Off with their head!!! ~ Queen of Hearts

Off with their head!!! ~ Queen of Hearts (Happy Halloween!), originally uploaded by Abby Lanes.

Happy Halloween!

Halloween is my favorite holiday. Being a visual person, i love the colors, the costumes, and of course, the candy.

Enjoy your day, and remember to get some memorable portraits!

There's something strange and powerful about black-and-white imagery. Stefan Kanfer

     In my first high-school photography class, I was taught to photograph portraits with black and white film. Then we retreated to our chemical fragranced dark room, and waited patiently as our photos came to life in our lab.

     Fast forward a few years, to this well developed age of digital media, and voila, black and white happens at the push of a button.  

I edited these images with various photoshop actions.  This one has a black and white haze, from The Florabella Collection.  http://florabellacollection.blogspot.com/2009/11/florabella-actions.html

This one is from Mandy Chiappini Photography, and is a Fairytale black and white action. http://mandychiappiniphotography.blogspot.com/

I felt this photograph had a sweet vintage feeling, so I added a free TTV texture from Skeletal Mess, on Flickr. http://www.flickr.com/photos/skeletalmess/sets/72157611177099692/

There are so many things you can do, using actions, including unifying clothing choices that don't necessarily match in color.  This one has a softer, more sepia tone, which brings this three generation grand-mother, mother, and grand-daughter trio even closer.  One thing is for sure, digital phototgraphy and editing give us so many choices, and feels less like you're a mad scientist in a lab, and more like you're an artist at a pixel easel. Happy shooting and editing everyone!

Family of Five

     Photographers are lucky when they get to work with a family on more than one occasion. I had the good fortune of photographing this family's children a few years ago.  This time, they wanted the whole family to get into the act. 

  They wanted a chohesive look for all five of them.  A nice way to unify a family is to make complimentary wardrobe choices.  Luckily, their mom, has a knack for chosing just the right colors, fabrics, and styles to make a photo pop.

We shot in two locations, and with one wardrobe change.  The pink and black and blue jean combo worked so well with the 1920's Spanish style architecture at Malaga Cove, in P.V.E., CA.

And the knitted earth tones worked well at the Wilderness Park setting, in Redondo Beach, CA.  Another plus, we had a relaxed session, and enjoyed our time together, which shows in the photographs.