One of the things that's always important in our world of photography is to constantly be shooting.  Like any craft, instrument or sport, the more you practice or do what you love, the better you get.  So as we strolled into the new year without hardly noticing (thanks to Haydn) one of the first things we wanted to do was put together a shoot to start getting our creative juices going again.  Come early Feb, thanks to our assistant Christian, we were able to schedule a weekend, find a couple more than willing to be our models, pin down a location and make some cool new friends all at the same time! =) Meet Stephanie and Saxon ...definitely one of the coolest couples we've been blessed to have crossed paths with!  We have to admit though, after working with these two, we're totally bummed we won't be shooting their wedding but regardless, we know they're going to look great in their photos =) To Stephanie and Saxon, thanks again for being our models...we had a blast with you guys!  So when's sushi?!! =) Here are two of our favorites from the day followed by a link to their Engagement Story.  Enjoy!! =) There's more pics from their shoot at the link below... ****************CLICK HERE FOR THEIR ENTIRE ENGAGEMENT STORY************** ----------------------- On a side note, we're still booking weddings for 2009/2010.  If you have any questions shoot us an email at Weddings@johnlauren.com

When Lauren and I shoot weddings, we're always looking for those little and even not so little details that the Bride may add to her Wedding to make it her own.  From the Brides bouquet, to the intricacies of her dress, we love detail shots and we're ALWAYS looking for them =)

In the same way, there are so many little "detail" type things that a new born does that maybe as parents, perhaps don't even notice.  But sometimes, it's in those little things that bring out the best and warmest memories.

Its amazing to think that at one point in our life our hands couldn't even wrap around our parents' finger...or

 how our feet were so small and (for some of us at least), were soooo cute! haha.

Meet Jerrilyn+Kevin and baby Gavin! =)

 This was my favorite shot of the day.  We love shooting late afternoon, when we could use the sun to our advantage and where the shadows are at it's longest.

Even though baby Gavin cried for most of the day (maybe he doesn't like Harley's Kevin..haha), when he let up, we took advantage =)

 

Not sure what got over me to ask for this shot but whatever it was, I'm happy I did!  This was a close second to my favorite shot =)

 

 To Jerrilyn+Kevin and baby Gavin, thank you so much for asking us to capture this moment in your family's life for you...it was an honor and we loved shooting them for you both.

Your friends,

John & Lauren

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

For Wedding or Portrait inquiries, simply shoot us an email at Weddings@johnlauren.com or give us a ring at (626)806-4990 (day) or (951)520-5674 (night).

Don't forget our "Great Names Derive from Great Inspiration" - Name Our Baby contest deadline is 1 1/2 weeks away!!  Give yourself  a chance to win a $100 GC.  Just submit your entries to Contest@johnlauren.com and you're in!  Simple as that!

Our "Give Back" Promo will officially start Monday, Sept 22nd (due to some technical issues with our site) so don't forget to check back in then!

This past weekend, we finally got a chance to shoot our good friends Valerie+Jason.  They're our super cool friends that got married this past June in Wisconson.  We were originally going to shoot their Engagement pictures for them but planning a wedding while being 2000 miles away from where you're having it is no easy task.  Needless to say, we couldn't find time to do it.So being that we didn't get to shoot their Engagement images or  even make it to their Wedding (which we were totally bummed about btw), we thought it would be a great idea instead, to shoot them fully decked out, Wedding Dress, Suit and all when they got back.  And are we glad we did =) Val wore this beautiful vintage looking dress with so much detail...I had to capture it. Being that we weren't so pressed on time like we would a normal Wedding day, we decided to come decked out ourselves and bring our lighting gear.  My hope for the shoot was to walk away with a shot...or two that looks like something that would be in a Wedding magazine.  Do you think we got it?! Being super exhausted from the day's activities I wasn't planning on editing right away but seriously, I couldn't resist!  After seeing how a few of them turned out I ended staying up till 2am editing everything!!  I can't tell you how excited I was with how everything turned out but seriously, how do you not get a good shot with these guys?! Finally, I decided to put together a really quick slideshow of our day.  So enjoy! Val+Jason...thanks so much for being the cool cats that you are!  We hope you like your images as much as we do!  =)  Oh and Jason...did I tell you that I'm interested in buying your bike?! =) haha *****CLICK HERE FOR VAL+JASON'S DAY AFTER SESSION***** ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- If we haven't gotten back to you with email...we're playing catch up and we're hoping to get back to everyone today so keep an eye out for it! =) Don't forget!  Our "Great Names Derive from Great Inspiration" contest deadline to submit your entries is October 1st!!

If you want more information on our contest click here!

For our latest Wedding Day Slideshow, Click Here!

