Part One: Karen and Jason (And Aidan!)

Things that inspire me:

Stripes
Candy
Red Dresses
Vintage Chairs
Voluptuous Women (Christina, Crystal...)
Paul Thomas Anderson Movies
Francesca Woodman
Gin
Wine
Pasta
Cookbooks
Fall


and...

Love:

More to come....

Stuff and Junk. And Lots of Pictures.

Hey Gang! Okay I know it's been a bit quiet 'round these parts lately. Believe me it's not because I've been kicking it on my favorite couch watching Sopranos and drinking gin, although that does sound pretty awesome. No, it's partly because since wedding season ended I haven't had a lot of new work to show--but that doesn't mean I haven't been busy.  With what? Well... 

Like making my awesome new portfolio! 

 

One thing I know I've been missing is having a clear concise way to exhibit an expanded portfolio when I meet clients in person.  Most photographers show sample albums, which is a nice way to kill two birds with one stone (ie, showing both your album samples and samples of your work in one place) and I will certainly do as well...but I liked the idea of having an actual portfolio to show clients.  This thing is sweet--it's a big, huge 12x12 hardcover book with full images on the front and back and a bright yellow spine.  I think it Screams LORENZ PHOTOGRAPHY! I love love love book-making. I love designing the book, I love ordering the book I love checking FedEx tracking every 5 minutes to see when my book will arrive--and my favorite part--I love opening the book for the first time, and flipping through all the pages.  I love the way new books smell and feel and it's especially great when that new book is full of your work. So, yeah--yay :)

What else? Well, ordering products for clients, like my new proof books!

This is an example of a hard cover (left) and a soft cover (right) proofbook.  I love my new books because the design options for the cover and the inside is so much more extensive, allowing me to really customize each book for each client. Different fonts, different lay out etc....here's a few more examples:

 

This is Katie and Manny's 8x10 hardcover book. 

 

And this is Sarah and Nate's Soft Cover Proof Book

 

Real books--not spiral bound magazines. They feel great in your hand and are an awesome way to have a hard copy of all your pictures in one beautiful book. Yay! 

What else? Well...making friends with Photoshop!! Well, sorta. One of the big changes here at LP is that I'm switching to a new lab and moving away from Pictage. For me, Pictage was a great way to help me get started as they take care of everything for you.  And I mean everything: They make your proofbooks, they fulfill orders and print, and the thing that I liked the most was that they had album design software, which meant that I didn't have to screw around with Photoshop. And while Pictage is a great company, and many established photographers use them, I recently decided that I needed to move away from them.  I feel like I've really gotten the hang of almost every service that Pictage offers (ie, print fulfillment, proof book automation, etc...) except for album design.  As I've mentioned before I have a pretty rocky relationship with Photoshop (it tends to make me cry using only it's words), but I decided that if I'm going to make this work, we're going to have to set aside our differences and learn to get along. My first challenge: to design stationary for my new Baby and Maternity Service, Over the Moon Imagery (Blog coming soon!).  You remember Theo, right? 

See?? I did it! No crying or anything.  The font on the back wound up a tiny bit off center because I got confused about the cut-off lines, but it's barely noticeable.  The cards look BEAUTIFUL and they're printed on really pretty watercolor paper. Hooray! (Big thanks to Ruby Hazzard, Erin Carey and Caleb Cole--there was a lot of hand holding involved here...)

I also just finished a new album for Sarah and Nate, which I designed completely freehand in Photoshop, and I don't think it's too shabby if I do say so myself.  Once we get their design finalized I'll be sure to post it up here as well! 

Other than all this fun card/book business it's been a lot of behind the scenes biznezz.  I've been trying to set up an engagement session gallery for my website, been corresponding with some really awesome vendors with whom I worked last summer (that's a whole separate post!), and busily chatting away with clients about their wedding plans. I'm getting super excited for what's to come in 2010--and even though it's been a bit quiet around here, I have such hugely high hopes and expecations for this year.  I know it's going to be awesome.

So, in the meantime, I have a favor to ask of you dear readers, fans, friends, family or whatever the heck you are that brought you here: Blogging material. I needs it. Give it to me. What do you want me to write about? What do you want to know about me, my business, my process?  Any pictures you want to see more of?  Or do you want me to just shut up and go away now?

Until next time...muahaha! 

