Photos of an Amazing Miniature Baptism Dress

I was asked to make photos of an exquisite baptism dress before it got used. I know that I am a guy and that I should not get excited about lace and stitching. The thing is, people rarely go through this much trouble to make things themselves anymore. Most of us would go to Babies R Us and be done with it.

I cannot imagine the hours spent piecing all the parts together. This kind of craftsmanship is so old fashioned and I think that is pretty cool. 

The lace inserts are floating in the middle of the fabric. You can barley see the stitches.

Web Site Featuring the World's 1st Biodegradable Nitrile Glove

One of the hottest topics today in business is "being green". This can involve saving energy, recycling,  using recycled materials, or reducing waste products. Showa Best Glove has hit a home run with their latest hand protection product called GREEN-DEX at www.Green-Dex.com. I got to design the web site.

Why is a Biodegradable Disposable Nitrile Glove So Important?

Disposable nitrile gloves get used and thrown away by the millions per year. Imagine a job requiring constant glove changes by a single worker. Now multiply that number by a large workforce over a year's time, and one can see the result will be staggering mountain of gloves and tons of waste material.

Little things add up to be a lot of space in a land fill... especially if they do not quickly break down when exposed to wind, rain or the tiny organisms that turn a pile of trash into dirt. The chart shows how much faster Green-Dex breaks down compared to standard nitrile which barely moves at all on the scale.

GREEN-DEX™ packaging is also made from 100% post-consumer waste
and dispensers from 100% recycled material.

Different Materials Can Take Many Years to Biodegrade in a Landfill

I find it interesting to see how long everyday items take to biodegrade and the chart tells the tale of common things we throw away everyday. If this does not convince people to think more seriously about recycling, I am not sure what will.

Product	Time to Biodegrade
Apple core	1–2 months
General paper	1–3 months
Paper towel	2–4 weeks
Cardboard box	2 months
Cotton cloth	5 months
Plastic coated milk carton	5 years
Wax coated milk carton	3 months
Tin cans	50–100 years
Aluminium cans	150–200 years
Glass bottles	Undetermined (forever)
Plastic bags	10–20 years
Soft plastic (bottle)	100 years
Hard plastic (bottle cap)	400 years

All this talk about trash reminds me of my favorite commercial from the seventies...

Family Photos with the Humphreys in Atlanta

I have known Lisa since the 90's when I worked with her at my day job at Graphic Works. A lot has happened since those days, but one thing has remained the same. She is one of the nicest people that you will meet, and she has a zest for life. She's Italian... what did you expect.

Her two children, Graham and Marissa, have the same adventurous spirit, and they are just fun to be around. Every couple of years we get together for a photoshoot and to compare how much bigger the kids have gotten. I do not know what she is feeding them, but they are growing like weeds.

Here are a few photos from that day. The Fall colors were not really in "bloom" yet in Atlanta, but they were on the verge of changing. The day was very overcast which I prefer over too-strong sunlight. This can give a hazy feel to the photos and the colors don't pop as much as would strongly backlit leaves.

I hope to keep doing this with them for many years to come. It will be great to look back and remember the journey. To see last time's photos, check out the previous Gallery Link here.

It is not hard to figure out who Marissa will look like when she grows up.

It was a very nice day spent with old friends.

The full 2012 gallery set can be found here.

Corporate Group Photo in a Narrow Gray Box

Sometimes the locations where I am hired to make portraits are not very exciting. Let's be honest, many American corporate offices are basically gray painted boxes. In the case below,  it was a narrow conference room in which I needed to make an eight person corporate group photo.You cannot tell form this angle, but I would have been hard pressed to squeeze behind the subjects.

Because of the tight confines of the room, my only option was to set up two large strobes to the right and left of me at the close end of the table, and push light into the room. This was not ideal because of the glass display at the end of the room showed the reflections of the strobes very clearly. Also, the frame rate of the screen was giving me weird partial images. In the end, I just decided it was faster and more efficient to put the logo in post-production.

