Mini-Wedding

It was a really really cold October day when close friends and family gathered for this little wedding at the Legion of Honor. They'd come all the way out from the midwest - I guess the idea Let's Get Married in San Francisco! simply came upon them one day, and they did it.


The Legion of Honor is actually an art museum, though I'd never thought of it as more than a good background for engagements and wedding photography. There's actually some famous artwork behind those marble walls. It's a great background because it's monotone, but not boring because of the architecture. It thus provides an interesting but not distracting background.




Have you been to a small wedding? Where there is no aisle? But rather, just a gathering of people, a small crescent shaped standing crowd facing the bride and groom. This makes taking photos incredibly difficult. I can't shoot straight on - I am edged to the flanks of either side of the crescent, and can't get a photo of both bride and groom faces at once. This is where it would be useful to be really tall, or really impudent (is that the right word here?) - and stand in front of the crowd of people for the Best view. I am neither, so I just did what I could.


I was given ample time to take couple photos after the very very quick ceremony, so that made me happy.

How Can One Not Smile

When presented with pictures of a dachshund? Impossible! Since it rarely hurts to smile more, I am posting More photos of Wally the dachshund, but naked this time.


Look at those little legs! And would you have guessed, that he can fit a tennis ball in his mouth? And there he is, mid-shake. I consider dog shakes Not Involving Water to be a Mode Change. Change from playful to finding a good pee spot. From sleepy to awake. From itchy to not itchy. From entertained by you to Bored by you. Ever notice that? Anyways. Another photography dream of mine (besides kids in pumpkin patches, and kids DJ-ing) is to photograph dogs on a trampoline. The dogs being on the trampoline, me on solid ground. The ears would be caught in flight, cheeks and tongue in mid-flap, jowls defying gravity, long fur in the wind.

Wally and his parents. He has a little carpeted stairway that leads up to the bed, a most endearing piece of furniture. And he even has a cute little behind.

*Mode Change*
So. I got a call from a Yelp Account Executive today, who wanted to set up a phone appt with me so that she could explain ways in that Yelp could help with my advertising, and drive more visitors to my site. I went ahead and agreed, because this is my opportunity to give them grief (and perhaps find a solution) about my reviews being "removed" automatically by Yelp. Why would I want to bring more traffic (by spending money, no doubt) to my Yelp page which is devoid of reviews, when all people come to Yelp for is precisely to find reviews?

Ah so bittersweet, as another client just left a review for me on Yelp. Alas, she too is a one-time user. That my photography service is so satisfactory that I inspire people to write a Yelp review for the first time, that should mean something! It may or may not still be up:
http://www.yelp.com/biz/ginkgophoto-san-francisco

Dress Your Kids in Stripey Tights

The original photo was way under exposed. The camera metered (figured out how much light was available) for the background (ie, the very bright sky) and decided on a short shutter speed. She was pretty much a silhouette on the hillside. There wasn't much texture in the sky (solidly cloudy) so I didn't lose much by digitally exposing the entire photo more, and then further lightened the face. And added this post-apocalyptic color scheme.

Pumpkin Patch Dream

I finally did a photo shoot at a pumpkin patch! This has been my dream for a while. Well, since the Fall started. Partly because the dreary weather makes me crave splashes of bright color in my photos. My kids pics are not ready for posting, so all you get now is very gloriously orange, photo of many pumpkins. This is the Clancy Pumpkin Patch, at 7th and Lawton in Inner Sunset.

This pumpkin patch was very well set up. There were many scarecrows, none of them truly scary. Hay stacks, and hay rides, and small children underfoot. I guess pumpkins are very tempting to sit on, if you are a wee person. I overheard many a child not to sit on the pumpkins, as the pumpkins bruise.

(Oct 27) I see that many of you are finding my blog as a result of googling the Clancy Pumpkin Patch. I just thought I'd add that I was impressed by the pumpkin patch - lots of decorations, bales of hay, including a hay fort that kids will love, and many photo ops. All different pumpkins to choose from, different sizes, shapes, colors, varieties. Parking immediately outside the patch is limited, so be prepared to look for street parking. No food/refreshments.

Electric Youth & Tangents

If you can place the post title to a decade and musician, and possibly recall a classic slow dance song from that album, well done. We have something in common.

This green vehicle is an electric car in Seattle. It is quite small, perhaps the size of a Smart Car, but it is not a Smart Car, but a different breed. Good for intra-city travel. Not for inter-city travel.


Isn't he cute? Looks good in a preppy sweater. Like all little tykes, he is not always this chipper. I had a few days to get to know him before the photo session, and I do think that helped with the bashfulness.

