Our client-friends are amazing. What is also amazing is how much they have in common with each other and/or me. I thought it was really interesting that several of our brides picked the same shoes! That really says something about how specific the people we attract are!
This is a really fun video is about High Heels that I thought was fitting.
This year we actually went to a party for Halloween! Last year we were in Ohio visiting family and the year before that I had the flu. (Not this year; I took Echinacea and it worked!)
Our makeup artist Amy did my makeup and I got dressed up 40's (with some cracks) Amy was 40s Frankenstein! She did her face soooo good!
Fun in the kitchen! Somehow I'm always laughing or eating in photos! ha.
Edward Scissorhands! He kept the perfect expression the whole time and kept hitting me with his scissors!
Brandie, Dana, Shireen, Amy, Leilah and The beautiful host, Brittney. Also some guys enjoying our photo!
Our billion-year Sprint contract was up yesterday, finally. So instead of staying with them and being forced into buying new phones (and renewing our contracts for one more billion years), it made more sense not to renew get the iPhones. It actually saved us money!
Levi is Owen's younger brother and it was his very first birthday. And Dana Grant Photography was there to document yet another historic event in the life of The Rachunok Family!
This party was a pirate theme and it was lots of fun!
The Birthday Boy!
Aunt Amy and Pirate Owen.
Owen enjoys a snow cone.
Levi did NOT enjoy his cake!
But he did enjoy this niefty piece of cardboard.....
....and this snow cone.....
....and being tossed in the air!
I love shooting kids eating. And they kept yelling, "El Pollo Loco!"
Aren't we cute?! Melody, Levi and Dana. (Thanks Amy!)
Do YOU know any 20 year olds that celebrate their birthday Princess style?? I do!
One of our family friends, Destinie turned 20 last month. So of course she had a Belle-themed party! Haha! Only Destinie. So here's some pictures she INSISTED on seeing on the blog!
We are going on a little camping adventure Monday through Wednesday (July 14-16) this week. We usually go to Yosemite but we didn't have a place to stay this year! So we WERE headed to Big Sur (except that it's on fire!) so now we'll be in Cambria.
We won't be able to answer emails until Thursday. If something is urgent, please give us a call at 951-515-9597. (Hopefully we'll get service!)
So many peeps in Long Beach. Some even camped out to get their spot. This is the window from my sister's boyfriend's house.
The other view from the house. That's the Queen Mary over there.
Fireworks! It was weird seeing them from a balcony since we're usually under them.
And as per usual, something crazy happened on this 4th (we've gotten $1000 ticket for setting them off just to name one!) and this time it was something else. We saw someone through an M1000 on the street and almost hit a car!! Insane!
It was a good weekend! Come back soon for more blogs this week!
In between our wedding madness of June, we shot Jeremy's cousin Amber's graduation from Corona High School (where I also graduated.) It brought back so many memories of my graduation day. The weather was exactly the same and I felt completely transported back in time. I even got a bit teary eyed remembering how I was feeling that day: So excited to leave high school and start my adult life, I didn't even cry then. It only took 8 years and my cousin's graduation to get me all emotional about it!
If you only could have seen Amber's mom in action! She saved us all seats and was guarding them with her life!
Jeremy got a really great spot and with the telephoto lens was able to get some really great shots of the whole thing.
On the walk down.
The view from the stands as she gets her diploma.
This is my FAVE.
Amber, mom, dad and brother.
Sooo happy!
Now you see why it's okay when I make Mexican jokes!
They LOVE taking pictures!
Amber with our Nana. She's the most wonderful Nana ever and we love her!!!
Fun after pizza.
A race broke out and Jeff won. Now you REALLY see why I make Mexican jokes!
We love you so much Amber and we're so proud of you!
Life was horrible without the GPS. Jeremy and I yelled at each other every time we got in the car. We were late everywhere from getting lost. We showed up to the destination irritated. We had a huge fights over which way was right. So we came to the sad conclusion that it was either a. get a divorce or b. get a new system. In order to save our marriage, we chose the latter. And we lived happily ever after!
