My dancers in black and white | Dance Photographer

Every fall, I have the chance to observe my kids in their dance classes. For this one week, I get to see what they do during class and watch them concentrate so well on what they are learning. This year, while editing the photos, some of them were just begging to be edited in black and white, so I'm posting them here all together. There's something about the starkness of the black and white, in this dance setting, that just seems perfect to me.

Solo Dance Portraits | Dance Photographer

When creating my previous post (and a couple of upcoming ones!), I kept coming across photos that are much more portraits - solo, duo, or a few dancers together. They're not quite representative of the class as a whole, which is why I didn't want to feature them in the posts I'm doing about each recital. Instead, I will share them here, with each photo getting to stand on its own.

Ballet Dance Recital 2015 | Dance Photographer

As all of you who follow me on Facebook know, I spent much of my time in June and July finishing the action/stage photos from the Loudoun School of Ballet's spring dance recitals. This was a huge undertaking - I ended the dress rehearsals with over 4,000 photos, spread over about 50 different classes. It took me the better part of a week to just organize everything! And at that point it was edit, edit, edit. I could not have been happier with the results, and am so thankful to the parents who chose to purchase from me.

I of course cannot post all of my favorite photos here - there are just way too many! So I thought in order to provide everyone with a sampling of the style of stage dance photography I do, I'd post my favorite shot from each class. Even narrowing it down this far is a little bit difficult, but I think I've managed to highlight the best ones. I also took posed "class photos" at the end of each dance, but the action shots are so much more interesting, I think!

The school has graded levels of ballet classes - in this recital were levels II - X. I have a soft spot for Ballet II since it was my daughter's class!
Ballet II

Halloween Costume Photo Shoot | Child Photographer

Kids love dressing up in their Halloween costumes, and it's so hard to get good photos of them during the excitement of Halloween night. So, what's a photographer to do? How about get the kids dressed up before Halloween and do a couple of photo shoots? Both were done just after my daughter's dance class (as her hair was already done!) - we just changed into costumes and headed outside!

This first set were taken just outside of our house, near the pond. My son was VERY excited to wear his full Darth Vader costume (and use the light saber as prop!), and my daughter was happy to model her newly purchased dance costume.

Welcome to the world, Baby L!

About a month after our sunset maternity shoot, baby L entered the world! I photographed him around one week old, and he was a fantastic little subject...who did not want to miss a thing during his shoot. Look at those bright eyes!

The G family | Maternity Photographer

I was so excited for this maternity shoot, since the dad-to-be is a coworker of mine! He and his wife are lovely, and a lot of fun! They brought a few ideas and props to the shoot, and I had some ideas of my own - together, it made for a very fun sunset maternity session.

Little Miss E turns 1 | Child and Family Photographer

After photographing this beautiful little one as a newborn, at 6 months, and 9 months, it was finally time for her 1 year photo shoot!

Supermoon Eclipse 2015

Despite cloudy skies on Sunday night, I was able to sit on my back patio with my husband and watch the Supermoon/blood moon eclipse. We had a clear view of the moon before the eclipse started.

The Extended K Family | Northern Virginia Family Photographer

During the first weekend in May, I was scheduled to shoot my largest family session ever: 10 adults and 3 kids, spanning 3 generations! This shoot was so much fun. I had gotten to know one of the couples here through my daughter's dance class, and was so happy when they asked for me to do this special family photo shoot. When you have 5 siblings plus spouses, children, and grandparents, it makes for a boisterous, fun group! We all met up at their house at Lake Anna in Virginia, and took photos around the property. It was a stunning location, and the family was a ton of fun!

Seattle, WA | Travel Photographer

With all of the travel that I am fortunate to be able to do for my job, I try to post my travel photography here relatively soon after it occurs. However, sometimes certain photos slip through the cracks, and it turns out that these from Seattle are on that list! I took these just over 2 years ago, and only recently had the chance to finish editing them and posting them here. Despite the time delay, I still wanted to share as it was nice for me to go back and see them again after so long! Also, even though I think I have grown as a photographer in the past 2 years, these didn't come out too badly - and Seattle is a very pretty city.