If you'd like to inquire about our services, email us at Weddings@johnlauren.com

If you have any questions you'd like to ask us, we'll do our best in answering them for you!  email us at John@johnlauren.com or Lauren@johnlauren.com

I know, I still haven't posted on Apeerture but trust me, I'll get there. I wanted to share with you a few more pics from our shoot last Saturday with Loyd from Red5Studios so here you go... Loyd has this new toy that I'm not too sure what exactly it's called (Glide Cam maybe?) but I think he got it from the Dark Knight himself...that thing is intense! What I love about the shot to the left is how it's framed.  You don't see his face but what you do see is his awesome Ghost Busters shirt instead.  Btw - he's holding most of, if not all, the movies he's done with his Brides and Grooms. What I wanted to capture in this shot is that "Forbes Magazine" look...you know that, "I'm standing in front of this tall building because I own it" look? =) haha Of course, we couldn't hold in how funny that idea really was... And for my last show+tell, I had to throw in one of his Light Saber shots.  That thing was SAH-WEET! =)  The way it recorded in the camera was awesome!  Oh and if the last pic from yesterdays post didn't clue you in...yeah, Loyd is a MAJOR Star Wars fan. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Don't forget!  Our "Great Names Derive from Great Inspiration" contest deadline has been moved!!  The new deadline to submit your entries is now October 1st.  That gives everyone a good two months of inspiration! =)

If you want more information on our contest click here!

For our latest Wedding Day Slideshow, Click Here!

If you'd like to inquire about our services, email us at Weddings@johnlauren.com

If you have any questions you'd like to ask us, we'll do our best in answering them for you!  email us at John@johnlauren.com or Lauren@johnlauren.com

For the past few weeks I've been waiting for our new toys to come in and yesterday they finally arrived!

Ok so you're prooobably thinking..."uh ok?!"  And yeah I guess Lauren's right when she says I'm a big nerd. Anyway, so what are these?  Have you ever heard of Pocket Wizards?  Remember our post on OCl or Off Camera Lighting?  These are what you use to remotely trigger your flashes or even remotely trigger your camera!  The best part is these are a 3rd of the price!  Not only that but they're super small and compact.  Definitely something you want especially when you're traveling shooting weddings.  Here's a shot I took last night at 3:30am (yeah that AM, not PM).  I put one of our compact flash cards in between the two just to show you how small they actually are.  And if you're wondering, the small one is the transmitter (goes on the hot shoe of your camera) and the larger one is the receiver (connects to your flash).

These are starting to get super hot and photographers all over are picking them up so if you're interested, it'll take at least 2-3 weeks to receive them.  To check them out just to the Alien Bees website. If you're starting to get into lighting (which by the way, is amazingly fun to play with) these are a must have! Speaking of a must have...if you're a bride to be, meet Red5Studios...one of the top talents in Wedding Cinematography. This past weekend, Loyd, our good friend from Red5Studios asked us to do a last minute portrait session for them for a special project that'll be revealed at a later time. So we threw around some ideas and we ended up, believe it or not at an empty movie theatre parking lot!  How fitting =) Why?  Well Loyd has this amazing talent that puts Brides and Grooms, their Wedding Party and even family into their favorite movie with a Wedding twist.  For this reason (and more) Bride and Groom’s all over the country contact Red5Studios.  They put you (the Bride and Groom) into your own short film…you decide on the movie, Loyd studies it, scripts it and then with you and your cast (ie Bridal Party/Family Members), he literally films it! If you have a few minutes, you HAVE to check this out...it's probably the funniest video I've seen them do yet.  It's their "wedding twist" version of Napoleon Dynamite that won the Ruby Award in the Concept Video production category at Video '08. Here's one of our favorite pics from our Saturday shoot...

On Sunday, we had the second half of our shoot.  Loyd wanted to capture a make shift production photo and for me, new territory.  Usually prior to a shoot, I/we envision how we want the shoot to go but for this type of a shot with five people! it was a challenge.  We ended up in my garage, something Loyd actually loved because it gave it that "home made video" type of look to it and after an hour or so of figuring out lighting, positioning, and going back and fourth examining each shot, I finally nailed it!  I finally got the shot I wanted!  It was pretty exciting because after about 50 or so shots, I knew as soon as I shot it, that was what we were looking for. It's amazing what one flash and a reflector can do for you in a cramped and dark home garage! =)

Thanks Red5Studios for picking us for your shoot!  We had a blast shooting it! I'll post more of our favorites later this week so stay tuned =) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Don't forget!  Our "Great Names Derive from Great Inspiration" contest deadline has been moved!!  The new deadline to submit your entries is now October 1st.  That gives everyone a good two months of inspiration! =)

If you want more information on our contest click here!

For our latest Wedding Day Slideshow, Click Here!

If you'd like to inquire about our services, email us at Weddings@johnlauren.com

If you have any questions you'd like to ask us, we'll do our best in answering them for you!  email us at John@johnlauren.com or Lauren@johnlauren.com