Here is another shot from the engagement shoot that I did with David and Erin.  This was when the sun was starting to peek in and out of the clouds.  We had such a funny day that day, because it was kind of raining, and kind of not.  The weather just couldn’t make up its mind.  I almost had to say that we would come back the next day to shoot more, because I didn’t want them to not have any shots without the the sun around.  Engagement pictures should be happy and fun, along with a few more serious shots.  This is one of those more serious shots that I liked the way it turned out.  It has a fashion edgyness to it that I really like, and with them all dressed in black and white the contrast is great.  This is one of my

So I was walking around the plaza in Santa Fe on the 4th of july, and I saw this girl and her rickshaw and decided to get a portrait of her.  I’m a big fan of these candid portraits.  She of course saw me shooting, because I stepped right out into the street to get this direct shot of her.  I frankly think she half enjoyed having her picture taken.  That and I was pretty obvious because I was using my 70-200 with the hood on, so my lens was huge.  Not exactly the kind of lens that is great for staying under the radar.  I had to crop this shot way down, because I didn’t have time to zoom in as much as I wanted to, and I’m still amazed at how clean the shot is after cropping it down so much.  I probably cut out about 2/3’s of the shot.

This shot was taken at 1/1250, IS

So for the 4th I went down to Santa Fe.  A wonderful place to vacation in, but not so much to live.  I love all the art and the culture, and really just how interesting the place is, but for me when I lived there it just didn’twork out so well.  There really aren’t that many places for younger people to hang out, and it’s rife withtourists.  Not that I’m not a tourist a lot of the time, but after a while you get tired of answering the question of “where’s the plaza from here?’.  I of course had my new 70-200 and just had a blast with it.  It was great to be able to zoom around across the street and find interesting people to take photographs of.  I’m still sorting through the probably 20-30 shots that I will be posting up here.  That was culled down from about 200 photos a

So after reading tons of reviews, half of which were total and complete crap, I decided to treat myself to a new lens.  I need it for a couple of things that I’m going to be doing here in the next few weeks, one of which includes a weeding, that i’m shooting for practically free.

I can’t believe how great this lens is.  For a zoom lens the bokeh is amazing.  I freaking love the smooth tones i’m getting, and the contrast is awsome.  I went down to Santa Fe for the 4th of July, and I’m still going through the tons of pictures from that trip.  I’m sure there will be tons of those shots up soon on my blog.

Sorry I haven’t been posting as much lately, but look for a flurry of stuff soon.  I’ve just been so busy going on vacation, and planning things like that.

So I g

I often get asked how I get the rich colors for the images that I have.  I always try and see the world as if it was just a little crisper and brighter.  I wanted to walk you through how to get some of those really deep rich colors that are so prevalent in today’s hyper-saturated photography world.  This simple shot was taken while walking around downtown Hudson Valley in the Rhino Art District.  I love walking around art districts that are set in more “rough” areas because there always seems to be interesting things going on.  I also find inspiration from the art that I see when I look through the windows of these places.  Anyways back to the reason for the post.

First I’ll show you the original image:

Here you can see that already there are some bright colors.  The orange is crystal