Witnessing the Very First Breath

When I envisioned being in the business of photography, I had a specific ideal in mind. I simply wanted to capture moments as purely as possible. This means my sole purpose would be to document the event without any interference on my part. On February 21st 2017, I was able to do just that.

I was tasked to capture a C-Section birth.  I got there early for the prep, during which family members were present for support. A toddler and infant were also there and they, of course, required the attention that toddlers and infants demand. Some of my favorite shots of the day happened to be those of the adults attending to the little ones. The moments of interaction between the family members and the emotions evoked at the time were just as important to the telling of the story as the birth itself.

The birth, of course, was the main event. Being the photographer, I had one of the two best seats in the house to view it and boy was it quite a thing to witness! I was in the OR for my second child's birth with a camera in hand, but my focus was very much divided. I wasn't there to just witness the birth of our child but also (and more importantly) provide loving support to my wife. However, on the 21st of February, with no familial considerations, I was simply there to capture the event. Once it was clear that the birth was about to take place, my focus was entirely on capturing those first breaths, those first movements, that first scream.. it was beautiful and I felt extremely grateful for the opportunity to be in the room to experience those moments.

This session turned out about as close to the ideal that I envisioned for my photography as possible, because it really didn't feel like a session at all. Not once did I ask anyone to do anything different from what they were doing. There was no posing or directing towards better light. I could have easily been a good friend or family member taking pictures with my phone. In fact, one of the family members gave me about the most flattering compliment I could think of by saying, "I didn't even notice you taking pictures half the time. You were quite unobtrusive." As it happens, "unobtrusive" has become one of my favorite words, especially when it relates to my photographic style.

When it comes to photographic assignments, this was about as perfect as it gets. I was able to function purely as a documentarian. These few hours contained emotions of excitement, nervousness, anticipation, and elation that you would expect from the birth of a child, so precious moments were happening in abundance, and I was there simply to capture them with my camera. Days like these make me feel incredibly fortunate to be in this profession!

Below is a "FotoFilm" that tells the story in pictures described above. Enjoy!           

A Manchester City Hall (Double) Wedding

When I started my business, I planned on eventually getting into wedding photography. I really didn't think I'd get a chance to do so for at least a year or two, because people tend to want to make sure that the moments of their special day get captured in quality images that they can share with friends and family for a lifetime and for that people tend to go with someone who has an established track record of providing such images. Other than a wedding I shot long before I could even remotely consider myself a professional (a blog topic for later when I get more weddings under my belt), I had no such record - nothing that I could put in my portfolio anyway.

I really thought my big chance would come from someone I knew well, because it certainly is a risk to hire a photographer to shoot your wedding when they don't have experience doing so, no matter how good their other work is. Weddings are a different beast altogether. They are fast-paced and chaotic. No matter how meticulously planned out they are, things will always catch you by surprise and the photographer has to be on his/her game at all times. Most any pro will scoff at the notion of a newbie taking on a wedding without at least being a second-shooter first. To make it worse, most pros even won't take on second-shooters unless they have experience as second-shooters.

Having said all that, I was pleasantly shocked when, just four months after starting my business, Samantha and Jordan chose me to shoot their City Hall wedding over many other established wedding photographers who had also vied for the honor of doing so. I was also highly flattered that they did so based off my portfolio, which had no wedding imagery whatsoever.  I was, of course, nervous, but those nerves were a bit mitigated by the fact that it would be a much smaller affair when compared to that of a traditional church wedding... But then those nerves shot right back up when they informed me that Samantha's sister was also getting married and asked me to capture that as well. All of a sudden the difficulty level went way up! I had another set of bride and groom to account for!

The wedding itself was a beautiful thing. It reminded me that it's the people involved that make the occasion special, not necessarily the surroundings. I attended a wedding a while back that was set in a beautiful garden with the ceremony in a building that I'm pretty sure was specifically designed for weddings, but I came away from it not feeling like anything special actually happened. At one point I found the bride sitting in a chair saying, "I'm soooo bored!" The event couldn't end fast enough! The bride and groom barely touched each other after the ceremony and ended up going off in separate cars. The fact that the groom's car was decorated with "Just Married" and you could see him and his best man driving away from the place together was a joke that capped off the dreadful afternoon.

Now, our Manchester City Hall building was itself was beautifully designed, but the site of the ceremony and most of the action was a courtroom. The lighting was dim and awful (by a photographer's standards). However, this case was the complete opposite of the story I just told. The brides and grooms and their family took over the courtroom and made the event their own. I witnessed the father of the brides walk proudly into the courtroom with both brides locked in his arms. He also walked each of them down the isle to their beaming grooms for each of the ceremonies. There was even a ring bearer! I heard later that he insisted on doing so. And to top it off, the grooms surprised their brides with some karaoke Top Gun- style by lip-syncing "You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling". Those are just some of the many examples of moments that made this day feel special. Basically, this wedding was anything but dull. It had character, it was full of emotion and spirit ...and I was very fortunate to have been chosen to capture such an event. 

