to set for a burst, rapid fire or continuous shooting mode, and fire off several shots, the idea is that during one of the exposures you hopefully have held the camera still enough for one shot to turn out! Does it work? For me it works pretty good and some of the blurs are even useful for backgrounds, etc. You can also change your ISO to 400 to even 1600 and beyond depending on the camera you have, you get a little more grain but sometimes the trade off is worth it.

Gearing up and Adding Boudoir

Gearing up for a busy season, April and May are always busy months with weddings and we are looking forward to shooting in a lot of nice Churches and locations in the upcoming weeks. This weekend we are going down around Georgetown Kentucky, for a much anticipated wedding. Two weddings are scheduled for the next weeknd and several in May.

We’ve started offering Boudoir Sessions a while back but really never promoted them before now. If you read our web site you will find a link for http://starrphotos.net/boudoirphotography.htm On the page it list some questions you might have about Boudoir Photography, what to expect, costs, and a limited time offer for a select few people that want to Model for some samples that will appear on the website. We do have samples available upon request from previous models that requested not to be placed on a web site that is open to the public but are fine with them upon request. We do have releases for the pictures we display and your pictures will never be shown to anyone that you don’t show them to.

Boudoir photography makes a great gift for that special person. Over the years these images have become a popular to be given as a wedding or anniversary gift. Our limits are your limits as long as it is legal and not pornographic. We are open to Individuals, Girls Night Parties, and Couples. If there is something special you need we can probably help you. We do Mini-BLACK book albums and custom prints.

Another Great Week

Another GREAT Week - Had a shoot Saturday, in between raindrops at a local park, It turned out really well. The couple is getting married in a couple weeks and wanted a nice engagement fun picture for a signature matt. This isn't what they chose, but I liked this one, it shows why We do weddings, They are in love and it showed through he whole shoot and made me feel good for the rest of the day.

Wedding season is really starting up!! -Be sure to check our Links pages for Vendors that we recommend.

Time for another phototip - We've done, Exposure for shooting in the snow (hope we don't need this one again for a while), Shooting outdoors with Fill Flash. This week Lets go into a little of

Shooting at night
we are talking doing Cityscapes, building that are lit up, etc.

First off using a TRIPOD - This is really needed, although you can get by with using something like a wall, or a fence post, or even a trash can or top of your car. The important thing is not to move the camera during the extended exposure you need.

It helps to have a remote release too, or you can use the camera's self timer. If your camera has an option for Mirror Lockup that can help with vibration also.

Okay you have found something you want to take a picture of, set you tripod up mount your camera on it. You can try letting the camera take the picture, but I recommend playing with the settings to get the look you desire. Depending on the scene you can start at f11 at 1/2 second and go up and down from there. If you camera don't have manual settings you can still take the picture using your auto settings, Try flash on, flash off, this helps even though your flash can not reach or light the scene, most cameras will set the shutter to 1/60 of a second when using a flash. Sometime you can set a EV setting of +1 or +2 or -1 or -2 Try these and keep notes so you learn what works for your scene. I've shot scenes at f5.6 and 4 seconds and got great results, it all depends on what you are shooting. Next time around I'll write a little bit on using Flash at night for shooting people and other things close up, and even a WEDDING TIP will be included for those with SLR Cameras.

I shoot Canon SLR Cameras, and will do some Tips on settings for these cameras specifically too.

New and Exciting stuff

Just had a meeting this week with a Social Network Consultant, Kind informative, and something we have done in the past. I.e. This blog, Myspace, Facebook and they recommended a couple others that I hadn't heard of "Twitter" and "Linkedin"

"Linkedin" looks really cool so far, join me on there at http://linkedin.com/ look for me via my email George@starrphotos.net

Great Weekend

The opening image is an Infra-Red Image of the Supension Bridge and Downtown Cincinnati.

I got spoilt over the weekend, the weather was great.. The days started out a little cool but turned out nice. My son and I went down along the Ohio River heading to the Newport Aquarium and got distracted by a Helicopter hovering above one of the skyscrapers. Being four and a half years old this was something for him so we stopped under the suspension bridge. We got out pictures of the helicopter and took some of the cityscape and bridge, took a walk and took some more. It was a very relaxing morning for the both of us. It does make me wonder how good he will be in a few years, he was using one of the extra cameras we have a Canon Rebel XTI which is about his size camera.

The image below is one of his favorite's and I love the angle he took it from, it's like really seeing it from his view.