Savannah, GA | Travel Photographer

Here is the final installment of the travel photography that I've done so far for 2015 - a day trip that my husband and I took to Savannah, GA in June 2015. It was one of the hottest days I've ever experienced - nearly 100 degrees with 100% humidity, but the city was absolutely beautiful. We took an open-air, guided trolley ride around the city to learn its history and see some of the famous sites. I was able to get some very lovely photos of the buildings through the window.

Butchart Gardens | Travel Photographer

More travel photography! It's nice to finally have the time to show off the places that I have been this year. This one was possibly the most beautiful of them all...while in Victoria, BC in June I took an afternoon trip out to Butchart Gardens. It's billed as the oldest botanical gardens in Canada, and is definitely one of the most stunning that I have ever seen.

Beautiful wide landscape shots, right? I feel like I'm forgetting something...oh, that's right: flower close ups! I would be remiss if I didn't show you those. There were stunning flowers everywhere, and I had a lot of fun in editing them afterwards.

Sunset in South Carolina | Travel Photographer

In June I spent a few days near Hilton Head, SC with my family, visiting my in-laws. They live on a golf course community, and as promised by my mother-in-law, the sunsets over the golf course are pretty spectacular. Despite the heat and humidity, and therefore the need to adapt my equipment to the elements before I could take any photos, the end result was worth it!

Georgetown, Washington DC | Photography Lesson

As anyone with a craft/passion should do, it's important to periodically take classes to improve one's skills in that area. I really enjoy taking photography lessons, whether it be informally with fellow photographers, sharing tips, or in a class that I have paid for. While a lot of my lessons recently have focused on photographing people, which is really what I've focused on, I have taken other lessons in other areas. A while back, I took a class in Washington, DC where we walked through Georgetown at dusk. The class focused primarily on how to adjust things like white balance in camera, not in post editing, to get different "emotions" in the photos, as well as some tricks for evening/low light photography. It was definitely fun to work on adjusting the mood of the photo while shooting, instead of during editing as I usually do! For all of the comparison shots below, I did not do any editing in post; it was all done on camera.

Victoria, BC | Travel Photographer

At the beginning of June I had the opportunity to go to Victoria, British Columbia for a conference for work. It's an absolutely beautiful town, and I had a wonderful time walking around photographing the beautiful buildings (these are my hotel and the capital building).

 

Little Miss E: 9 month portraits

It's very important that I get this little cutie's 9 month photos up here, as I just shot her 1 year photos last weekend! I've previously shot Miss E for her newborn photos, as well as at 6 months (we skipped 3 months because that's a very difficult age to get good photos of a baby). At the very beginning of May we scheduled (a bit after 9 months, to be true, but sometimes that's how schedules work), and I was very excited to have this shoot be a bit different than the previous two. First, we shot outside (the other two were indoor portraits), and second we shot at a brand new location that I had never used before, hidden away in Leesburg! I absolutely love this location, and can't wait to do another photo session here.

Welcome to the world, Baby R! | Newborn Photographer

I'm so happy when I have a friend who has a baby, and even happier when I get asked to take some photos of the new baby and parents. Again I was able to visit one of my very good friends in the hospital when she gave birth in May, and she and I were fortunate to get a couple of hours in the hospital room just the two of us (and the new baby of course!). We don't get that often, so it was a really nice time, capped off with some photos of the little one and her mom. I've never really taken photos in the light that we had (a single light from above and behind the hospital bed), and it was definitely a bit of a challenge, but I loved capturing mom and baby in the first day of baby's life.

Cherry Blossoms 2015 Part 2 | Nature Photographer

In my last post, I showed photos I took of the Tidal Basin during peak bloom of the Japanese cherry blossom trees in Washington DC. In addition to those, I took a number of close-up photos of the blossoms themselves, and had some fun with editing them to bring out the beauty in the flowers, and the light around them. I hope you find these as beautiful as I do!

