You know those days where you particularly love life? Today was one of those days for me… and I was lucky enough to pour some of that really great energy into a really great engagement session for Ashley and Tim!

Here’s a quick preview of our shoot today in the lovely Los Angeles neighborhood of Los Feliz Village… it’s a brief moment I caught that sums up what I think a great day is all about.

Happy Tuesday, everyone!

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At the moment, I live in the desert of Southern California just north of Los Angeles where once every few years we see a bit of snow here and there. Well, yesterday we had a storm like we hadn’t seen in many years that dumped more than 8 inches of snow! I wasn’t here in town for most of the day, so when I finally got home last night (which was an amazingly exhausting effort and an incredibly long story) I was amazed at how beautiful everything looked. Everything in this town, in which I have spent the majority of my life, looked so unfamiliar. I spent a majority of the night outside in my snow gear playing around with my sister and a friend and taking photos.

These were all taken around midnight in and around my yard:

And this I took this morning in my front yard. Stunning.

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Wednesday night, I had a blast at the Pictage Christmas Party at Life on Wilshire! For the party, the LA, Orange County and Long Beach PUGs (Pictage User Groups) joined forces for a night of great appetizers, drinks, magic, music and socializing fun. It was really great to get to know the OC and LB PUG members and, of course, it was great to just have a social night with the LA PUG people.

Here are some photo collages of all the fun we had, thanks to Jules Bianchi for taking and posting these!

So much fun. Happy Friday, everyone!

1 Comment » Posted by Heather / My Life

I just stumbled upon this music video and because I’m obsessed with the Twilight saga, I thought I’d share it.

Sure, the books were probably written for teenage girls, but I know a whole bunch of 20-somethings who are completely dazzled by the books and are all getting together next Friday (opening night) to see the film together in LA!

Meg and I were lucky enough to see the movie already — she has a connection that got us invited to a screening with the director when the film was still in the rough stages of editing. In LA, it’s all about who you know. It was actually quite embarassing at first since the other people who were invited were all young girls between the ages of 8 and 14!

After the movie, we spent some time talking to the director about the film– choices they made in the screenplay adaptation of the book, editing choices, and what it was like working on the movie. It was an incredible experience. We even got to talk to her about our impression of the movie. The whole experience was even more interesting to me because while I was in grad school at USC, I thought I wanted to get into the film marketing industry.

Here’s my iPhone photo of us in the screening room.

Needless to say, I cannot wait to see the movie in its final state.

Oh, Edward…

1 Comment » Posted by Heather / My Life and Just a thought...

My great friends Hillary and Jeff recently added a little one to their family and I had the pleasure of visiting them all this weekend. His name is Tillman and he is the ultimate nugget. In my vocabulary, a nugget is anything that is small and super cute. These photos will show why he is the ultimate…

I love this series!

Hillary holding the nugget.

When he shakes he loses his face.

One of my favorites…

Thanks, Hill and Jeff for hosting me this weekend! I can’t wait to come back and see Tillman! (…and you guys of course )

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Yesterday was my sister’s bday and with all the celebration (and the work I had to do in between) I didn’t get the time to post a b-day message to her.

So, Happy Birthday, Monk! I love you!

Here’s a photo of Hayley and me at a friend’s French Party (hence the berets) from back in July where I set up a fun photo booth of sorts. It’s awful that this was one of the only recent photos I can find of us together! I’m adding that to my list of tangible goals for the next month– more photos with my sister and family!

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Donna and John were married one year ago today, and that’s just insane. I cannot believe how quickly this year has gone by. Although so much has happened in my life professionally and personally the past 12 months, it still feels like it wasn’t that long ago all of us ladies were scrambling getting ready for the wedding day.

Congratulations, Donna & John. I love you both so much! Here’s to many more years just like this one.

Since I was in the wedding, I didn’t do a whole lot of shooting… but here are the images I did manage to capture.

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Meg has posted some of the photos she took of me last week at our double portrait session. Here’s one of my favorites– a fun series we shot in Los Feliz Village, but check out her full post and give her some comment love!

Speaking of comment love… seriously, post comments when you stop by a blog. At my wedding on Friday for the fabulous Amber and Nathan (to be posted soon), I met some lovely people who told me they love my blog and read it daily (thanks to the encouragement of Amber), but that they never leave comments. After expressing my grattitude, I asked them why the never leave comments and they couldn’t give me an answer. So, I know you blog stalkers are out there and I would love to express my appreciation to all of you for checking out my work… but I can’t if I don’t know who you are. Let this be a new day… leave some comment love.

Happy Monday, everybody!

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I spent the day today at a great annual event hosted by Pictage, an online gallery and lab service that I currently use along with thousands of other photographers around the country. This event is a chance for photographers to get together and hear from some of the industry-leading photographers about key topics in our field — everything from the art of photography to pertinent business issues. I heard some great speeches today from some accomplished, knowledgeable photographers, and also got to meet and get to know other very talented, fun photographers from across the country!

I’ve been having a great time here, and am totally exhausted from being up far too early this morning and all the information my brain has had to process all day. And… tomorrow it starts all over again!

I’ll have more to talk about after tomorrow’s sessions… just all part of my constant effort to improve my art and my business!

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A few weeks ago I finally got the opportunity to go visit one of my best friends Ashley up in Northern California. I’ve been meaning to visit since she moved up there in March for work, but was finally able to make the time when our schedules fit together!

Ash and I have been friends since 8th grade. We’ve gone through so much together — growing up, fun times, stupid/silly moments, family tragedies — and no matter what we were going through, or where we were, I’ve always known that if I really needed something, Ashley would be there

I am so happy for, and proud of, Ash for everything she is doing in her life. It takes a lot of courage to move to a foreign town, knowing nobody, to take on a new and very challenging job. But, she has done it. She’s met some great people, has a great place to live, and I can say with confidence that I know she is truly happy, despite the occasional bouts of missing home.

Here are some of the photos I snapped on my trip:

I had to pull over on my way up there because I just thought this view was spectacular.

Ashley and me at a little lake near Monterey where we fed the ducks. Thanks to Chris for taking this for us!

These guys looked docile enough… but they scared the heck out of me! They’re pretty ruthless when it comes to getting their food.

And of course I had to get some portraits of Ash alone. Her eyes are really this stunning.

Great laugh. We manage to do this a lot together.

I got these right before having dinner in downtown Monterey.

This one was on the way home off of a different highway than the one I took up there. I’ve always had a strange fascination with these machines, having seen them a lot on family road trips as a little kid. I’ve never seen so many of them in one place, though! It’d be so fun to do a shoot in this field.

Thanks for hosting me, Ash! Looking forward to my next visit up there soon!

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