Weisinger Fam

This past Sunday I had the opportunity to make a family portrait for the Weisinger family. I was thrilled that they showed up in casual clothing because I was able to pose them to best let their personalities shine.



This was actually the first time that I got to meet the boys in the family. I've known Charlie, the Proud-Papa, for quite a while since he used to work in the same office as my wife. L'via, the Mega-Mom, has sorta been working alongside me for a few years since she provides the amahzingly fantabulous cakes and stuff for many of the events that I shoot - you MUST check her out! I shot Tali's Bat Mitzvah some years ago (dontcha love her Punky Brewster kicks?!) and Batya was one of my many models during Camp Shalom picture days last week.

Couple wrapped in a puddle inside an engagement.

Ok, so I may have reinterpreted this famous Winston Churchill quote, but that's kinda how this picture makes me feel. I took this portrait of Tova & Judah a few months ago and with their wedding fast approaching I figure its time to preview their preview shoot.

Gabi's Smashcake Session

This being the first post post-contest lets celebrate someone's 1st.





Of course these are pictures from Gabi W's 1st Birthday Smashcake Session taken this past summer. Her father was the winner of my recent Comment Contest and his first daughter was first featured here.







In case you are not familiar, it has become a tradition of sorts to let your kid devour&destroy a cake and photograph them doing so in honor of their very first birthday. We actually did that with our little guy at his first birthday party several years ago, long before it became a "thing." While he wasn't officially getting his portrait taken while doing so, his smashcake was the ceremonial highlight of the party.

I dunno how this thing started - maybe it's because kids are not old enough to blow out candles yet. Or maybe it's just us parents allowing ourselves to allow our kids to make a huge mess without freaking out about it. Whatever the reason I love the idea and I love photographing Smashcake Sessions. Good clean dirty fun.



And hopefully this will hold over the W family until they cash in their prize...

Slow Sunday / Portraits in the Park

Sometimes work is slow. That's just fine with me.

White Winter / BMOB Portraits

As we wrap up the outdoor portrait season I wanted to share some images from last winter:



Lots of adorable kids...






...and families too...



Just about a year ago a Shul (synagogue) in the Teaneck Area of NJ approached me about taking pictures of all their members. Since taking everyone to the park was out of the question we obviously had to create a studio indoors. I had many ideas but opted to setup a seamless white backdrop. Portraits on white are timeless, allow for endless creative options and are also easy to maintain. Plus, the consistency of the lighting and positioning of the subjects on the backdrop makes for efficient portraits sessions, which is a must when you have close to a hundred families to shoot! Ironically, last year it pretty much snowed non-stop, so other than their outfits these pictures would have looked the same had they actually been taken outside!

Anyway, this is what the space looked like when I arrived for the first day of appointments:




This is the same space an hour later:




On the other side of the partitions I had a slideshow running on a monitor and some coloring books to keep the kids busy while they waited:





I hope to arrange several more indoor portrait days this coming cold season. If you are interested in having me come to your neighborhood please drop me a line.

Snow or Shine it's gonna be a White Winter!

Avraham After / Family Portraits

Here's a real quick follow up to yesterdays post. How handsome is he now?!




Great kid from a great family.

Autumn Portraits in the Park

Well, the leaves certainly didn't waste any time this year. After an early snowstorm caught them off guard and brought down many of the trees in the area, it seemed like they decided to all fall at once. And with the City struggling to clean up the storm aftermath, the leaves became an afterthought. They fell & fell this fall and the kids had a blast running & rolling in the deep carpet of foliage.









I couldn't let their parents escape without a few quick shots of the whole family.



We really lucked out that day. After some nasty weather we had a bunch of mild days that were just perfect for Portraits in the Park.

Gurock Family Portrait

This past week I had the pleasure of taking a portrait of the entire Gurock Family. When I moved to Passaic over 18 years ago they were one of the first families that I met. Their oldest son and I were in high school together and we shared a carpool for a couple of years. Those were the days.
With kids living out of state it's not often that they are all together and, regrettably I am only in touch with them via Facebook (it's a new fad, you should check it out). But this past Thanksgiving weekend I was excited by the chance to photograph them together and the resulting image is above.

Often when I am asked to take family pictures the goal is to get a variety of shots of the family sitting, posing, playing and just being themselves. The images from those sessions may each be beautiful independently but make a compelling story when told together either in an album, as a collage or just a series of framed pictures next to each other - check out these family portraits from a couple of summers ago. The Gurock's on the other hand wanted a single great shot of the entire family; anything else I could get (and I did take other pictures) was icing on the cake.

So my assistant Aryeh and I spend a short while scouting the best location and posing each of the subjects in the picture. The real work however, came in post production. As you can imagine getting 16 people to all look good in the same shot is nearly impossible. So I set my camera on a tripod and took four shots, making minor adjustments to the posing while doing my best to keep everyone engaged and smiling at the camera (when dealing with little kids that usually involves me making a fool of myself). Below you can see the four pictures next to each other along with the printout I used to markup which faces and body positions I wanted to use for the final image




It's a little hard to see in the smaller version here, but trust me, the subtle differences in expression of each person can make or break the picture (but sometimes that can add to the character of the shot as well). Notice how the guy sitting on the right side of the picture is slouching in the first shot, while the tall guy standing in the middle has his hand in his pocket for all the other shots. Things like that don't always matter as much as the two examples below. The three shots of the boy and the three shots of the girl are both chronological. While she is perfect in the first picture he takes a few tries to get comfortable. Kids will be kids.




Anyway, as you might have guessed it's very time consuming. Unless your group shot has more than a handful of people in it and your know you intend to make a large copy (this shot on canvas with some brush strokes would be really sweet) it's not necessary to go though all this trouble. Your family is perfect just the way they are!

Lag Baomer / Upsherin Photography

It's almost Lag Baomer, you know what that means? A lotta little guys getting their haircuts!



Yesterday the rain stopped just long enough to take some before pictures of Avraham. On Sunday he, along with countless other little boys, will get their first haircuts as they hit the milestone of their third birthday.

Avrahams hair is not too long but it sure is curly. He was a real pleasure to take pictures of, easygoing and ready to smile, the camera loves him.




He's super excited to start wearing a Kippah and Tzitzis.







Y'know its not easy holding up those three fingers...that's his sister showing him how its done.




He only stood still for about 10 minutes - but thats all we needed!