Her voice isn't the same but we love our new GPS system so much! Dear homeless person/drug dealer/user who broke into our car:
We are no longer leaving our GPS system in the glove compartment. If you must steal something, please feel free to steal the whole car. We would LOVE a brand new one covered by the insurance company!
My mom, (also known as Diana) needed a head shot for her work. She's the Senior Director of Orange County ROP. She tells me what exactly she does but somehow I always manage to tune out...oops!
Isn't she sooo cute?!
Btw, my mom is the most difficult person I've ever shot! I don't know what it is; she's just really hard to get making a good face. As she said, "The true essence of Diana can not be captured!" hahaha!
Finally, we got a great one:
Thanks Brandie Bedell for giving us pointers on the make-up!
In honor of last night's season finale of the Office, I decided to have my morning coffee in my favorite "I heart Jim" coffee cup. Best one dollar I ever spent! I'm just so mad that I didn't buy one for all my friends!
Not sure which relationship I love more, Jim and Pam or Jim and Dwight. Enjoy one of my favorite clips:
Here's a few more details from Salvation Mountain I've been meaning to post. In case you didn't know the story of this Leonard Knight, he has worked his whole life to paint this mountain about God's love. And he lives in a house without electricity or running water! That's hardcore! You can read more about it here.
We got to meet Leonard after a film crew was done making a video of him. He was a very nice man with the best aged face. The kind of face that you know has been through a lot and has so much character. He gave us a DVD about the mountain and we asked him if we could donate a few bucks for the paint. He said "I only want people to donate if it comes from the heart." Very cool.
I love taking photos of other people's art.
The view from the top of the mountain.
The paint cans were everywhere as it's a never-ending project.
Before we left San Francisco, we stopped to meet with a really sweet couple (hi guys!) and we took some pictures of random things.
I was so sad that I didn't have enough time to take more photos of swirlies!
Caught! Right after we had breakfast, he goes and gets another drink!
The Ferry.
A little art fair:
I love fire hydrants. I always take photos of cool-looking ones.
Jeremy tried to take a bad photo of me but it came out good!
On the LONG way home on the 1 Freeway.
Right by the Hurst Castle, there's this spot to view Elephant Seals, not to be confused with regular seals.
They make the funniest sounds!
I hope this one is just sleeping!
Observe "The Jerm" in his natural habitat. He's a strange sloth-like creature. He reaches in the funyun bag, his lips slowly strech out and finally grab his meal.
Here's some more fun stuff from San Fran. It was a really quick trip so we didn't take a ton. We were mostly traveling or shooting the engagement session or sleeping!
We left late Thursday night and drove for about 45 minutes before we realized we forgot our albums! (Kind of important when you're meeting with potential clients). So we had to turn around. We ended up staying the night at this little motel in the middle of nowhere. I have to look up the receipt to see what town, hold on.... it's "Apricot" or "Firebaugh". I don't know....
Jeremy can never take a normal picture with me!! Sigh.
He's a crazy!
This one makes me laugh out loud!
And Moi. Driving is serious business.
McDonald's has the BEST regular coffee. It's WAY better than Starbuckscrapola.
Like this trash can.
I heart coffee!
Jeremy hearts.. uh.. greenery, yeah that's it!
What? Don't you like to stand by the dumpsters after breakfast?
Lots of dead bugs, the bridge, and San Fran here we come!
Jeremy's ginnie pig before the shoot. I'm on a straight-forward-look kick.
Come back tomorrow for more adventures in "On the way HOME from San Francisco!"
Our car got broken into (probably by a homeless person since we were parked right by the trash and we've seen them going through it) and they stole our GPS system out of the glove compartment. And just for fun, our insurance doesn't cover it!
