Bob & Dawn Davis

Always furthering our photography skills, Jen & I attended an all-day seminar with Bob & Dawn Davis, two photographers from Chicago.  The two work as a husband/wife team, which was intriguing to us, obviously.  Bob is the photographer and Dawn is the photoshopper/album designer. 

Having filmed Tony Parker and Eva Longoria's wedding and being a go-to photographer for Oprah, I was very interested in seeing what Bob could teach us.  We learned much about lighting from Bob.  He took us outside to show us high speed flash sync.  Here he is taking what I call the "rockstar" photo of our friend Robin and her daughter Brynn:

For the geeks out there, this is the result of using high speed flash sync in manual mode.  It stays strictly TTL the entire time for metering and there is no flash on camera.  Now back to plain English :).  Here is Bob showing me the result in camera:

It was a great day and we learned a lot from Bob & Dawn.  We email each other back and forth now and Jen & I look forward to a future session when they tour again.

Website Is Up!

After months of preparation and many revisions, I'm happy to announce that our website, http://www.midwestlifeshots.com/ is up and running!  Take a look and feel free to provide feedback.  The homepage has a slideshow on it with music to peek at some of our work.  If you want to browse the client section and see a gallery of a client, type "ellie" as the password.  A special thanks to those friends and family members who were willing to be guinea pigs during our experimentation.  With our studio opening on November 3rd, we are now set to accept appointments and have another month to practice.  If anyone would like to be experimented on, send me an email at scott@midwestlifeshots.com or comment on the site.

Here's a screen shot:

Christ Community Church concert - Rochester, MN Event Photographer

Christ Community Church is our Church home in Rochester, MN.  We offer our services to them free of charge and love to help showcase their activities.  Recently we were able to photograph a concert held for their Impact Teenage Ministries group, where the Christian rock group Bensonwells performed.

Elder Family Trip - Labor Day 2008

Every Labor Day, the Elders from Illinois and Elders from Minnesota rent a cabin in Laurie, MO, nestled in a little cove on Lake of the Ozarks. Though we don't do much as far as activity goes, the state of relaxation we reach there gives us a nice break from reality.

One of the features I (and my father) enjoy the most about the cabin is the porch and its steady stream of hummingbird activity. I set out with a goal of obtaining a few shots of the little guys, which proved quite difficult. Here is what I was able to get:



In addition to the porch area, the cabin features a little dock, where Spencer had a great time feeding the ducks with his Grandpa Tuck and Grandma Sue.

Jones Family - Rochester, MN Family Photographer

Midwest LifeShots Photography had its first official photography session with the Jones family. Nate & Suzanne are great friends and we had a great time taking photographs of their family. Here are a few photographs from the day.

Lightning

I couldn't resist trying to get a shot of the lightning near our house this past storm:

MEL Vacation 2008

Every year we attempt to get the entire family on Jen's side together to enjoy a vacation. This year the McCasland, Elder, Lazan (MEL) trip was to Brainerd, MN. We rented a cabin in the area and had a great time. Though it is still a family trip, we can't resist bringing our cameras :). Here are some pics:

Jen & Ryan on the tube

Laura & Ryan

Abby


Crabby Abby

Kristin & Ryan on the tube

Laura & Abby

I love these dock shots

Abby w/ Grandma

I call this one "waiting his turn"

Love that juicebox

This girl loves her bubbles

Jen, eating healthy as always

Light painting - a blast with photography
My favorite of the trip