Cherry Blossoms 2015 Part 1| Nature Photographer

I absolutely love photographing the cherry blossoms around the Tidal Basin in Washington DC. This year, peak dates were delayed due to the cold weather, so I was able to get there during that time (first weekend in April) to take some sunrise photos. I went again with my good friend Kathy; she and I had gone two years ago and photographed the trees at sunset, so we thought we'd mix it up this year and hit sunrise instead. This meant bundling up against the cold, finding a parking spot not too far from the Tidal Basin (which was easier than we thought it would be), and finding just the right spot to get started.

Rising Stars Interns | Dance Photographer

In January, I had the opportunity to photograph a large number of dancers at my children's dance school. Through a series of unforeseen circumstances, the photographer who had been hired to do the action photography on stage ended up leaving during the dress rehearsal, so I was asked to step in at the last minute. I wasn't fully prepared, but did have my favorite lenses on me, and so I think I was able to capture the dancers as requested! I don't really want to post the photos I took of the little ones here, so instead I will focus on the high school age Interns, who dance with the little kids on stage. In addition to helping out the young ones, they also do their own opening and closing number. These girls are beautiful dancers and very sweet with the little kids, so I was glad to have the opportunity to get to capture them dancing!

A birthday photo shoot | Leesburg VA Child Photographer

Last month my son turned 5. On that day, we actually scheduled our very own family photo shoot! This photographer has to get her own photos taken too, right? As much as I love photographing my little ones, I can't exactly be in those photos!

When we arrived for our shoot, the previous family was running a bit late, so we had some time to kill. In order to entertain my kids, and to get some shots of them while they were looking their best, I did my own quick photoshoot with them.

 

Miss A: Senior Portraits | Portrait Photographer

Last fall I did a senior portrait shoot of a colleague's daughter. She's absolutely lovely; a beautiful girl both inside and out! I had already posted her "sneak peek" album on Facebook, and so I wasn't in a huge hurry to get these photos up here on the blog...but since just this past week I attended her graduation party, and on Wednesday she officially graduated from high school, I thought I would finally put up a few of my favorites. Best of luck to this lovely lady as she heads off to Embry Riddle Aeronautical University in the fall!

St. Louis Zoo | Animal Photographer

I absolutely adore taking photos of animals. So when I spent two days at the St. Louis Zoo for work, I could not pass up the opportunity to explore the zoo and capture the animals there. It was difficult to weed out my favorite animal photos here, and not post too many of the elephants, sea lions, and penguins (all of which I took many photos of!), but I did my best.

 I was so excited to find out that they have a red panda, as those are my absolute favorite zoo animals!

Bar Harbor, ME | Travel Photographer

In my previous post I highlighted my favorite photos from a day spent in Portland, ME. The next day I found myself 3.5 hours north on the tiny island of Bar Harbor. 

Portland, Maine | Travel Photographer

My last post (lighthouse on Cape Cod) was a hit, so I thought I would follow that up with more photos from lovely New England. Last summer while in Maine for work, I had the chance to photograph two different locations: the area around Portland, and then the island of Bar Harbor. Both of these locations were two of the most beautiful that I've had the chance to visit for work. I will start here with Portland, where I had a few hours to kill while waiting for a colleague. I headed to the water front and enjoyed walking around the town (including eating some delicious food!).

Cape Cod Lighthouse | Travel Photographer

At the end of March, I ventured out to the very cold Cape Cod with my family. We didn't really have a destination in mind (sometimes those kinds of trips end up being the best!); we just wanted to see somewhere we had never seen before. We ended up venturing down to Woods Hole, and thanks to Google maps I saw that the Nabsko lighthouse was just outside of town. We were the lone car headed out to the lighthouse, and I am so glad we did. Despite the chill, it was beautiful in the sun, with the ocean wind blowing at us!