But let me change subjects. I did a set of photos for a tutoring company a few months ago. They're finally up on their website in a short slideshow:
http://cardinaleducation.com/

Most of the photos are mine. You can figure out which one isn't. See the thing was, CE didn't want to use stock images for their website - it would look too generic, like every other tutoring company website - apparently there aren't many options when it comes to tutor/student stock photos*. So they hired me to take photos of real tutors and students. I did a lot of editing. The student, with the flowery top? She had just returned from a sunny vacation, and was quite sun burnt. I had to give her a healthy complexion. The kitchen scene? The large turkey on the fridge? The brown was originally quite dark and attracted attention unnecessarily. I had to tone down the turkey.

* It occurs to me that you might now know what stock photography is. Well say you're putting together a brochure about Whale Watching. What is a brochure without photos? Boring! But! You have no whale photos of your very own! What can you do? Can't just pull one off the internet, you'd get sued for copyright infringement. Instead, you go to a stock photo site, where there are loads of photos up for sale. You pick out a nice pic of a breaching humpback and pay to have rights to use it on your brochure. There are stock photos for everything. Kid wearing goggles in a bath? Crying clown gazing out of window? Fruit salad tossed in mid air? A dozen meerkats? You got it.

There are photographers that do stock photography. They think of everything that anyone could ever want a photo of, and take that photo, post it. When it's bought, the photographer gets a cut. Apparently, stock photo sites have more than enough pictures of flowers and dogs from photographers. One site actually said Please do not submit photos of flowers or dogs. They need more people shots. Of course the difficulty in that is that to sell a people shot, you need a model release form from the people subjects, and not many people are keen on having their image for sale. Usually aspiring models are the ones happy to sign model release forms. I briefly considered trying stock photography, but then decided it's not my thing. Gotta focus.

Bugs, Veggies and Hot Dogs

Meet the Giant African Millipede! Two pair of legs per segment (you might be able to see that in the pic, even) as opposed to one pair, like the Centipede. Feels like a walking toothbrush, we say.



Organic, Veggie and Vegan hot dogs for sale by Underdog, SF's environmentally responsible hot dog mini-restaurant! They've got a place in Inner Sunset, between 18th and 17th on Irving. The best non-meat dogs I've had. I chatted with the owner. He had a vision for eco-friendly food, yet the kind of food he wanted to eat. He has several adopted cats and dogs. Go to Underdog for a great hot dog!



It took some coaxing to get kids to get kids to partake in produce sculpture, but once seated and presented with the possibilities, the kids loved it.

Hmm, maybe I should back up. This is the Children's Harvest Festival, hosted by savenature.org. It happened on Saturday, the same day that the Blue Angels were burning up piles of fuel. CHF was tucked up some uninviting looking stairs. Our signage was lacking, so we sent some savenature people down to the street to recruit families. You know how when people try to advertise to you on the street, you're likely to (a) avoid eye contact and act like the advertiser has a contagious disease (b) politely say no-thanks - well. that could have been us, with the contagious disease. However, armed with LIVE BUGS, people FLOCKED to our reps on the sidewalk. We didn't let them touch the bugs on the street, but lured by the promise of touchable bugs upstairs, people actually attended our event!


I really think very few people would have come otherwise. The people that did looked like they were really enjoying themselves.

Remember when I said I was going to advertise with postcards offering a donation to savenature for every session booked thru my CHF ad? Didn't work. My little postcard display was right next to the bug table and quite frankly, anything that wasn't a live bug on the bug table vicinity was Not Noticed in the Least! Oh well.

Farm Fresh To You, a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) org, had a table at CHF, and I signed up. Just received our first box of locally grown, seasonal produce today! Very pleased.

Supergirl

Her parents have no idea where she picked up a knack for posing, but I'm glad she did. "What pose are you going to do now?" I'd ask, and she'd think for a minute, and then her eyes would light up and she would strike a pose. Many of them were Tough Grrl poses. No princess here!


This is a softer, less posey pose. I think she was tired, after almost an hour of running around, and her perch on the ladder limited the types of poses she could create.


The fighting poses were fantastic. Her first expression was a happy friendly face, but then we told her to make a mean face.

I was very impressed by the variety of poses in her repertoire. Most of us have been leafing through magazines most of our lives, but cannot necessarily come up with one pose after another. Between camera clicks she would adjust slightly; small changes in angle or stance. I've found that only grown-ups with modeling experience know to do this at photo shoots. She's not done any modeling. She's just at one with the camera!

