There are times

I talk to a lot of photographers, it seems those that enjoy weddings are a rare breed. Most consider them something they have to do. We don't see wedding this way, we enjoy being with the wonderful people we meet, seeing them get married. We enjoy meeting their parents, their friends and family, and sharing their stories with them.

Of course like with anything there are times I question if this is something I want to continue, There is a lot of work not releated directly to photography involved with our part of the weddings. All the paperwork involved and then keeping up with orders and the like during our busy seasons. There is a lot involved with weddings too, I spend about 3 hours doing equipment checks, verifying everything is loaded in the car. The wedding itself is the fun part where we do what we really enjoy. After the wedding it takes time to get all the pictures ready for presentation, in most cases about as long as the wedding and reception it's self. I do this because I refuse to simply give our clients RAW work. If there is an album involved it can take even more work and time, depending on the number of changes they require.

Sure this is the reason most photographys don't want to do weddings, but for me, I can't wait to get home and in front of my computer to see the images we captured, and when and album comes together the feeling is great. Next is my favorite part, delievering the prints to the customer and getting their feedback. It makes all the other work we do totally worth while.

In 10+ years it's all been good, I've had one issue with one bride that took a long time to get her album approved, and with some changes made to it that went wrong where I sent the lab my original copy of the album to print and had to get it back from the customer to have repaired which took a while. She loved her Prints, and got the Digital Images very early on so I guess she wasn't in a big hurry to review the album and then got impatient. I guess with all the bad news about fly by night photographers assumed she had been taken and wasn't getting her album or something.

Anyway one complaint in 10 years from someone that loved her pictures and is taken care of. I guess 1 out of all the wedding over the last 10 years that we have done isn't bad.

Even with all that is involved, we both still love shooting weddings, and always have a good time with them, and capture lots of nice images. The image above is just one of many cake portraits we do, we cover weddings totally and gets several different views of most shots, we never know what will look best to a clients in their album until everything comes together.

I try to add something personal to my blogs from time to time, not just all business and my rantings about different things. Here is my son, as he was standing on 1st base saturday at his first T-Ball game of the season. If you have met with me before and seen some of my portfolio work you will now that his pictures is the last page in one of them that I love to show people. I keep his picture there to remind me why I do this, besides the point that we like it, it does help pay for the extras in his life.

Family is important and we believe this and we really do like being part of your family for a day.

Thank you to the brides I've delievered work to over the last month, it's your kind words that keep us motivated to keep doing this!

Two for one

We had a busy weekend but it all turned out well. We had a great time with both weddings, everyone showed up on time and everyone was in a good mood and the pictures turned out great. They are both posted up for the couple and their guests to preview within a week of their wedding!! We always shoot for a week, althought we quote two.

Looking at one of the couples pictures they posted up on facebook made me think that while it is good to have a pro take your pictures because of the quality of the images it is good to have family and friends take some too. While as professionals we try to get everything we can your friends know the people better and sometimes get a shot that we might not get. However, don't depend on them to get all the shots you want, or in the quality that you might want to hang on your walls or in an album. While small digital cameras have improved over the years, they don't replace having profesional cameras and professionals taking your photographs.

It's is always fun for us to see the pictures your friends and family take, so feel free to include us as your friend on facebook or myspace or just shoot us an email with a link if they use something else to share them.

If we are doing an album for you and they have one that you just love we would be happy to include them with our images.

We have one wedding this weekend coming up and I'm looking forward to it and hopefully the weather will hold out.

Locations - Hidden Gems in and around Cincinnati

Over the years, we've shot in lots of different churches, and halls, and neat locations. Above is a picture taken in the Packard Museum located in Dayton, Ohio. It's a very neat location for the car lovers amongst us.

We've shot at the Phoenix, The Madison, and a lot of the Standard places, and some of the not so "Standard" places. I put that in quotes because even though you might not think of a location for a wedding it doesn't mean that it would not make a neat location. There are a lot of hidden gems around our fine city for locations. You can also travel to a scenic spot for your pictures if you leave time either before your wedding ceremony or between it and your reception. Devou Park and other locations along the river are wonderful for that. Sharon Woods, Ault park, Mt Airy, and a lot of other parks make a great spot for pictures and/or your wedding. The Lodge at Sharon Woods is a wonderful place for an wedding/reception.

Other locations we have shot at and were surprisingly beautiful are, The Benchmark in Covington, The Carnigie Center in Newport, Mill Race Banquet center in Winton woods (pictured below). Todays blog is not a listing of locations we have shot, or even the only ones that we think are hidden gems. If you have others you like let me know and I'll add another blog post.

We also like simple... Like the small church pictured below. There are lots of other locations around for weddings, Take you time and find the one that is perfect for you. Remember to book early for all your wedding vendors and locations. Photographers book quickly, but the location you want might book up even quicker.

We've even shot in a church so small that we didn't have room to sit up any additional lighting equipment. But the picture turned out great anyway!! We carry with us a lot of optional equipment that helps us with difficult jobs. We have loaned out our backdrops to one bride to give her privacy while changing in a room with big windows and no curtains. Rest assured that no matter what your locations is we will get you good pictures.

One of the most challenging weddings we have had was an outdoor wedding in the rain, It's hard to protect cameras, stay dry, and get good pictures at the same time, but we managed.

Christmas and the New Year

Christmas is a time for family and we were busy with other peoples families this year, however, we took time out for ours too.. Here is my son proudly smiling after beating Myself, and his Aunt and Cousin at Wii Resort Bowling over Christmas Break.

I hope everyone had a Great Christmas and a will have a good year in 2010, A Few changes are in the works to help us meet your needs a little better. With the way the economy is these days I find people trying to cut cost on services and it gets confusing to me to do custom packages based off of my other packaes. I just had 2 parents albums made last month for a couple that only ordered a Bridal album.. Ooops!! The loved their Bridal album and I guess I will love the other 2 albums over time!

We were busy with a lot of Maternity portraits over the last two months and I can't wait to photography all the babies. While we mostly do weddings we are available for other sessions too.

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.

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.

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 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..

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.

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.