In order to cope with these HUGE (I'm very dramatic at the moment! Ha!) loss in my life, I'm writing a letter to the good ole GPS: Dear GPS,
I'll miss the way you used to get us to places earlier than expected. You were so smart and always knew the best and fastest way to get there.
I'll miss how we didn't have to think about which way we were going. Sometimes, you'd even talk to us. But if we ever got sick of hearing your voice, you'd be quiet too.
We'll miss how we NEVER got lost. This is very important as I'm super creative at finding new ways to get myself all turned around.
I'll miss all the fun adventures we use to have just driving around with the security of knowing we could always find our way back home.
But most of all, I'll miss how we could find any food or any store our little hearts desired. You always knew exactly what was closest and easiest to get to.
It was like you could read our minds.
Farewell Friend. There will be an empty place in my heart until we meet again!
Yours truly, Dana Grant
Jeremy took these pictures of the glass on the ground.....
We can't believe Owen is already 4! If you're not a regular blog reader, we've been documenting Owen (our friend's first child) since before he was born! And we couldn't stop now. It's so fun to watch him grow up and to look back at the pictures from when he was little. Isn't that the fun of photography?!
For my second trip to Vegas in a week and a half, we went for the WPPI tradeshow. Well that's what we MEANT to go for. We ended up meeting new photographers, becoming fast BFFs and spending the whole time having way too much fun! This year really was the most fun we've ever had in Vegas for WPPI.
This is the only pic I got of the tradeshow, The adorable Jules Bianchi in action!
--Day Two: Lunch at Diablos. Margarita-friend, Britney, Aaron and Larz. No one ever saw Larz face because that Dude always had a camera on it!
---Night two, [ b ]ecker's party. It was so fun but the a/c broke right before the party started and it was hot! Here I am in the fotocabina there (someone needs to teach me how to pose!)
Saturday I spent the day with my fam celebrating Easter at the Schneider Ranch in Horse Capital U.S.A. (aka Norco) and I shot a few fun pics. Tomorrow we plan to go to church, see Jer's fam and then see my sister's family who's visiting from Hawaii! Yay for family!
Happy Easter!! We hope you have a wonderful weekend!
Check out my Mommy's bunny cake. She was THRILLED with it!
While we get all of our fun photos ready, take a gander at this self-portrait I shot at the amazing dive bar, Double Down Saloon in Vegas. I got very well acquainted with this bathroom last year (two words: ass juice!!) and I've always liked to photograph cool bathrooms. And this one is my absolute favorite.
Sometimes ya just have a have a girl's weekend with your bffs. In Vegas. We celebrated our friend Brandie's birthday. And Yowza! We had an extraordinary amount of fun. It was the stuff dreams are made of.
Brandandie, your birthday curse is lifted! We had the best birthday weekend of all time! Happy birthday!! I love you, my friend!
We stopped in Barstow at the largest McDonald's. Brandie, Evey and Danie.
It has a gift shop. Oh how right you were, sign. How right you were.
We brought our own mini-bar. This was the first night.
The daylight was only seen once, when we dragged ourselves to the Paris Buffet. Worth it! We sat at the buffet for two and half hours!
Lucky me, I brought along a Hairstylist(Ev) and a Make-up Artist(Bran)!
Just a few Vegas slogans that describe our trip of a lifetime:
A photog took our pics at Body English and I found it VERY necessary to tell him I'm a photog too! Fun night!
Right before we were about to leave the super long line at Tao, we were escorted to the front of the line. But we couldn't get in because the b-day girl lost her I.D!
Other Vegas fun facts: -We never paid to get in anywhere! We got in mostly by being a group of three girls. They needed to fill their quota! -We met the nicest people ever. No dirty guys. Who knew they existed in Vegas?!
Stay tuned for more adventures in Vegas next week as I take my man candy with me to the WPPI photo trade show and photog fun nights!
