Catching up: Miriam's Wedding

Earlier in the summer (like, 2 months earlier!!), my first cousin Miriam got married! She asked us to shoot it which was super fun (family wedding ... no pressure!), plus we just loved getting to be with all of my family, immediate and extended, for once!

At the rehearsal dinner:


The wedding was in my aunt and uncle's backyard ... so awesome! I LOVE weddings at home!

My mom's side of the family:

Cousins ~ we've grown from 6 to 13 (too bad Dan didn't make the wedding due to summer camp):


Girl cousins:

Love this pic of Caroline!!


And, for a couple of photos of the bride and groom ~ we're excited to add Chris to the clan! Here's the photoblog entry about their wedding if you want to see more!

Look who's growing up! (*edit*)

Over the past couple of months, we've gotten to see some favorite friends on our travels to shoot weddings all around! Thought I'd show you who all is growing up! Can't believe how big they are all getting!!

Annabelle and Judah:


Taylor is 1!!


Timothy and Samuel:

Ryan, Brittany, and Reese (notice they don't have a link ... don't you wish that would change?):


And Melissa, Sydney, and Taylor! We are so excited that Taylor came to meet everyone yesterday ~ 5 lbs. 14 oz., 18 inches. Can't wait to meet her in person in just a couple of weeks!


*Edit: We just took Raegan's 1 year pics today ~ I figured it was worth a blog edit for you to see her!*


Such cute and wonderful kids ... I think Elliott has a lot to live up to!!

Pictures are cool

I think pictures are cool. I guess I'm in the right profession.

For Christmas this year, my aunt Lisa scanned in a bunch of photos for my grandmother's digital photo frame. I copied them on to my laptop and was just looking at them this morning.

Here are a few that I think are so awesome:

My grandmother (aka Mither)

Mither and Papa:


My dad with Aunt Lisa:


Mither and Papa:


Probably my favorite, my dad with his puppy:


Ok, ok, there were a few more recent photos in the batch too. I'll include these for a good laugh, mostly because Anne is much deeper into the awkward phase than me in both of these. The annual cousins photo:



Don't forget to take pictures of everyday life this week ~ it's important!

So excited!

We are excited to announce our long long overdue new photoblog!! We are moving from maryrosenbaumphoto.blogspot.com to:

www.maryrosenbaum.com/blog



Yay for an easier URL, BIG photos, and an overall makeover!

Don't forget to update your links, RSS feeds, etc.!

Missy's Wedding

Hi. I'm here. And back in action. I've been on a little (or big) blogging hiatus due to a 3 weeks trip and trying to recover from said trip. Lots of fun stuff to share soon (1 word: Europe!!).

Stop A of our trip was in Nashville for Missy's wedding.


Photographing the weddings of my friends is one of my most favorite parts of my job! I just love weddings (guess I picked the right profession) especially when it means a great excuse to hang out with college friends for a couple of days!! Who wants to get married next so we can all play again?

Here are a couple of photos. Check out my photoblog for more "real" pics.

Rehearsal Dinner at Belle Meade Plantation ~ our favorite! Julie, Kali, Lo, Missy, Rachel, Katie, Lauren! Heart you girls!!!


With the bride!!


A couple of reception favorites:

Rebs and Lauren:


Reba and Kali working it on the dance floor. This is classic!


Adam with Ben and Andrew:





What a fun night of celebrating Missy and Andrew! We love you guys and congrats!!

I love The Vegas and The Vegas loves me.

Puh-leeeze tell me somebody can name that quote in the title!

But it's true! We do love the Vegas and it loved us back last week. We just got home from a fun couple of days in the city. Adam has been for a brief trip or 2, and I’ve been only once as a high schooler, so we were both excited to get re-acquainted.

Every year, the mother of photo conferences, WPPI, happens in Vegas and our schedule finally worked out this year to attend. We stayed 2 nights at the MGM Signature which we loved. It’s attached to the main MGM but much quieter and less Vegas than the casino hotels ~ it was perfect! We would definitely recommend it! Our view:



We drove through some SNOW to get to Vegas:


then headed down the Strip to Dos Caminos, a fabulous Mexican restaurant in the Palazzo recommended by our friends and Vegas connoisseurs the Ma’ins. The tableside guacamole, shrimp/mushroom quesadilla, and ahi tuna did not disappoint.


*Side note: Dos Caminos was the location of the infamous Heidi vs. Spencer vs. Bolthouse Productions throw-down in Vegas where he came to “win her back”.

After dinner we wandered our way home through the Forum Shoppes and Caesar’s Palace, and ended up back at the MGM for our first round of Blackjack. Thanks to some prep from our friends and a little bit of Lady Luck, we ended up walking away with about $230 more than we arrived with from our 3 days there! Vegas is fun when you win!




We spent the next day listening to speakers, attending workshops, and checking out all of the latest photo industry news and products. It’s so inspiring to be around others in the same biz as me, and I really learned tons and walked away with tons of great ideas for this year. It was a little overwhelming but really great!

Dinner was at Nobhill, a Michael Mina restaurant in MGM where we had a celebrity sighting (Andre Agassi) and another wonderful dinner.



Our last day, we finished the conference in the morning and headed to the Bellagio for lunch and walk-through.