Below is a Fotofilm (slideshow-video with a sweet catchy tune) that tells the story that I just spoke of. Enjoy!

My Version of "Baby Crazy"

FotoFiferna is still in its infancy, but I have already experienced one of those things that I truly was looking forward to when I started this business, which is photographing a person/family at one stage of their life and then doing so again at another. In this case, I had the privilege of shooting a maternity session with a mom-to-be and her husband and then following it up with a newborn session. This is quite a drastic transition. During the maternity session our mom-to-be was a woman with a belly full of possibilities. She and her husband were anxiously awaiting the birth of their baby boy and I like to think that their decision to have the shoot was in part a result of that anticipatory excitement. I was really happy when they decided to book the newborn session. It was as if my brain was pregnant with ideas and I was anxiously awaiting that date when I could deliver them. I couldn't wait to see/photograph them as parents of the force of nature that would be their newborn baby boy.

This also happened to be my first newborn session and I was grateful for the opportunity to see if my skills would translate to this genre of photography. I planned on shooting it in as much of a documentary style as possible, which for the most part (and to my great pleasure) happened. The initial idea was that we'd do some traditional group shots with the parents and grandparents and then I'd hang around for an hour or two to "document". In the end though, I think their baby wasn't too into the posed shots so what transpired was that he was passed around to various family members and I just took pictures of those interactions. There was also bath time, bottle feeding, plenty of crying, and plenty of soothing going on. Even their cat and dog were able to get in on the action (more to add to my ever growing pet photography portfolio!). All in all, it was a very relaxed session. I tried my best to kind of just blend in, which seemed to naturally occur with conversation, so that everyone present would forget that there was a relative stranger in their house taking pictures. How successful I was at that I don't know, but from my perspective it worked out really well and I was quite happy with the results.

Now that the photos have been edited and the gallery delivered, I think I've caught a bit of the "baby crazies". Only with me they come in the form of wanting more newborn sessions. I can't wait till the next one!  

Here's a short slideshow with images from the session. Enjoy!

Photojournalistic Post #1: Mila's Fall Fest

One of my favorite aspects of photography is the ability to tell a story. A striking image is one thing, but if that image can draw you into the narrative that surrounds it then a whole other dimension is added. To immerse the viewer even further into the setting, a series of such photographs will add the dimension of time. It's my intention to every so often post a short story through images with a minimal amount of commentary. The first story I'll show you depicts my family's time at a "Fall Fest" put on by a local church. It features my two year-old toddler Mila, following her as she navigates a series of activities, facing challenges along the way:

We arrived early, so we kept Mila entertained by running along an orange meshed fence..

Ominous clouds threatened to pour down rain on us the entire time we were there...

Finally we were let in and Mila started off in one of the many of the bouncy houses...

We then moved on to get Mila a feline face...

Satisfied with her cat face, we could then go on to splash in the kiddie pool, sift through the corn kernel bin, and roll a few frames at the haystack-laned bowling alley and all the while a happy grandma watches on...

The highlight for Mila came when she experienced a S'more for the first time...

We'll conclude this segment with Mila taking on the big blowup slide, in which she gets to the top, questions the trip down, but  gets a little help from some good Samaritans... 

After that she got herself stuck in a blowup obstacle course so I had to put down my camera to go be a dad. Then the clouds opened up and we raced for the exit. 

Photographer's Child Syndrome

Children, especially the younger ones, are very difficult to take pictures of, no matter your photographic skill level -- the level of difficulty increases exponentially the more you snap away. As a parent who happens to be a photographer, I as well as many others like me, can and will attest to the fact that the complexity of this challenge can get pretty absurd. This challenge has a name in fact. It's called the Photographer's Child Syndrome and it is very real.  

First off, kids have trouble staying still for more than even a split second. Now, cameras today, with their extremely advanced autofocus ability, are still often no match for the shifty toddler. In order to take a technically sound shot, you really need the patience of Monk to find that split second that your young subject will stay still enough for you to be able to acquire focus and release the shutter, not to mention framing your shot in good light and adjusting for exposure! Secondly, as I mentioned previously, children tend to shy away from the camera the more you point it at them. A photographer's child will, in fact, make a game out of doing all he or she can to ruin your shot. My older, nearly 3 year-old, child even does so with a smirk on her face.  She seems to possess a sixth sense in being able to avoid the perfect shot just fractions of an instance before I take it. It's uncanny. Even my 10-month old daughter is in advanced stages of this syndrome... woe is me!!    