Other photographers always ask us what to do to help their business. We say networking is one of the best things that you can do! Last night we went to Digital Wedding Forum get together at Victor Sizemore's house for a fun night of talking with other photogs. It was really fun. Sometimes I can be really shy and not talk to people like I want to but I did really good! I met new people and talked to a few old friends too. Jeremy is always a social butterfly so he didn't have any problems!
I was sooo happy they had the Red Cheese Booth there since I don't have a point and shoot to bring to these kinds of events!
For Valentine's Day, Jeremy and I decided to take a drive through Ortega Highway. It's something we've been wanting to do for a long time. One of our favorite things to do is drive around and look for unique and secluded places to shoot.
First we stopped at The Look-Out. My dad used to take me there on his motorcycle (I had my own helmet and everything!) when I was little and it brought back so many fun memories!
Then we HAD to go to The House of Jerky. It's Jeremy's favorite Jerky and he was really excited since he hadn't had it in a long time! I won't even mention how much we spent on it, but it was too much!
We stopped to take some pictures and Jeremy got these great shots of me. He always gets me making funny faces so I was really happy about these ones.
It's weird to see myself without glasses. It's like part of my face is missing!
I'm still having trouble with my blog. The pictures aren't showing up. And I have like six things to blog!! I'm so sad.
Check back later this week and hopefully you'll see some new pics!
P.S Now I know all you blog stalking buddies didn't vote on the previous blog because WAY more of you check than the number that voted. (I know this because I"m psychic. Just kidding. I have a stat checker.) So do it. You know you want to.
Our blog stats are up! So I just wanted to say hello and thank you for looking. I really am honored that anyone would take time to look at our blog. It's amazing and we thank you!!
Please don't be shy about posting comments, my little blog-friends. We love it!
Here's a poll (who doesn't love to vote?!) so I know what ya'll like to see and read about the most.
In October (I know, sooooo late!) Jeremy went on a road trip across the WORLD! Ha. Just kidding, the U.S.A. I thought I'd post some (finally).
He went with our friend John to pick up John's work van. They took a flight to Florida, picked up the van and drove through the rest of the way home! What an adventure. I could never do that unless there were months of planning involved first!
I thought I'd post some of each place. I'll start with New Orleans since it is Fat Tuesday (for a few minutes anyways!)
This is one of my all time faves from this trip. You'll see it on our new site!
These guys were selling drugs on the street and when they saw Jeremy taking photos, they wanted money.
For about six months now we've been working on our new website with more updated work, bigger photos and more fun layout to say the least. And we're so excited to show you a more complete body of work. So whether rain or shine, that site is going live by the end of this month. I had to make a declaration so I stick to it. I will not be a perfectionist and chicken out! (My new motto for this year.)
Here's a screen shot. Isn't she pretty? This is one of our sample weddings gallery.
So please stayed tuned. We'll make the announcement when it's officially official.
Lately there have been a lot of planes flying at the same time from the tiny Corona airport very close to where we live. And today, after driving home from our engagement session at about 3:30pm with our couple Brian and Christy, we saw debris falling in the air a couple streets down. If you're familiar with Corona, it was right off Serfas Club and we were driving toward it. We couldn't figure out what happened but we were all curious. We drove around trying to find out. We ran into tons of cop cars, fire engines and helicopters. We found the street and talked to a few people that confirmed two planes crashed into each other. And where the planes fell was on Auto Center Drive, where Jeremy's brother Jeff works at a car dealership. Jeremy finally talked to Jeff and he said that three people died, one of which was his former co-worker. And I read the only report I could find online, it was confirmed four people have actually died; two from each plane and two from the debris. We'll be following closely to see if we can find out how that happened. Here's the Report.
The helicopters are still flying around even now, three hours later.
Well it wasn't really a blog but it got me thinking about how what I did then isn't so different from what I do now! When I was in High School, I got to keep a journal for photo class, since I took it all four years. I did my own assignments and I put everything in my journal. I would write little notes on why I did certain things. And so would my teacher, Mr. Nino. I just got this book out last night and I thought it would be fun to share!