Luna, Harry and Juniper in Lincoln; Part 1

 

"Bob...Bob...hey Bob...Bob...Bob...hey, Bob...Bob....." 

I adore this picture of Harry, who is painfully shy and has lots of anxiety.  It seems to me that this is his safe spot in the house, and he is very much married to it.  I love the way the light is coming in from the west, but his face is hidden in shadow.  I'm also obsessed with that soft curve of his lower back and the smushiness of the blankets...

Bob and Erica are, if nothing else, Dog Lovers.  As I mentioned above, Harry is extremely shy and is plagued with some extreme anxiety issues, with which Bob and Erica are lovingly and patiently helping him. Luna, on the other hand is a total ham, who kept running at me full speed and shoving her deflated soccer ball in my camera lens. These two are so fortunate to have Bob and Erica as their people.  Even better--Bob's brother and sister in law live next door with their lab/golden/shiba mix Juniper.  Throw Olive into the mix and it was a DOG PARTY.  It was 20 degrees and I had my coat off after about 5 minutes, chasing the four of them around the backyard.  SO FUN!

Once again...thanks Bob and Erica :)

Harry on the couch

Sneak Peak: Luna, Harry and Juniper (and Olive!) in Lincoln!

Shy Harry, here with lovely Erica....

More to come!

New Website New Website! Hooray!

Okay for those of you who haven't gotten my email....

Or my Facebook status update...

Or my Facebook Link....

NEW WEBSITE!!! SO excited.  I have been really pumped about this for months, when I first decided to revamp all of Lorenz Photography.  I got my logo (Thanks, Dave!), brushed up my blog, got new business cards, etc....but the one thing, the KEY thing to this whole operation, my website, was still hanging in the interwebs balance.  I've been nitpicking over everything--which any creative professional should do--but I was starting to get overwhelmed and afraid of the whole thing (I scare easily).  Finally, after a business meeting with Caleb (ie, he and I sitting in our pjs drinking coffee on the futon in the office), I decided that I just need to get over myself and finish this damn thing so I can really start marketing more aggressively.  Next step: brush up Google Ads....

So for those of you wondering, no I did not build the website myself; it's a Bludomain template site.  A LOT of photographers use Bludomain and a LOT of people really look down on it.  Bludomain is great in that your template is very customizable and very easy to change at a whim (which I like because I change my mind every week on just about everything) and also pretty affordable.  What's not great about it is that if you're not careful, you can wind up with the EXACT same website as someone else out there.  This actually happened with my last website.  I was just browsing different Boston photographers' websites and stumbled upon one that was literally the exact template.  Even weirder, the photographer was a NESoP grad. I had always felt like to be a wedding photographer in this Region you had to conform to a certain look--in this case I was sharing a website with someone else.  Not okay (Don't get me wrong, her work is lovely, but it just freaked me out...).

So I decided to go bright, go fresh, go bold (ie the awesome logo made by Dave Scott) and just put myself out there. I'm pretty happy with it, but there are a couple of things I need to straighten out (like the fact that my logo can only be like a fingernail big...blerg), and I still need head shots for our info section. Also I think I need a couple more songs, as if you were to go through all the galleries, the music will start over before you're done browsing...

Which is another issue--the edit.  For any of you who know me photographically, you might know that editing is not exactly my strong suit.  I really tried to pick my true favorites and not get caught up in what I "should" show...unfortunately I had like, 140 images which for any visitor might result in a head asplosion.  I asked Dana Smith, an instructor here at NESoP to take a look, and he put it so well: I need to trim the fat, and get rid of anything that is not the best of the best.  He said that some of the strongest images were just getting lost in the mediocre ones.  So even though I LOVE that picture of the uncle doing oyster shooters because I was there and it was SO FUNNY and such a GREAT experience, the fact is, it watering down the overall collection.  So--out went some of my "favorites" and what remains is, (I hope) the best of the best.

It's not perfect, and I know it never will be, and I have to be okay with that. I would love to hear any feed back you've got--ideas for pictures that I could pull, problems loading (A friend said that it was absolutely not working on his computer at all, but it works fine on every other computer I've tried...) etc. 

Thanks to all of you who take a look! And as always, please feel free to spread the Lorenz Photography love around to anyone and everyone you think might also enjoy it. Thanks friends!