Sheep | Animal Photographer

There's a spot on Route 15 north of Leesburg that I drive past fairly often. There's a beautiful farm, and hillside that is always covered in sheep and goats. I kept telling myself that I would stop and take photos there at some point, but over the past few years I keep failing to do so. Well, a couple of weeks ago I finally did, and despite the less than perfect lighting, and cloudy skies, I am happy with how these came out (including a little pop with editing in Lightroom)

Even with shooting from at least 20 yards away (using my 85mm lens), I still attracted a little bit of attention. I was hoping a couple would come closer to me, but unfortunately none did. It was still fun to observe and capture them from a distance!

Love is Good | Leesburg Child Photographer

During Valentine's week, the theme for the Weekly Photo Project was "Love is Good". I had a couple of ideas for photos, including setting something up similar with the kids to what I did last year. Ultimately, I decided to shoot my children with a few of the things they love the most: their "lovies". I did see this as an idea on some photography site (I can no longer remember which!), and I was so happy with how it came out. I instructed the kids on where to lie, and then captured moments as they presented. Love these faces!

Little Miss E: 6 month portraits

As I am about to take 9 month photos of this little beauty tomorrow, let me get her 6 month photos up here! I gave these to mom and dad well over a month ago, but have not had time to get them up here. No time like the present.

Miss E is seriously a cutie. I've previously shot her newborn photos, which were a mix of lifestyle (in her nursery) and posed photos. I don't often shoot lifestyle, but it was a lot of fun to do, and she was such a good baby throughout!

For her 6 month, we did posed shots in my studio area. Once again, she was so good throughout. I didn't get a lot of smiles, but she was very attentive and alert, and had no problem with any outfit her mom put her into. If only every baby was like this!

Central Park in the snow

In January 2015, I spent a few days in NYC, during which the "monster blizzard" was due to hit. As just about everyone on the east coast knows, the storm ended up staying east of NYC, meaning that instead of the 2+ feet of snow that was promised, the city ended up getting maybe about 6". But because of storm preparations, the city had shut down, leaving my colleague and I with no work to do for most of the day. As we were staying in Times Square, we put on our snow gear and hiked up to see Central Park in the snow. I had some fun editing these photos, and pulling out the beauty of the city in the snow.

Boston Museum of Science: Butterflies | Nature Photographer

Over the weekend I visited the Boston Museum of Science with my family. We thoroughly enjoyed the trip there, and I took quite a few photos and videos. One of the highlights for me was our visit to the indoor butterfly garden. My daughter and I had a wonderful time there, watching the butterflies all around us!

Macro photography: Plants in the snow

On Sunday, I ventured out to take some macro photos of some of the plant life peeking through the snow. As the theme for the Weekly Photo Project was "Controlled Focus", which I thought worked quite well with macro photos like these. The first was my favorite, and was my submission for the week.

A Frozen photo shoot | Child Photographer, Leesburg VA

One cold, dreary weekend in January I set up my new backdrop and let my daughter wear her new Elsa hat (with braid), along with her Elsa dress. The result: a Frozen-inspired photo shoot of my beautiful girl! Not on that, but it was an excuse to play with my two prime lenses (50mm f/1.4, and 85mm f/1.8). This photo in particular was my favorite.

Tulip Macro Shots

Sometimes I like to challenge myself to take a "good" photograph not using my DSLR. Yes, gear and lenses make a big difference, and I can do so much more with them...but it's also more to carry around, more editing to need to do (if I shoot in RAW), and, well, the lens on my iPhone 5S isn't half bad either. With the magnetic lenses that I received as a present a while ago, I can do even more.

For the Weekly Photo Project this week, the theme is "A Bug's Eye View". Today my husband very nicely purchased tulips for my daughter and I, so I thought: where would an insect me attracted to, but the flowers? So I added the macro lens to my iPhone camera, and with a small amount of editing afterwards, this is what I have!

Disney's Frozen on Ice

In October 2014 I took my family to see Disney's Frozen on Ice. I've previously taken them to see Disney's Celebration  and Disney's Princess Stories; of all three shows, I think we all agreed that this was our favorite. We had excellent seats, and with my 75-300mm telephoto lens, I was able to capture some beautiful moments!