I scanned these and the pages are too big so I had to piece it together.
We always liked finding different places to take pictures! That's me on the left and Jeremy is one of the guys on the right.
My note says, 'I really like this cause bathroom mirrors are rad.' Ha!
So since we got rained out of our shoots last weekend, I needed to post something! Here are some of the Christmas Cards I designed. One thing I'm trying to do this year is not be so much of a perfectionist. I wanted to post these at Christmas but I ran out of time, so normally I wouldn't post them at all! But I'm posting them anyways-even if it's just for the archives.
I REALLY love designing. It's a lot of fun for me. It gives me another outlet for all my creative energy.
Horizontal Post Cards, 2 sided:
1st Baby's Christmas Card.
A Thank you/Christmas Card.
Vertical 2 sided:
Photo Card:
4 sided cards, front, back, inside:
My sister's cute fam!
Christmas/New Address Card. We used pics of their new home and address.
These next two are some of my all time fave designs, probably because it was a team effort. They gave me most of the wording and so many ideas that I just brought it to life. And I LOVED how they turned out!! I still can't figure out if it was more fun for me to design or for them to give them out! They said they got tons of complements and some people even cried. Wow!
This one is a large format 5x7 card so it opens up to 14 in. Pretty neat. This reads front, back and inside.
I MUST post a Christmas-y blog! It seems like this month went by way too fast! And it makes me sad because I love Christmas. I love to wrap, bake, send out cards, decorate the tree and do creative things. I just didn't have enough time to do everything I wanted! Boo Hoo!!
I did have two really great days: a wrapping party with my girlfriends and a cookie day with my mommy. That's what feels like Christmas.
Our cute little three and a half foot tree!
Presents.
My fave ornaments. My Wizard of Oz ornament (love the movie!) and the baking one since I love baking and with love too! And of course the to go box.
A little something I'm working on for our clients.
If I don't bring these goodies to fam functions, people will be angry! This year we added home-made biscotti to our bunch. Yummy!
I know this is long but I really do hope you read it all!
After we shot The Heimstra's Fam Session, Jeremy had an idea to take just the two of them for a shoot by themselves. They've been married for 22 years and have never really had a good shoot done. We didn't know this going into it but we wanted to do something fun and different. They were up for it. Jeremy drove around all day looking for the perfect burned up place and he found it.
It was really touching to see a couple that has so much love and passion for each other after all these years. We can only hope for half of what they have! We realized after doing this that we want to do more! So we decided to call these types of shoots our "passion shoots." And we can do it for new couples or couples that have been married for years. The concept is kinda like a Trash the Dress but one doesn't necessarily have to wear the wedding dress. The point is to have fun, get dirty (hopefully!) and get some really great photos where the experience will be remembered forever.
The images came out great. More importantly I feel like we were changed just by doing this. It was definitely an experience!
So here is Jeremy's vision. There's a lot more that we can't post because it's too personal. But here's what we can:
Last Friday, we had a party to celebrate our December Birthdays (Jeremy's is the 10th and mine is the 20th). And because you can't host a party and be the photographer, I didn't totally come prepared (and by "I", I mean Jeremy)! So I didn't take too many of Jeremy and he hates being in pictures anyways due to his eyes always being closed! But I did get some fun ones, thanks to my friends.
What the guys did.
Looks like Daphne shares her mom's passion for desert.
Christmas Babies.
Chad giving me a bottle of Chateau Margaux. Good stuff.
Me and my little buddy Owen. (Levi and Jeremy R sneaking up on us).
Levi's face is a crack-up!
I love him!
Somehow I don't think Melody was supposed to be in this.
Silly girls!
I didn't take this. My guess is Amy or Melody. So cute!
Love girl friends!
Thanks to everyone who made it to the party! And for those of you who didn't, we missed you!