The Pug Is Bigger

I think that it's great, that the pug and baby are the same size, both have some chubbiness to them, they're held in the same manner and have a similar pose and expression. Actually, the pug is bigger. Hee hee!

Before I retire for the evening, I have to throw together a small ad. Tomorrow is the Children's Harvest Festival hosted by SaveNature.Org and I'm taking the opportunity to advertise my photography services there, in exchange for making a small donation to SNO every time a booking a made through my advertising at CHF. Essentially, GinkgoPhoto is now a "Conservation Partner" for doing this. I don't know how successful it will be, since (a) people don't go to Harvest Festivals looking to hire a photographer, so the mindset isn't there and (b) CHF is in Fisherman's Wharf, packed mainly with tourists. Obviously I serve locals.


Anyways, I'm going to give it a go. My printer is down, however, which means I need to hand letter a sign. Sigh! And, add little hand written stickers to my postcards with a note to mention the codeword SaveNature.Org when booking a session in order for the special donation to happen. Then I need to hunt down a little stand for my sign, and a holder for my postcards. Fun things to do especially immediately after a move.


It's fantastic when parents paint their nursery walls. This nursery was all about bright colors, including those orange curtains.

Filters and Numbers

Finally got this set of wedding photos done! The funnest editing comes with portraits. That's when I can throw on fun digital filters and see what happens. The banks of the stream in this pic were actually kind of mucky, and not that attractive in color. Which made it a great candidate for a limited color palette. What do you think, brown or green?

I've set a record for myself. This month, October, I have 20 (TWENTY!) scheduled photo shoots. That's more per month than ever before. That's more than one every other day. 12 on weekends, 8 on weekdays, in case you're wondering. 12 baby/family, 2 engagements, 1 business event, 2 head shots, 1 maternity and 3 weddings (2 of those are short and sweet casual weddings, one full blown wedding). And all that's not counting at least 2 volunteer photography (non-profit events) services. Wow.

Directions for Atomic Ice Cream

You'll need the basics. Some sort of heavy cream, and a lot of sugar. And then some flavorings. Sugar soaked strawberries for example, or chocolate syrup.

Some recommended tools: whisks and stirring type spatulas. And don't forget the goggles. And industrial grade gloves. Or, oven mitts will do.



Then add liquid nitrogen. Two cooks required; one to add the nitrogen, the other to stir vigorously. Add enough to make the concoction a ice cream consistency.

The whole process should take 1 minute. 2 tops. The result is quite delicious!

Atomic Ice Cream will be taking place at the Children's Harvest Festival this weekend, hosted by SaveNature.org, which is my other job. I won't be making AIC, as I've been assigned to the food sculpture table. Apparently I am the only one with food sculpture experience.

Dr Emmylou Harris

Third and last day of Hardly Strictly Bluegrass. I had an afternoon baby shoot, so I showed up for the evening shows, including Emmylou Harris, the evening grand finale of the Banjo Stage. Even my super duper lens wavered, challenged by very low light and great distance from the stage.

Emmylou received a honorary doctorate from Berkeley for a lifetime of musical achievement. This doctorate has been given to musicians such as Gillespie, Armstrong, Estefan, Fitzgerald, to name a few. To be honest, I'd heard of Emmylou, but had never heard her music, at least not knowingly, before. But I must say she seems like a wonderful person. She runs her own animal shelter after all, rescuing dogs from euthanasia from over populated shelters for another chance. Anyways, a heartwarming, feel-good way to end the three day fest.

Actually the whole festival was very feel-good. Lots of messages of love and peace and being good to your neighbor and earth etc. Given that at points the festival was so crowded, it was amazing that I did not see or detect even the tiniest bit of impatience or negativeness. Alcohol was consumed responsibly. I'm sure it was much to do with the music genre and it's appeal to more mature generations, happy to settle back in portable lawn chairs or sway gently to the music. Maybe it was the wafts of pot smoke emanating from unseen sources. No crowds of frat boys here (not that frat boys are impatient or negative or non-pot-smoking).

5 Inch Platforms Please

I didn't take as many band pictures today. It was SO crowded, it took 10 minutes to progress 100 yards. I spent most of my time staying put, at our blanket home base.

Yesterday I spoke of the advantages of being small. The obvious disadvantage of being small of course, is that it is hard not to get tops of heads in my stage photos. You can see the blurs of heads on either bottom corner of this pic. Sigh. When I walk past tall standing audience members, I can't help but think of what a clear view they must have. I see mostly backs and shoulders, and must find gaps in the swaying crowd, and then time my shutter click for when two dancing/ rhythm bopping persons sway towards the outer sides of my viewfinder. I don't often wish I were taller, but concerts is the one occasion where I by far more than others, wish I were way taller. Not only for better views, but also to avoid being elbowed in the head.

