Eternal Champions' first show! Private holiday party

Devon's new band played their first show - finally! - in December, at our friends' office holiday party. His band, Eternal Champions, along with the band Loma Prieta, rocked the house. But that wasn't all - there was also a massage therapist, a caricature artist, a fortune teller, a craps table, and lots and lots of snacks! It was the most fun holiday party I've ever been to.

Here's Dev before the show - looking nervous yet drinking more coffee:



The warehouse location (top secret, sorry) of the party is filled with arcade games and other fun stuff!







Everyone loves Olympia the dog:





This is one of my favorite recent music purchases - in the age of the mp3 digital download, some of our friends decided to release their most recent albums on cassette tape. Everything is totally true to the old school style of tapes. I bought two, one to listen to and one to keep in mint condition, because I am a HUGE geek, but then Devon knocked the "mint" one over and the packaging ripped open. So, if anyone wants the 5 tape collection and missed out... let me know ; )



First was Loma Prieta, with Devon's best friend for over 15 years now, Sean, singing and playing guitar. Loudly but beautifully!









Josh Staples of the Velvet Teen and the New Trust guests for a few pretty phrases on one song:





And then Eternal Champions hit the floor! I am biased (it's true) but people seemed to really like them. I've tried to describe them, and the closest I can come is "video game inspired music with metal riffs".















What do you do when your guitar strap falls completely off? Just drop to your knees and keep jamming!



Everything is really, really grainy (and out of focus) because it was extremely dark in there. During the Loma Prieta set, I was like, ok, cool, this is fun to experiment with. Then someone turned out even MORE lights, so I was basically shooting by the light of really-far-away Christmas lights and Devon's laptop screen. Something like ISO 3200, pushed in RAW processing, at f1.4 and 1/20th of a second.

OK, I'm off for the weekend, so have a lovely weekend, don't forget to enter my engagement shoot giveaway contest (or inquire about your discounted portrait session), and stay tuned for more photos soon!

In the meantime, enjoy the sun (SF Bay Area only, I guess - and we're supposed to get rain, so enjoy it for about another hour). Our daffodils (which we didn't know we had - yay for moving into a house with new mystery bulbs planted!) popped up out of nowhere yesterday, so vibrant and yellow. Hooray for spring!

Holiday! - gone through next week

We're heading out of town on a real live vacation! No working allowed :)

Which of course means I'm scrambling to get everything in order TODAY before we go... and I know Devon is as well (at his job), but the thing I love about my work is that all of the stuff I absolutely have to get done right now asap, is stuff that I WANT to get done, and love doing. Like editing photos, talking with clients, and sending out promos to photo editors.

Anyway, I turn 30 (!!!) exactly one week from today, and sadly we are staying in Northern California rather than Belize or Mexico (this time), but it's going to be a fabulous, relaxing and romantic trip. Leaving me very refreshed to come back for a bunch of August weddings and other shoots.

Please give me a chance to catch back up to emails and phone calls upon my return to the office on Monday, August 4th. In the meantime, enjoy this Muxtape I've been making for awhile:




(Next time will be the super-motivating techno-y/ dance music one - this one's just a nice chunk of what I've been listening to while editing. We'll see how this one goes over... there may be a swear or too, but nothing too crazy)

As well as this awesome Madonna video from 1983 - such fresh dance moves!



And a Sex Pistols one from 1978- also thirty years old, I might point out. Doesn't it feel kind of cute, tame and harmless these days?



The Pixies' "Holiday" is from 1986 - are we getting an "I'm really old" theme here?:



Just to bring it (almost) up to the present, here's My Morning Jacket's "One Big Holiday", which has a much happier, chiller (rocker) vibe - plus I love this band:



Thanks for everything, see you after the 4th!

a few more things I love

I forgot to mention in my last post, how much I'm loving:

-fresh tomatoes - I have a bunch of beautiful heirlooms growing on my plants and can't wait till they're ready! In the meantime, store-bought 'matoes and fresh mozzarella balls are the awesomest.

-the book "Eat, Pray, Love", which I wasn't sure about, but am (bad pun) completely eating up.