Having said all that, I just got finished editing a batch of recent photos and noticed a small section in which my older daughter seemed to have shown me a bit of mercy. For some context, she was probably rampaging throughout our house, with the typical boundless energy that toddlers seemingly possess, at which point I was tasked with taking her outside. Of course, I carried my camera with me. The results were quite surprising. While I did absolutely no staging whatsoever, the pictures had the look of a planned out photo shoot! I can only assume that some specific stars were in alignment for those 20 or so minutes and that it won't happen again for billions of years. Anyway, such an event requires a blog post post with photos and here are those photos:

Now having posted those, I do have some recommendations on photographing that uncooperative child of yours. Under no circumstances tell your kid to look at the camera. Doing so will penalize you with at least 5 minutes of them doing everything but look at the camera. Convince yourself that you couldn't care less if you get that shot or not. Toddlers can sense even a drop of desperation in the air and when they do that picture of yours is done for. Don't look a toddler straight in the eyes. Once you do, they will full-on bullrush you at which point you can forget about capturing this moment and just focus on getting you and your camera to safety... In all seriousness though, each child is different and you just have to figure out what works for yours. Just be patient and every once in a while you might get that small pocket of time when the universe smiles upon your attempt to get that perfect shot. Good Luck!

New Camera, New Me/ Fuji X-T2 non-review

I read somewhere that frequent blogging is good for business... something about having fresh content out there to keep the outside world engaged. Well, the last one was weeks ago, which is far too long (shaking my head). Hmmm, now, what do I have of interest to blog about...? A new camera! Yes, that's actually very interesting... to me anyway. To my family however, well they probably think differently. Since we just moved here to this beautiful town of Derry New Hampshire, with its colorful leaves and all, I haven't really gotten to meet many of the locals just yet. So my family have been my sole test subjects and oh how have they ever been so subjected to constant and unrelenting testing (10,000 clicks and counting so far)! Same goes for Lola, our cat, who is ever so loyally walking across my keyboard and rubbing her face against mine as I try to type this.

So my new camera.. Well, I'll start off with its name, the Fujifilm X-T2. It's quite similar to my old camera, the Fujifilm X-T1. In fact, if you have ever seen me taking pictures, you probably wouldn't notice the difference. Maybe those of you observant souls may notice the number increase, but that's about it. The performance, however, is a different story. The X-T2 differs in performance by more than a factor of 1 from its predecessor (there is no standard to this value, but if there were then it would certainly be better by more than a factor of 1).  That said, this won't be an overly technical review, or even a review at all. Basically, the reason why I have been so obsessively annoying my family the last few weeks is that for the first time in my life, I have a camera that captures what I want it to most of the time. This equates to far less blurry pictures to delete when I import them to my computer. This is highly exciting...to me, that is. The only downside is that I end up having many more beautiful pictures to edit. As a result, I'm drowning in editing debt. Somehow, I need to figure out how to put down this glorious piece of image-capturing hardware and get to working on the software. So, in the best interests of this blog, I will stop typing right now and get into LightRoom so I can provide the relevant photos for this photo blog (I think I'll rename it  "Fotoblog" just for fun).       

So there you have it, some of the very first pictures I've taken with my new camera. In fact, the very first one in the gallery is the very first picture I took with the camera. I had just entered my new home after a 9-hour drive with Lolita (cat) and there it was waiting for me. Though it may not be the best image of the bunch, it certainly was love at first shutter actuation (click). I really could have added hundreds more photos (no exaggeration), but I wanted to get back to finishing this blog, so I'll spare you! No one really wants to look at hundreds of photos anyway... there really is such a thing as looking-at-too-many-photos fatigue.  

Oftentimes, after looking at a photographer's pictures, people make the comment, "Wow, you must have a really good camera!" Photographers really, really hate that, by the way. But, in this case it's really true. I really DO have a really good camera. I can't wait to let it loose on my new (NewEnglander) neighbors!  

The Birth of a Blog

It's hard to know exactly how to start a blog, but here I go... It feels as though this will end up being very much a stream of consciousness type ordeal without much structure. I imagine I'll use this format to ramble on about photography in a personal and general sense. There will probably be posts about my own struggles (there have been plenty) and successes (there have been some of those as well). I will most likely offer up my own take on common topics facing the world of photography... and of course there will be pictures. Many, many pictures. On that note, here is a random photo:    

Well, now that I think about it, maybe it's not so random. Since this post is a birth of sorts, I suppose a case can be made that uploading a picture of my firstborn daughter shortly after her birth is somewhat relevant. In fact, I think I'll name this post something dramatic like, "The Birth of a Blog". Anyway, it was at this point that my obsession with photography really started. Or at least, this was when photography began to really mean something to me. I had it in my head that I needed to document her life so that she could have a record of times that her memory couldn't account for. Well, it was something like that. It certainly started a journey that eventually led me to a point at which I would be writing a blog on a website devoted to my photography. I'll go ahead and end it at that. Stay tuned for more!