People have asked why I did not just use the fluorescent overhead lights to make the photo. There are a few reasons. First  fluorescent lights flicker unevenly and can cause issues with exposure and color balance. Those can be overcome, but it just adds complexity to the shoot. Secondly, there is not as much light as you might think in the room. Human eyes are much more sensitive than the sensor in my camera. Even at high ISO settings, I would have to set a longish exposure... not good for sharp shots of this many living, blinking people.

Flash captures the scene in 1/100th of a second freezing everyone perfectly. It allows me to control the color and shape of the light more easily, and in this case it made it possible to get the strong reflections in the table... the most interesting part of the photograph.

My Philosophy on Photographing Children

Photographing children is as much psychology and timing as it is a little luck. And, I am not just talking about child psychology either. Dealing with the parents can be just as challenging.

The final usable portrait of Tyler

I once heard a parent threaten their crying child by screeching "Do you want a spanking? If you do not sit there and smile, you will be in big trouble! Quit fidgeting and smile for the camera! Stop crying! You are going to get it when we get home".

You don't have to have a PhD to know that this is going to end poorly with either terrified looks, tears or even therapy many years later. Take a chill pill folks... Let kids be kids.

My approach with children is a bit more laid back. I play games with them. I ask them silly questions and make them forget that we are making their portrait. The thing that many adults forget is that children are creative creatures that may come up with a better pose or facial expression all by themselves without being told what to do every second. Sometimes, you just have to get rid of the "sillys" before you can take the portrait, as the photos below clearly show.

Tyler has a lot of personality. I have more silly photos than serious ones... 

I try to get the standard posed shots and then see what the kids do. You just might be surprised what wonderful characters they become. Creativity and personality should not be squashed by overbearing parental behavior. It's my opinion that sometimes the totally wild photos become our favorites many years later.

My own mother told me that her favorite photo of me as a child shows me crying because I did not like the surly Sears photographer who was trying every trick in the book to make me smile. The story only makes the photo better. Thanks Mom.

Full disclosure.... Tyler is my nephew and nobody was yelling at him except maybe his little sister, Sara. Here she is demonstrating the perfect smile. Oh man, I can't wait to embarrass them when they are teenagers.

I was a Guest Judge at the Roswell Photographic Society

This is only half the room.... yikes!

In August I was asked to be a guest judge at a local photo club named the Roswell Photographic Society. I have been asked by photo clubs in the past to give presentations on my work or to judge events, but this was different just because of the sheer size of the event. There were probably 100 people in the room. I did not have time to count because that would have just made things worse for my nervousness about public speaking. Where is the "King's Speech" guy when you need him?

I always feel under-qualified in these situations because honestly critiquing other photographer's work can be a tricky business. I consider many of these shooters to be way more talented than myself, yet I was asked to critique their art. Some people are very serious and some very sensitive, but I figure truth is the best policy... stated as tactfully as possible.

After a nervous start, I almost forgot that there were so many people listening to what I had to say. I was highly impressed with the quality of images in the contest... some were so good that I would have gladly hung them on my wall. I have a feeling that more than a few pros or advanced amateurs were sitting in the ranks.

A few people told me that I did a good job and that they were glad that I brought up some basic presentation pointers along with artistic advice that was not sugar-coated. I think I was fair, but I would hate to be on the other end. It takes a lot of guts to have your work praised or picked apart in public. This would be the Atlanta photo club to visit if you are serious about photography.

I don't feel that would be right for me to reproduce the photographer's work full size on my blog, but you can see selected photos from that night's contest by clicking the Gallery Link below...

Click image above to view some of the excellent Silhouette Contest entries.

Complete Graphic Design Project for LumenBrite Dental Strips

I love when I get to provide start-to-finish design services for my clients. This particular project was for teeth whitening products such as dental strips and peroxide pens. Services included logo design, multiple package design, product photography, web design, some copywriting and Joomla programming with some help from my friends at StruveDesigns.com.

The packages utilize 4-color printing plus opaque white on shiny silver metallic board. This allowed me to use the ever changing sheen of the silver surface as part of the design. Wherever white prints behind the color ink, the color appears matte. Conversely, wherever I allowed the metallic surface to show through, then the color would appear metallic. The design is decidedly simple, to maximize the impact of the silver. These really shine on the shelf.

Check it out at buylumenbrite.com