This is a member of Okkervil River. I like the Golden Gate Bridge backdrop, with the hint of trees coming in from behind. The bridge and the shadow are worked into the composition. A shame about those heads. I couldn't crop any more out without losing the guitar.

Massive Music Fest

I started out this far back from the stage. I had my rented 70-200mm IS lens, but even that wasn't enough reach to render the musicians discernible. Thus, I meandered my way through the crowds in socked feet (so that I might step on the many blankets spread over the grass - though by this time my socks were probably as dirty as shoes, I felt it was more respectful than imprinting my shoes on personal blankets... maybe it's an Asian thing). Making one's way to the front of a stage is made easier, I believe, by being a small female, and looking young doesn't hurt either. Walking amongst tall people, I didn't block any views, nor take up much space, so there was no protest. Lots of smiling and sweet "Excuse Me"s got me within 15 people thick of the stage. Also, this was a mellow, friendly crowd. It's bluegrass, after all. People even allowed me to momentarily crouch on their blanket space to take photos.

Tom Morello, of Rage Against the Machine, has a gentler side to his music. Still full of socio/political message of course.

The back of the stage was a backdrop of heavy mesh. It did a great job of preventing back lighting, but also sucked in the tree surroundings, as if a forest scene had been printed on the mesh. Most interesting effect.

The amazing thing about Hardly Strictly Bluegrass is that it's a FREE event, sponsored by a local investment banker that happens to love bluegrass music. The event costs millions to host - flying in musicians from around the country, to a five-stage, 2 and a half day event.

Dogs are welcome. Every 20 ft or so there is a dog. As we walked past the food stalls Charlotte vacuumed up kettle corn and other snack droppings. There are a lot of LL-Bean-esque folks in their sensible walking shoes, fleece vests and light, foldable chairs. There are plenty of artsy Stuck-In-Another-Decade-Haight-Ashbury types, with home-embellished skirts, bellbottoms, fairy wings or hats, bearing hand made percussion instruments. And everyone in between. We did notice an extreme paucity of people of Asian ethnic heritage. It seemed there were more of such people taking advantage of the abundance of discarded aluminum cans than as audience members. Making rounds, completely uninterested in music yet with a keen eye for any recyclables peeking from under a backpack, they made a killing with their many garbage bags full of crushed cans.

Lyle Lovett and his Large Band was a fun mix of funkier songs as well as folksy ones. His band played until past dark, and then, exhausted, we trudged a kilometer to our parked car.

Dashing Dachshund

Today is a great day for you! I am finally recovering from Moving-Associated Discombobulation (MAD) and I present you with fun ways to amuse yourself while simultaneously embarrassing your dog, AND I will write more than a few un-inspired sentences stating the obvious. And photos in Diptych form! What a day!

Here is Wally, a young Dachshund. I prefer him without glasses. This was a home shoot, wherein we pushed the furniture around so that the sofa received good natural lighting from the window. Wally was very sweet natured, and protested only a bit when accessorized. Bribery with hot dog bits had nothing to do with these intent gazes and lovely still poses. Both outfits were worn for the minimal amount of time required to get a few photos.

The Tube is a type of dog house that I've not seen before. We know that dogs like to be cozy, in small cave-like hideaways. The Tube is a long (4ft? 1ft diameter?) crinkly leopard-print fabric covered flexible contraption held in tube shape by a wire frame. It has windows (of course!). Wally charged to his Tube every so often, and peered at us from the tear-shaped windows (Any Hotdogs? No? Well I'm staying Put!) When no amount of cajoling could coax him from the Tube, his parents simply upended the tube and with a little help from gravity, Wally came out.

I could not help but imagine a large tube, for my 55lb Charlotte. Would she enjoy such a shelter?

And now for the good news. Wally's lovely outfits were purchased from a pet store in the Castro called Best In Show. Wally's mom shared some of these pics with them, and Best In Show would like to put my photos on their blog! Yea! With credits and website included of course.

Gardening Is A Good Activity

I'm still in packing/unpacking disarray. Here are some kids enjoying a backyard. Gardening is good for candid photos.

Mystical Place.

