Meghan and John's engagement pictures

I shot some engagement pictures for friends at work recently. I've done engagement pictures before, but I've been getting into off-camera flash, and this was my first real attempt at mixed lighting. I have to say I'm pretty happy with the results.

After one of Katie's and my last Barnes and Noble dates, I ended up with a copy of Advanced Digital Black & White Photography, and I played with some more, well, advanced digital black and white photography.

And whenever I do shoots like this, I always end up with a picture that I didn't even notice when I shot it but it turns out to be one of my favorites. Here's that one:

And now, the part where I opine about photography: Maybe it's just me, but I find 'posing' any more than a few generic suggestions and asking for 'big smiles' just doesn't do it for me. The fun of engagement pictures (and really, wedding pictures too) is in the actual real happiness of two people, not the coordinating-but-not-matching outfits and the pretty locations and the 17 compositional rules you're supposed to follow or not follow or creatively break. That's why I love bringing Katie along when I do these sorts of things. She's so in tune with people that she's able to foster those real connections that make the pictures much more interesting. (Plus, she holds my diffuser for me!)

I got plenty of well-composed, accurately-exposed pictures of Meghan and John smiling at the camera like everyone assumes they're supposed to. But the pictures I always gravitate to—the ones that make me stop and smile as I speed past them in Aperture—are the ones I take right after the couple thinks they're done with a particular 'pose' and they let their 'I'm being photographed' guard down.

The times, they are a-changin'

Soon, this will be an all-too-common sight.

We're in the process of getting the nursery ready, and part of that involves washing EVERYTHING. Katie's kicking butt at laundry so far!

A Wolf Loves Pork

Absolutely amazing kind-of-stop-motion video. Definitely worth your four minutes.

A Wolf Loves Pork, courtesy of Laughing Squid

Mandy's son Peyton

We visited a bunch of old high school friends over Easter break, and we got to meet Mandy's 2-month-old son, Peyton. There's a gallery of his photos here.

Too cool not to share

We got back from DC almost a week ago, but I'm just now getting around to culling through my 500 or so pictures. I'll have a full gallery and whatnot up in a few days, but I stumbled across one I had to share. I wasn't blown away when I took this picture, but when I got back to the computer, the expression and angle on the lead soldier's face just seemed to fall into place. A quick trip through Aperture and Silver Efex Pro, and this is what I came up with:

This is exactly what I was doing last night as I was blogging.

Like I've said before, this comic gets me.

Stars on Tanks

OK, last post for the night, I promise.

While out at Yuma for work recently, I came across their display of Army equipment that had been tested at Yuma Proving Grounds. Some of the tanks were WWII- or Vietnam-era equipment that saw battle. These pictures are battle-worn stars from those tanks on the front lines. They are sized to be used as wallpapers on widescreen monitors—if you want 4:3, let me know and I'll see if I can recrop them.

P.S. Thank a vet today (or tomorrow).

The Bailey Family

I was looking through some pictures from Christmas (finally processing them) and found one of my favorite things: an unexpectedly interesting picture that I forgot about almost as soon as I took it. For as long as I can remember, grandma and grandpa have had a set of little clear plastic magnetic picture frames on the fridge—one for each of their grandkids. As they get new pictures, they simply put them in front of the old ones. There's a surprising amount of family history in small little piles on that fridge.

(P.S. In case you can't tell, I'm having a love affair with Aperture and Silver Efex Pro tonight.)

Jesse

Valentine's Flowers

Stargazer Lilies were the flower of the day at the Bailey house on Valentine's day—after a decade or so, roses get a bit repetitive! Plus, they smell GREAT. You can avoid cleaning the kitchen a lot longer when you have the overpowering scent of lilies!

And one more of Molly that's a bit blurry full-size but too cute to pass up:

McKinney 'Falls'

Another part of our photo excursion was a trip to McKinney Falls State Park in south Austin. Unfortunuately, because of the super massive drought, the 'falls' weren't really falling, but we did find some interesting streams cutting through the rocks. Here's the whole gallery, and here are a few samples:

Downtown Austin on a cloudy morning

A few friends and I headed out early this past Saturday morning to put our cameras through their paces. Our first stop was Zilker Park in downtown Austin. The sunrise was less than spectacular, but it was a fun trip nonetheless. The whole gallery is here, and here's a link to all of my 2009 galleries so far. Here are a few of my favorites:

2008: My Photos of the Year

(EDIT: I've changed the blog template to be a bit wider to better accommodate when I post photos here. I know the header looks dumb—I'm working on it.)

Many of the photography blogs I read have been posting their "Photos of the Year" for 2008. I took a stroll through my Aperture library, and here are my favorite shots of last year. Click through to have a look.

This comic gets me.

A gentle reminder, courtesy of What The Duck.

The Yuma Proving Grounds

I'll have to post my "trip diary" later, with stories of almost-speeding-tickets, getting lost, and French Fried Potaters; in the meantime, here are some pictures.

The Yuma Proving Grounds is the U.S. Army's gigantic testing area in the middle of nowhere in Arizona. Near one of the entrances, they have a small display of some of the equipment that has been tested there. Here are some pictures I grabbed this morning:

One of my personal favorites. It looks like the morning in Iraq.

Happy wedding, Kameron and Ashley!

Well, almost 2 weeks later, the pictures are online from Kameron and Ashley’s wedding in Dallas. The ceremony was at SMU’s Perkins Chapel, and the reception was across town at the Aldredge House in Dallas. Here’s the gallery.

My brother, the marathon runner

Contrary to what the picture would suggest, he can’t actually fly, but he came pretty close! Brent ran the Dallas White Rock Marathon this past Saturday. He didn’t walk a step, and he finished the race in just over four hours. We chased him around Dallas thanks to a printed map, an iPhone, and a Suburban. Every time we saw him he looked like he had just started the race. I think I was more tired from walking around afterwards than he was from running the marathon. There are plenty of pictures here. Click through to see a few of my favorites as well.

I swear this isn't a baby blog.

We went over to Brian and Nikki’s for dessert and Christmas decorating tonight. Rowan’s getting pretty big, and he doesn’t particularly like to smile, but I got some pictures of him anyway. I’m just getting warmed up for the thousands of pictures I’m going to take of my kid, though...

Christmas lights!

By my math, we have about 3,000 lights on the house. Putting the icicles on the roof was an exercise in treachery—especially the back corner of the house (the far right in the picture). Sitting on that downhill slope while leaning over to clip on lights was a bit terrifying. Although, I have to admit, it was worth it—and it will be much easier next year. I couldn’t have done it without you, crazy multifunction ladder.

An early Merry Christmas from Molly!

We’re almost done decorating the house for Christmas. It looks pretty awesome, and there will definitely be pictures coming. Katie definitely has an eye for this stuff.

In the meantime, I caught Molly taking a nap on one of our new Christmas pillows. Fortunately this time, unlike most times, she actually stayed asleep long enough for me to run upstairs and get my camera.