Don’t miss this gem ~ the Guinness–certified world’s largest chocolate fountain ~ nice!


Overall it was SUCH a fun getaway and we can’t wait to go back!

92,352

So, this week I took my favorite child in for her annual check up (aka my 5D went in to Canon for a little tune-up).



While it was there, I asked them to check the shot counter to see how many frames have been shot on that camera body.

And the answer was 92,352. Wow.

Everyone can (learn to) take good pictures!

I was giving my mom a couple of photo tips for a wedding she was attending last weekend and thought that maybe I would share one with you. Maybe this will turn into a series. Maybe. Because I genuinely believe that everyone can learn to take great photos with any camera, any lens, and any level or lack-there-of of creative ability.

Today's lesson is about light. One of the first photographers that I worked for told me to think of taking pictures as taking a photo of the light rather than the subject. And it's so true! It's so so important!

My goal is to always put my subject in good light - I love natural, no-flash-needed light because it's easy for your camera to figure out and it's flattering for your subjects.

So here are some take-away principles:
1) When possible, use flattering natural light with no flash!
2) Have your subject facing the light source.
3) Put your subjects in even light (shade is great b/c no harsh shadows!)

Here's a great example from my friend Kaci's wedding that we were just talking about a couple of entries ago. We opted to take our small point-and-shoot (canon, of course) rather than the big guns.

Adam and I arrived at the wedding and were standing on a covered walkway just above the ceremony looking down on the ceremony site.

Hmmm, lets try to take a photo of ourselves with the ceremony site in the background.

Here's what we got - yikes!!! See! Everyone takes bad pictures from time to time!


What a disaster! The light on the area behind us was super bright (#3 - uneven light) and we were facing a wall rather than the direction that the pretty light was coming from (#2 - face your subject towards the best light source). What a mess - I totally turned off my photo brain for that one.

So, all we did was turn 180 degrees and this one turned out a little better! We're standing in the exact same spot but just facing the opposite way and what a difference!


The light is even and flattering because we are in the shade (no shadows!) but facing the light source.

Here's a few favorite examples from my real photo work that I think turned out cool just because of the light:

Here, Michelle is standing in a doorway so there is really pretty natural light coming from behind me:

You can see the light source in this shot from Heather's bridal session (who got married this weekend!! Be sure to check my photoblog for a few images but the real blog will hopefully be coming soon!).
In this hospital shot, I opened all of the blinds and windows to a large window just behind me, to let the pretty light in on Courtney, Kyle, and Raegan:


Of course there are exceptions to these "rules" and it's not always possible to have natural light and all of that, but this will give you a start to begin paying attention to what and where your light source are!

Ok - does that all make sense? Would you like to see more photo-tips in the future? Let me know if there is a particulay photo issue you would like me to address in the future!

Happy picture taking!

On the Road Again

Well, we are gearing up for another awesome trip. I know - my job is tough - we have to go work in Lake Tahoe. It's going to be brutal!

Since Adam and I aren't natives, we decided to make a road trip out of it and spend several days driving up the coast and seeing more of our state! The farthest north I've ever been in Cali is Santa Barbara. Adam's been to San Fran once but he was really sick part of the time and was in a mini-van with 4 other guys and they were driving through the night - I guess that's another blog for another day, though.

Here's a rough outline of our plan (feel free to enlarge for a better view of yet another photoshop masterpiece):


I've highlighted our important stops along the way:

Orange house = our home in Orange county (get it?)
Red shopping cart = Camarillo outlets (shout out LK!)
Peaceful blue waves = Monterey, CA
Purple railroad tracks = trolley tracks of San Francisco
Green Pine Tree = Lake Tahoe!

Let me know if anyone has suggestions of any must-do's in these areas. We're so excited and I'm sure we'll have lots to share when we get back!

Adam and Michelle's wedding

One of the million things that I love about my job is getting to be a part of friends' weddings. It's so meaningful to me to get to witness the weddings but also contribute to their memories of their day!


Over Memorial Day, I got to shoot my friend Adam's wedding (see photoblog for more photos). We went to Samford together and both spent a couple of summers in Greenville, SC working at a church camp (ok, I shouldn't lie - it was Traveler's Rest, SC, but Greenville is so much more cosmopolitan . . . ). So, needless to say, we have lots of fun memories together and lots of mutual friends, so I knew the wedding would be so great!! Not to mention that I LOVE his wife Michelle and am so happy that they are together!

There's never enough time but at least I got to see many long lost friends and get little snip-its about people's lives! Here are some of the wonderful people that I got to see:

Samford boys: Andy, Sam, Steven, Shae, Adam, and Tyler

Andy with his wife Lindsay and son Cade!

Dan doing a choreographed dance during the reception - amazing.


Amy and Tyler - I love this shot of them dancing!


Unfortunately, this is all that I got to see of their son Baylor:

With the Hinsons - Baby Judah will be here Monday! Yay!:


Hitting up the ice cream stand:


PJ the D.J.!!! One of my dearest friends from my first year at Look-up!!!!



With Jared and T!!! Jared was my partner during my first summer!!!!


It was such a fun night and goodness for my soul to see old wonderful friends and watch Adam and Michelle get hitched!!