I rarely include a pic of myself in my blog. But here I am, in a photoshopped landscape. The composition is not one I would have put together myself - ie the placement of 2 main subjects of equal distance from the left and right edge, and a big blank spot occupying the middle third. It reminds me of Dali-like compositions, and I rather like the isolation of subjects. My husband took this picture. When I hand him the camera, he takes a whole series of photos, adjusting angle and such a little bit every time, because (this is his idea) I can then pick my favorite composition. Works for me. If only I were wearing a long medieval flowy gown, or maybe a warrior outfit.

Making Magical Places Magical In Photos Too

With packing comes procrastinating. I couldn't resist the lure of photoshop, and the prospect of experimenting on my Olympic coast wide angle pics!

After and Before. Things that I did: (1) Brighten, (2) Saturated Colors (3) Made it Bluer (4) Increased Contrast (5) Lightened Sea Stack (6) Made Sky Even Bluer (7) Added Subtle Vignette.

The original photo didn't do Beach 2 (as it is so uncreatively named) any justice at all. When I emerged from the forest post 3/4 mile trek from the road, this beach was something out of a fairy tale. I didn't know such places existed.

Maybe it wasn't this blue or contrasty in real life, but I want this photo to convey some sense of the magicalness of the place. I can't give you the experience of the expansive space, the sound of water, the warming of the morning, the undisturbed sand. But hopefully the above picture makes you think Wow, like I thought Wow, when I arrived at this place.

For You Cat People

I spent the weekend with non-camera-shy cats, despite being allergic to cats. I rarely get any sort of response from readers when I post (though I know y'all are out there reading these) but the dog photo vs cat photo post inspired readers to (1) provide reasons for the lack of cat photos; (2) threaten to change a FB profile pic to a cat and (3) actually change a FB profile pic to a cat.

Here are Ivy and Basil of Newcastle, WA.

I'm moving apts this weekend, so my commentary will be brief, in this post and those in the near future.

Fall Break For Me

I leave you now, with a limited color palette baby in a basket, as I will be out of touch for a short while. Check back next week for more scintillating posts and pictures.

I'm trying to do more "environment" portraits. You may have noticed, most of my portraits are very Face-Centric. I want to add variety by including photos where the person/baby/dog is still obviously the main subject of the photo, but the surroundings add much flavor to the pic. It's a new challenge for me - to figure out what lens works best, how to compose using far away background elements.

On Getting Gigs

While we are on the topic of fruits, vegetables and non-profits, I thought I'd mention another event I'll be contributing to in October. It's called Walk For Farm Animals, hosted by Farm Sanctuary, whose mission is to "end cruelty to farm animals and promotes compassionate living through rescue, education and advocacy".
http://www.walkforfarmanimals.org/

I responded to an ad posted on Craigslist Creative Gigs for a photographer willing to donate time to photograph this event. I like to volunteer-photograph a few times a year, and I admit I was first attracted to this gig because of the prospect of photographing farm animals, but actually I don't believe there will be any farm animals (they are all in the Sanctuary, I suppose). The organizer contacted me, saying she liked my portfolio. She filled me in on the event, adding that there will be people holding Against Animal Cruelty signs, and would I be OK with that? I mentioned that I am vegetarian and a rescue dog mom, and she was happy to have a photographer on board with overlapping values. The event is in fact, a Vegan event. What makes an event a Vegan event? It looks like the organizers and members of Farm Sanctuary are vegan, and the companies sponsoring the event are vegan friendly, including V-Dog, a vegan dog food company.

I, and 10,000 other people in the Bay Area, check Craigslist Creative Gigs every 30 minutes for new job opps. Often there are posts asking for photography services, in exchange for "experience" or "building your portfolio". Sometimes posters point out how good looking they think they are. Good looking or not, asking for free photography makes Bay Area photographers really mad. They will post and tell other photographers not to accept Zero pay. Yet I'm sure, photographers do offer to work for free. I'm lucky to be in the comfortable situation of having a strong family photos portfolio. Originally I built my portfolio on willing friends and their babies that didn't have a choice. But some people (who don't have friends to photograph?) fall victim to exploitation. Sometimes I see ads that ask for (a) an online portfolio (b) pro equipment (c) rights to photos (d) the kitchen sink, in exchange for, granted permission to use pics in portfolio. No money. It's abominable really, what some people will ask for.

However, there is exception made for non-profits. No-one gets mad at non-profits for asking for photographer help.

When ever there is a post that offers pay, the person will be inundated by responses. Posts are taken down after a few hours because posters receive so many emails. I am pleased to report, that I have won the business of some clients via this method. It's tough competition though - I respond to such ads without any expectation of hearing back.