We did these last year and had way too much fun. Well they're back and this one is just too funny not share. (Thanks Melody!) You MUST see Jeremy's Elf. She sent this in a an email to me that said "What Dana wants for Christmas".
And if you make your own, send them to us! Christmas is fun!
On what is now referred to as "Black Friday" I got up at 3am (Jeremy stayed up all night) and braved the cold and crazy people in line at Wal-Mart . Then I realized I am now officially one of them! Oh no! Ha. It was such a fun time and even Jeremy and Steve joined the girls this year and had a blast. First, we met our friends at Wal-Mart that got there before us at 3am (Thanks Mel and Dest!). We waited until 5am for the doors to open and we got so many awesome toys for the kids! Then Jeremy and our friend Steve waited in line at Target so we had a good place in line. And we got a bunch of good stuff there too.
For our final destination we went to Dos Lagos and found out that they were giving away free gift certificates to 1000 people, some up to $1000.00. Chrissy wanted to wait so we did. We also got interviewed by the Press Enterprise and Chrissy's Interview is on there! So you have to check out Chrissy's interview Here. You can hear my voice but they cut me out! Good thing, I looked hideous! Jeremy and I both got $10 gift certificates, Steve got $25 and Chrissy got $100!! Yay Chrissy!
Then we went home and took a nap before our ringed session in Long Beach (more on that later).
For all you people that refuse to shop on Black Friday, you're missing out! It's so much fun!! We are now officially ready for the Holidays!
Okay, this is really weird. Maybe you can help. Jeremy was going through the images from Dave and Candy's wedding and found this picture. There is this dark figure in the corner and we can't figure out what it is. Was it someone in a trench coat? We don't remember seeing any person that fit that description at the wedding. Everyone did wear black. Maybe Candy or someone at the wedding will know what this is!
Close up, it looks like a very dark shadow or almost like that part of the picture was painted or something. But there's definitely depth. You can see that it's either a person or bag.
I drew the white around the dark figure and the arrow. WHAT IS IT?!
For the second amazing wedding of last weekend, we shot at another beautiful winery, South Coast Wineryin Temecula. It was originally supposed to be at Los Willows in Fallbrook but the fires did some damage so it was moved. And it worked out perfectly.
It's really fun to do a wedding with people that you've known for a long time. What's not fun is when your husband is an obnoxious groomsmen! Other than Jeremy's antics, it was such a beautiful day. I just kept thinking about our wedding (and why I married such a crazy!) since so many of the same people were there! Same pastor married us, same flower girls, some of the same bridesmaids and groomsmen. It was fun!
It was so hard to choose but here's a few faves.
The dress.
The vineyard outside the room.
Cool hairpiece.
Cute girls. Make-up by amymarieclarke@yahoo.com and Hair by hairbymelody@yahoo.com
We left for Ohio early Wednesday morning in a rush after I got confused on the dates. On our plane, we saw the fires burning bright. I've never seen anything like it. I wish we would have be able to take a picture but it was too dark. We're praying everyone stays safe. We are supposed to have a wedding next week in Fallbrook and we have no idea if it's going to be there or not.
Our first outing was to the National Aviation Museum where they have really awesome exhibits. We didn't even get through it in one day so we might have to go back!
Dfer saw us off.
The cool propellers.
We thought this was funny.
This is really cool because my Dad lives on Bataan street.
The aviators painted their jackets.
They have a Holocaust exhibit that I was so glad we got to see. Amazing black and white photos of the concentration camps. The sign means "work makes free" in German. A lot of Holocaust survivors came to Dayton.
We're off to Ohio to visit my Daddy and Patte! Yay! I went by myself last year but this time Jeremy gets to go too. We have a lot on the agenda including: visiting the Aviation museum, shopping at awesome flea markets Patte found just for me and of course the reason why we're going; so I can bake my Dad some delicious home made cookies. (Side note: Last year my Dad and I went straight from the airport to buy the stuff at the store! Ha!) We've never been to Ohio in October so it will be fun to photograph the change of scenery.
