Fast forward to this morning. I kept thinking about locations for her senior picture shoot. My mind’s eye kept coming back to graffiti and bricks, two elements that came to mind when I’d think of her. Off we went; I figured we’d do the graffiti first and then see how it went. Incredible, that’s how it went. So good I had to force myself to wander to other locations.

We had a ball – even shot some photos her Mother could use as a Christmas card.

The photo shoot will be the high point of Black friday for me – the shoot and the fact that I slept in instead of going out into the madness of the shopping extravaganza.

Here’s a few of the day’s photos.

Today I did a photo session with Rachel, who, by her own admission, isn’t exactly keen on being photographed. I think it took about 3 minutes before Rachel forgot she didn’t like having a camera staring her down. It was late afternoon – cold and windy, just a  typical end of a fall  day at the beach. We could feel the impending rain/snow storm heading in. Didn’t faze her a bit – she never even got cold ( wish I couyld say that for me!).

Heading home after the shoot, I was whistling – knew we’d gotten some pretty special photos. Here’s a sample of the day’s work.

Originally when Anvi, Augustine and I had talked about an engagement shoot we were looking at a few parks outside of Boston. Later Anvi asked if we could go to the public gardens.  I mentioned the problems but she clearly wanted to go to the gardens…and after all its her wedding. OK, we’ll do the gardens.

I drove down to find that there was an accident tying up traffic on Storrow Drive – the backup was all the way to beyond the bridge leading into the city. Chose an alternate route ( even though I knew I’d lose my GPS signal in the O’Neill tunnel) – came through the tunnel, driving blind with no satellite signal, made a few guesses and about the time I acquired a signal I was in front of the public gardens…still not sure how I did that.

Most of the meters were bagged – a film crew was working in the area – and the car was overheating. Not feeling good about this at all! Circled the gardens a couple of times, finally snagged a parking place, grabbed my gear and sprinted to the meeting spot. Anvi and Augustine were late…they had to deal with the same lack of parking, but we connected and off we went.

Its funny how I can be a little down about things – but that all goes away when the shooting starts. Ok, for all you “hate-to-get-out-of-bed and go to work people, all the can’t wait till the week’s over folks…I really can’t relate. The fact is I love what I do. Yeah, I know – I’m really lucky! But I digress.

Dealt with the crowds – they really weren’t as bad as they could have been, think the possible rain kept some away. Anvi and Augustine were a joy to work with – we knew we were running just ahead of thunderstorms and shot a bunch till they hit. Spent 30 minutes or so under a bridge by the swan boats, talking, looking at photos in the back of the camera, then at it again as the storm passed. Having so much we even pushed the limit on the parking meters. Finally wrapped it up and parted excited to do the wedding. Can’t wait, what a neat couple!

Here’s a few photos from the shoot.

It quickly became apparent that Anisha was simply amazing. We talked like we had known each other all our lives – and I was ready to shoot her wedding before I had even met her!

Two weeks later and I met her and fiance William. Wow! We sat in their house, talked then went strolling around Chelsea – the waterfront along the river, the Tobin Bridge in the background, apple blossoms bloomed that day – it was all perfect. The more we talked, walked and shot, the more I came to feel like family to these two – their wedding is in a month – it will be hard to wait.

Here’s a few photos from our session.

The castle itself was closed, but the grounds are amazing. Stone turrets, stone walls, beautiful woods, simply a great place to shoot photos.

We weren’t without our moments – at one poiint I heard a car alarm going off, didn’t think much of it until a short while later when the Windham police showed up. Turned out we had set off motion alarms while walking around – the car alarm was actually a breakin alarm. The police officer was great – it became clear we weren’t there to steal the castle and he was most gracious about having to respond to a sort-of false alarm.

Hannah and Miles were great too! We tried all kinds of photos, the more we shot the more they got into it. And when we were done ( it was starting to get dark) I had way more photos than I will ever be able to work with. Here’s a few from the shoot.

Remembered when I never shot color, saw only in black and white…sometimes still do, but thinking don’t see that way enough. Love that the content and composition become what the photo is all about, no getting diverted by pretty colors. Texture becomes color, what a wonderful way to see.