-this old school Madonna performance (which I found while searching for Prince's "Controversy" video to show a friend, which would've been appropriate to the recent subject of my blog, but which is unavailable due to stringent New Power Generation restrictions):



along with the memory of lipsyncing (and fake playing instruments; we traded off microphone duty) the entirety of the "True Blue" album in 4th grade

-planning some local camping and vacationing trips all over Northern California... we're having trouble narrowing it down. Gold Country? Tahoe? Lake County? Humboldt County and the Redwoods? Big Sur? Or even Monterey, San Luis Obispo.. the list is pretty much infinite, because my wonderful state is so gorgeous!

(amended to add):
This shirt was forwarded to me by a friend today, and it shares the "Love Wins" idea by proclaiming "Love Conquers Hate" (beautiful!) in support of the Human Rights Campaign and equality.

It also features some of the prettiest, and gayest, buff male models I have seen in a long time. Woo! :)

hold on for more updates soon!

I had a lovely weekend filled with hard work, relaxation and big life events as well. A wedding, a baby shower, a memorial - what a three day weekend!
I'm back at work today but my web host is having a big of trouble, so I won't be able to retrieve my email (and the blog photos are missing), hopefully not for much longer. I will be updating the blog with more of the photos from my vacation to British Columbia, a few personal/ portfolio shoots, and then Gregory and Jacqueline's wedding photos (!) in the coming weeks, so keep checking back.

In the meantime, if you need to reach me asap, please call me at 707-235-8953.

Tonight Devon and I are going to see Flight of the Conchords in SF, and I can't wait!



("two guys in roller skates, that's way hotter than one!")

Update: it was awesome and adorable!

the Velvet Teen, the Moggs, more concert

A few weeks ago we went to a show where 4 out of 5 bands playing contained friends of ours! Normally I'm bored for at least half of a concert (short attention span?), but this particular night I couldn't even find time to dash away for a drink!

Here are some shots of Moggs, a rad husband-wife duo out of Petaluma:







I also took some photos of the Velvet Teen with their new lineup!

























It was a fun, wintry night!

catchup, and stuff I'm liking

I had a lovely weekend off - a date in SF with Devon (yes, there will be photos!); a great concerts with lots of friends' bands (again, photos to follow); and a lazy Sunday off. Very nice. Today I am back at work, and I had the pleasure of spending the grey morning at two Napa Valley venues meeting with the lovely women who work at V. Sattui and the Villagio. It's so nice to have a chance to just talk, and tomorrow I'm excited to join the Bay Area Wedding Network at the Chabot Space and Science Center in Oakland for mingling and holiday treats, yay!

The point of this is that I have a lot of images I'm dying to share but not a lot of time yet, so please bear with me. The wintry season is a great time for me to catch up on office work, promos, communication, and, wow, actually hanging out with friends! But I love doing the photo thing, and want to post many more shots here soon, so I'm shooting (bad pun) for later this week, getting in some good blogging time.

In the meantime, I thought I'd share some of the media I've been into lately - you can always see the books I've been reading on the little bar to the right of the blog body (if you're reading this in a read, click on the link here to see what you're missing!), so I'm mainly sharing music - I've been listening to Yeah Yeah Yeah's newer EP; Tegan and Sara (and going to see them on Thursday night!); the Control soundtrack (can't wait for the movie); a Fleetwood Mac song (!) I never thought I'd like; Calla, Múm, Slowdive, and other shoegazey versions of winter time music; random Depeche Mode; In Rainbows (I paid $4 cause I love the idea); Sharon Jones; and lots more.

Haven't seen a lot of movies I'd recommend lately (though we want to check out "No Country For Old Men" and "American Gangster", and I hate that we missed "the Darjeeling Limited"!), but we did rent The Host the other night - unfortunately it was dubbed instead of subtitled! Bleah.


Here's one of my favorite YYYs songs - the video quality here's not great, but you can see a better one here.



Now back to work for me! I'm off to buy a new camera from a friend and can't wait to play!

the New Trust/ Des Ark/ Litany for the Whale

That same night, we saw this show with our friends the New Trust (kinda poppy, kinda rock and roll), Litany for the Whale (LOUD, kinda drudgy and rad noise), and Des Ark from North Carolina (kinda singer-songwritery, kinda punk and dirtyish). It was fun!

First up, Litany For the Whale! I like em but they are SO loud!



Des Ark:



And, the New Trust:





























Fun stuff! I don't go out enough so it was a good evening with friends.

One of the next projects I want to take on is an all-music portfolio... I have some cool ideas for it. Now I just have to find the time to update some shots... anyone need band photos? :)