We'll be out of the office from October 26 to October 30. We'll be available by phone or by email so you won't miss us much! Please let us know if you need anything!
Our wonderful photography teacher Mr. Niño (that we just went to visit a few weeks ago) won a national award! Niño was named "California's No Child Left Behind 2007 American Star of Teaching." You must read the full article from the Press Enterprise.
I'm not surprised he won something like this. He really is an extraordinary teacher and plays a huge roll in us starting this business.
Congratulations Niño from your favorite photography student! :)
On a whim, we decided to go to the fair. We didn't make to the O.C fair or the L.A one last year. I HAD to go because fairs may be one of my favorite things ever. And it's kind of a family tradition. My step dad usually takes us and he buys us drinks and food and forces us to consume it while we walk around until we want to pass out. Jeremy's a trooper and will tolerate it with me while I make him buy silly things and sit in the photo booths! So we decided to go late and stay late.
Fairs make me so happy!
My favorite nerd.
We're serious about our corn!
Lemonade and corn dog on a stick. Yum.
I love photo booths! I don't even care that it costs 4 bucks now.
Our own pictures of us in the booth!
Our first try didn't come out so we did it again and the guy sold it to us for one dollar.
So besides the food and photo booth, this was my favorite thing about the fair. A horse and a steer that are so freaking huge you'd have to see it to believe it. Really, I'm amazed. It was so fun watching people come around the corner, faces in amazement! If you can see the last pic where Jeremy is standing by the horse. He's 6'2 and look how huge the horse is in comparison!
The huge-mongous steer. It looks so much bigger in real life!
Two tired mama pigs and Amy kissing a cow!
Famous Pink's. It WAS really good. A summery of everything we ate: corn on the cob (Jeremy had two), Corn dog on a stick (he also had two!), taco's, Pink's Chili Dog, Ice Cream, Lemonade, Horchata, and shared a funnel cake with John and Amy! Way too much but sooo worth it!
And of course, ending the evening with a cigar and foot massage.
Since we had a teeny tiny break from weddings, it was nice to be invited to a dinner party on a Friday night. And not just any dinner party. One where we were required to dress up and eat yummy Persian food. Our good friend Roya and Mike were the hosts of this little soiree.
Party Peeps.
Our friends Chris and Lia.
My homegirls Roya and Lia.
I love these adorable centrepieces! It makes me so excited for fall!!
A wonderful Persian dinner prepared all day by Roya and Mike. I'd tell you what they are but I won't even attempt to spell them. I can just tell you it was good and I am now a huge fan of Persian food.
1. I love to smoke cigars. I love them so much it has become an obsession. I have over 500 cigars in my personal collection.
2. I failed photo class, but my teacher always said I had a good eye.
3. My friend Steve has saved my life on several occasions. There's 3 times I can think of off hand: Once when we were whitewater rafting and my foot got stuck in the raft after flipping over. Another time I got stuck rock climbing. And the last one I can think of is when he warned me I was about get wrapped up by a jellyfish. We found out later that the jellyfish was very dangerous and can kill you in less then a minute.
4. I still visit my 6th grade teacher.
5. The first time I saw Dana I said, "That is the girl I am going to marry". I was in Seventh grade Science class.
6. At one point I wanted to be a professional fighter, but then realized I am too lazy for it.
7. A few of my teeth are fake.
8. My first job was working for my father-in-law doing construction. A large window fell on my head. I warned the foreman the nail wouldn't hold, but he said, "what do you know? It's your first day". Also, later that day my brother in law, who was also working at the same job site, took me to get my first drink on the job. I wasn't even carded and I was like 16. All in all it was a good day.
A blog without photos! Even though I love to think I'm witty, I'm sure you come here for the pictures. I know it takes a little more energy to process words but c-mon, you're here anyway. You probably want to poke yourself in the eye because you're so bored at work right now. Save an eye, read up!