So I’ll just cut to the chase – here’s a selection of senior pictures I did at Great Bay Charter School. Unlike the ordinary senior picture shoot that involves going to the woods, beach or some other exotic location for a few hours, these were kids that needed senior pictures done, were at or near ( or past!) the yearbook’s deadline, and had to be done in 5-6 minutes each.

Oh, and one student who I just wanted to photograph so I convinced her to sit for a couple of minutes – she just made me promise not to ask her to smile. No problem there – I never ask subjects to smile.

I keep getting trapped in verbiage – it seems as hard to stop this post as it was to start it – enough already! Here’s the photos.

Had a good senior picture season, I’ll start off with Annie. Whoever said teenagers can’t get up in the morning haven’t met Annie – we met at hampton Beach early one fall morning. She and her Mom brought one of their horses. While Mom was tacking up the horse, Annie and I wandered off along the beach and dunes. It was one of those cold fall mornings, the sun fighting a battle with the clouds – not really providing much warmth but creating beautiful light.

Once the horse was ready we switched gears and shot Annie with the love of her life. The horse was a bit freaked out by the sand – and Annie decided riding him probably wasn’t the best idea ( although her mother jumped on and galloped through the water, great sight!).

The icing on the cake was a flock of geese flying through the photos as we sat on a jetty – couldn’t have asked for a more inspiring sight.

A bit of post processing work to emphasize the colors of the light and here’s some of the shoot to share.

When I was a photojournalist I’d try to limit group sizes with justifications like ” There’s more impact with fewer people in the photo.”. Thankfully, it usually worked.

So the phone rang a while back – it was a business colleague wondering if I’d be interested in doing a photo shoot of a choral group. “No problem, I’d love to do it.”

Did I ask how large the choral group was? No.

Another small thing I hadn’t counted on – assembling nearly 100 people is no small feat – and it doesn’t happen very often. When it does, they’re ready for a concert…translate that into there’s not much time to shoot. OK, I’ll admit maybe I should have thought of that, but I was pretty consumed by solving the lighting parts of the problem. Did I call that a small thing – long live sarcasm!

Three days before the shoot the final details were worked out – I’ll have a window from 7:15 until 7:30 to shoot and then tear down my equipment before the doors are opened to the public for the concert! Suddenly I needed an assistant, one who knows how to set up big strobes, adjust them and tear down in a hurry. The choice was obvious – my 13-year-old daughter has been around lighting gear almost as much as me. She’s good and she takes directions and orders ( as long as its about photography…anything else, she’s even more stubborn than me!) After some intense negotiating surrounding pay, we struck an agreement  and I had my assistant. Good thing too because in the Murphy’s Law of Lighting, there was no electricity where I wanted to position two of the lights. I was so flustered I didn’t see the solution – she did, and not a moment too soon. We had time for 6 test shots to check the light, then 16 photos with the 97 members of Portsmouth Pro Musica, then tear down and run with our gear so nobody would crash into it.

Technically, the photo was lit using 4 large strobes, 2 alien bee’s and 2 profotos. All were set to full power, we managed shooting at ISO 400 at F/8 with an 80mm lens.

Absolutely a wonderful challange and a type of photo way out of the ordinary for me…and my assistant! We did catch a bit of the dress rehearsal/warmup. These folks are really good and I’d whole heartedly recommend catching them some night. Here’s a link to their concert schedule, http://www.portsmouthpromusica.org/concertinformation.html . Put it on your to do list!

Here’s one of the 16 photos we shot.

Emails back and forth for three days leading up to the shoot – and finally at 8:30 that morning Lisa said, “Let’s go for it, no matter what.”

Now that is my kind of bride! We met at the entrance to the island, I stowed my truck and the three of us headed for the beach, much of which was posted off limits because the plovers are nesting right now. That didn’t matter – there were so many choices for great places to shoot we could have stayed there forever.

The rain never materialized, the temperatures weren’t nearly as chilly as predicted – though it wasn’t t-shirt weather – and we had a great time.

The absolute moment came when Lisa and Joe kicked off their shoes and waded into the water…yep, next was two people screaming their heads off…it is the North Atlantic after all … and they came bursting back onto the beach. Sadly or smartly, I didn’t get the picture of the reaction. Call me a wimp if you want, but I had stayed on dry land! I’d like to think it was a smart move.

Here’s some photos from the session.