Our photo-friend Kristine Che "tagged" us with this thing that's going around to photographers. I guess we're supposed to post 8 things not a lot of people know about us. Since we're two, we each get to do it. It's our blog, we make the rules! Why the heck not?!
8 Fun Facts about me:
1. I love cookies. No. I don't think you understand how deep my love for cookies goes. If I didn't become a photographer I could have been very happy (fat and happy!) being a baker, owning a bakery of some sort. Christmas is my favorite time to bake. I spend days slaving with love over different kinds of cookies. My favorite is home-made chocolate chip. Yum.
2. When my Mom was in labor with me, a weird word she had never heard before popped in her head. It was eleemosynary. She never knew what it meant until I found it in the dictionary when I was fourteen. It means charitable.
3. In elementary school I tested extremely high in English and extremely poor in Math. I mean really bad. At one point they thought I had some type of learning disability!
4. I have really bad spacial skills. I'm a klutz. At no time does my brain know where my arms and legs are!
5. I love kids but I want to wait until I'm 30 to have them!
6. I'm terrified of flying. I now have a system. Two drinks right before takeoff (it costs 20 bucks but it's well worth it!!) and 1-2 when we get up in the air. After that I'm okay.
7. When I was around 4 or 5 I went down to the lake to get the top of the cooler. I reached in to get it and I fell in. No one was around. I didn't know how to swim but somehow I got out. I never knew how I did it. I wasn't very strong and I couldn't reach the dock. Even being that little, I felt like it was some kind of miracle.
I could only come up with 7. That's enough. I'm sure you're sick of me by now. Stay tuned for Jeremy's coming up next.
And I'm supposed to tag someone else. I'll try my friend Leigh Miller.
Last week (I know I'm behind on blogging!) we went to Corona High School to visit our beloved photography teacher, Mr. Nino. We brought him his favorite lunch from Miguel's and had a wonderful time chatting about photography.
Nino was my very first photography mentor. He got me to buy my second film camera, The Canon AE 1. (I used and loved that camera until it got stolen out of my car a few years ago). Here's a picture of it:
Nino was always very positive and encouraged me to develope my technique and always said I "had the eye" and that can not be taught. I took his class almost every year. The year I didn't I was in there at lunch always working on something. Jeremy also took his class one year and he failed! Jeremy was every teacher's worst nightmare! So that's kind of funny, one of his best students and worst ones got married and started a photography business!
From the archive. I keep everything. I'm sentimental. What can I say?
From the very first roll of film I ever shot in Nino's class. I still love old cars.
HA! My class ids. For those of you that don't know, my maiden name is Sensenbaugh. Aren't you glad it's not Dana Sensenbaugh photography? I am!
I couldn't find my Senior photo (but I did find some parasols I'd been looking for! Don't you love it when that happens?) So this is my Sophomore pic. It's the best photo from school I ever got. I wish you could see how bad my Senior pic is!
Jeremy's photo of me from Senior year:
Jeremy's grad picture. Not a good representation of him.
Jeremy and I had this idea for a shoot and then we found the perfect couple when we met Candy and Dave. Dave is the lead singer to Throwdown (awesome hardcore metal band) and is finally back from touring The Warped Tour. And Candy is a gorgeous, quiet girl with great style. And we're on the same page, which makes everything more fun! We are all so excited that we finally get to do this shoot that we've been planning for so long!
This is our art project; you can interpret. It also works as great "photo-therapy" for us.
In order to get ready for a shoot we have for Friday, we decided to do some testing with ourselves. Painting with light is a really fun photo technique that I first learned in High School. And we've been wanting to try it for awhile.
We really like how these turned out so we wanted to share!
I LOVE this one Jeremy shot of me outside our place.
He always has his eyes closed.
Jeremy and his buddies came over to get something and they asked why we had the camera all set up. He showed them and they both wanted to try it. So here they are:
