Blue eyes is what pretty much anyone will say they remember when they meet Theresa. She has bright, bright blue eyes that everyone notices immediately. They were the focus of this photo… well, actually Theresa made her goofy expressions the main part of this image. But when I heard that she was engaged, among the first things I thought was “Perfect, I know exactly what bridal portrait I was to create with her”.
Cuz that’s what all creative photographers do, right? We use our gorgeous friends for creating beautiful photos, hahaha.

Theresa is a friend of mine from when I was a lifeguard and lifeguard trainer in Florida, at Disneyworld. We are part of a core group of friends, mostly lifeguards, that all spent a good portion of 2003 living and working together. Her wedding was a small reunion for some of us who hadn’t seen each other in years.

This posting will include a number of personal shots since these are my old friends. Typically I keep personal things off this blog, but this is different and I’m even in some of the group shots, too. Overall we had a great time hanging out in Downtown Portland and catching up on life. It was a crazy and hectic week – did I mention I flew to Portland for this wedding less than 24 hours after landing back in California from spending the week shooting in Michigan at the D’Orazio wedding? Yeah, didn’t sleep much at all.

Anyway, enjoy the photos. I’ll put more info in the captions!

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This photo inspired someone I’ve never met to completely change their life.

What an incredible compliment. Wow.

A friend of mine, named Liz, occasionally tells me about her friend Adam. I’ve never met Adam, it’s likely I never will. But I’m constantly reminded by Liz that “Adam has asked about you again” or “Adam mentioned you today. He’s still working out and exercising.”
I’ve heard this from her for at least the last year or so.

But, this week Liz sent me this in a text:

You’re his idol. Simply put. Like, you really did trigger something and inspire him to get into the gym.
It’s pretty major. You basically made him turn his lifestyle around and he doesn’t even know you. You’re amazing.

Adam, this is one of the most incredible compliments I’ve received in a long time. To be given even a small amount of credit in encouraging someone to change their lifestyle to be healthier and take care of themself is so hugely flattering to me.
I wish you the best in your goals, wherever you set them. And Thank You again for such a wonderful compliment.

I’ve never actually shared this photo on my blog – for those of you who don’t know, this is a self portrait I took a while back. To answer the most common questions: Yes, it is me. No, it is not photoshopped. Yes, I’m in that level of shape. Yes, I do actually eat food. Yes, I wear glasses, but usually contacts 99% of the time. The shot is fired on a timer, single light setup. And no, I have no clue what my body fat level is.

For those who are curious: My workout routine is mostly cardio. I run a few miles every day. I do pullups, pushups, and inverted (hanging upside down) situps. That’s about it. Occasionally I may use weights – but not often. I eat healthy, always have. But don’t deprive myself of things for the sake of being in shape. If I’m in the mood for something I will still eat it. And yes, I also eat bread… those Atkin’s dieters creep me out. The main thing… I’m consistent. I run every day – unless I’m traveling for work.

So, good luck to those who have their goals for fitness. Eat healthy, and stick with a routine.

And I’ll be back to photo updates soon with another wedding I recently shot. Thanks everyone!

… sometimes, you leave your wedding reception in a squad car.
<insert cliche about being sentenced to life here>… We should all hope to be so lucky.

I recently spent the week back out in Michigan. This was my second of three trips back out to the midwest this year. I was in town to shoot the D’Orazio wedding. I had been looking forward to this trip for quite some time. Mike and Christina booked me nearly a year and a half ago. Last summer I even had the honor of shooting their engagement photos while in Michigan shooting the DeLand wedding.
It’s always nice to hear any feedback on my work. I would say one thing for me that disappointing is that I never usually get to see my clients reaction to the photos I create of them. However during this trip I heard from both Mike and Christina’s families that they all loved the work I did for the engagement shots – and that they were all excited to see what I would do with their wedding day.

So, Mike and Christina… I hope that I don’t disappoint!

I have over 100 images in this posting. There were so many hilarious shots from the weekend that I had a hard time trying to narrow it down. So, hopefully you guys take a few minutes to look through everything. It should be quick to get through them. And, as always, I would love to hear any feedback from you readers about everything. Also, click on my Facebook fan page on the right hand column to stay updated with what I’m doing.

My weekend with the D’Orazio family was a blast. Spending time with Mike again was funny in the sense that Mike’s attitude was “do whatever you think will look good, John” every time I asked “So what are you thinking you want from your wedding shots?”.
Both the D’Orazio family and Vilk family said they had heard a lot about me. So, obviously I had the bar set pretty high, lol. But they warmed up to me fast, and ignored me taking pictures just as quickly. That’s always helpful since all my wedding work has a journalistic approach.

Anyway, I’m going to continue this blog post with a number of captions. There are so many small comments and stories to tell about the weekend that it’s better I do it with the photos that they relate to.
So please read on! Enjoy the photos, and leave your thoughts at the end!

Let’s get started…

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What a crazy two weeks! The amount of work and travel was ridiculous – but a lot of fun.

I recently returned from a whirlwind trip that spanned THREE different states (not including California, where I live). My travels started off heading back out to Michigan. I was in Detroit-area again, this time to shoot the D’Orazio wedding.
For those who don’t remember, Mike booked me for his wedding nearly a year and a half ago. I was also able to shoot their engagement photos while out in Michigan last July shooting the DeLand wedding. Check out the last image on this page.
Mike and Christina make such a wonderful couple. They were a pleasure to photograph during their engagement session, and their wedding weekend was just as exciting. I have so many great photos from the day and a half I spent with their families. But rather than make everyone wait I wanted to upload a single preview for now to hold you over.

Also, Mike and Christina had this to say after my return home:

“John, we can’t thank you enough for everything! We know the photos are amazing! You are a true professional and we are proud to say you were part of the best day of our lives! Thank you again.”
-Mike D’Orazio

“I couldn’t of said it better myself!
I cannot wait to see the photos! I know how wonderful your work is, and it makes me so excited to see the final product :) You were very professional and did 110%. Thanks again!!!”
-Christina D’Orazio

After returning from Michigan I was home in California for about 15 hours before boarding a plane to Portland for my friend Theresa’s wedding. I was attending purely as a guest – however when a friend with gorgeous blue eyes gets married, I’m going to take some pictures regardless…

This is why you throw down a couple grand and buy an 85mm f/1.2
Yep, you read that correctly… couple grand… f/1.2 – this lens will be worth every penny.

I’ve known Theresa for seven years, we used to work together in Florida where I trained lifeguards and lifeguarded for the Disney Water Parks in 2003. So, when I heard she was engaged, I knew the exact photo I wanted to take on her wedding day… this image above.

I have a lot of photos from my trip north to attend the wedding; most of my photos are actually shots of me and our friends all hanging out laughing catching up on the last five years since we some of us last saw each other. But I also have some shots I took at the ceremony. Those will be coming in later weeks after finishing work for other clients.

Check back soon for an update on D’Orazio wedding!

This week’s post is going to be a mix of a few things. I’ve been without internet (part of our city was out for three days) and am just getting back into the swing of things before leaving for Michigan on business Wednesday morning.
One of the shoots I did last week was with a model, and friend, named Chris Franklin. I met Chris two years ago doing fashion shows in Hollywood. He’s part of a small group of people from that time frame that I keep in touch with. Most of all of us from that group have gone on and climbed further and further up within our various careers (ie: photography, modeling, make up artistry, etc).
Chris has recently wrapped various projects with Nike and Adidas – so we talked about putting together some more sports images that could help his portfolio with different looks and style.

“Highest production value, John…” is what Chris said when I asked what he was wanting this shoot to look like. I’ll be honest, this shoot was a lot of laughs and story telling catching up on the last year. I had a few ideas in mind of things I wanted to try with lighting. Some of the shots hit, some of them missed. The running image above is close to what I was going for, but, I will likely try and bring Chris out again to reshoot it… I’m not completely happy with it.

The hardest part of our day was finding empty athletic fields to use, or ones that had public access for that matter. Overall I’m very happy with the images that Chris and I came back with.
I am, however, about to expand my gear (again) and purchase a lot of new lighting equipment… So I’ll be doing a lot more athlete and sports themed photoshoots in the near future.

Below I’m going to share some of the other basketball images of Chris. Please feel free to comment on which of them you like.

Before I did this shoot with Chris, I did some test shooting… with Beau.

Beau is one of my best friends, and old roommate. He is currently a working actor out on the east coast, but returns here to California from time to time as he prepares to move back west.
While in town last week though, I made him stand in as my test subject for the lighting style I wanted to do with Chris. I was pretty happy with how it turned out for a first attempt. I may go in and re-edit slighly; they’re a bit too contrasty right now. We’ll see.

The harder, bright sunny day, “this is my court” attitude of the shots was something I liked… which is why I opted for mid-day shooting.

Beau even needed a quick, updated, headshot while he was here… which was definitely easy to do outside that afternoon.

Lastly, I went riding yesterday with my friends Crazy Mike and Lyla Dee. You guys will remember Mike and Lyla from their shoot on Venice beach at night in the sand and water.
Well, it’s been months since seeing these two so yesterday I met up went riding with them. This shot was taken, by me, one-handed while riding alongside Mike on a R1 myself, haha.

Shot this image the same way. This is done with my 5DII (not my 1D) and a 16-35mm. Yes, I do put my gear in harm’s way from time to time. But, I get some really cool photos that way… Risk is just part of the job.

Mike also wanted a burnout shot… That smell takes me right back to shooting Formula Drift! Hahaha.

That’s it for this update, hope you guys hung around and checked out everything.
Wednesday I’m leaving for Detroit where I will spend the rest of the week for the D’Orazio wedding. Mike and Christina are a really amazing couple. I had a great time with them last July when I shot their engagement photos during another trip to Michigan. Their wedding will definitely be a blast – and with over 300 guests I even hired my friend (and photographer) Casey Shortt to assist me with all the madness.

Following the D’Orazio wedding I will be heading to Portland to attend my friend Theresa’s wedding in Vancouver. I may even be able to do some shooting while up there. We’ll see what happens.

Check back around the beginning of next week though! I’ll try and have a few previews up from the wedding! And I’ll definitely have some shots from the new 85mm f/1.2 lens I ordered!!

Last week I had the opportunity to shoot with Cazz and Marissa here in Hollywood.

Cazz is someone I’ve been in touch with a couple of months. He was a fan of my work with Crazy Mike and Lyla Dee on the beach in Venice and wanted to do a couples-shoot working with me. I wanted to try something a bit different than another beach shoot though. Cazz pitched the idea of a black/white CK-style shoot.

Having access to an empty Hollywood apartment was definitely a plus. We went with the LA lifestyle feel, and for those of you who did what I did and packed up and moved somewhere to pursue your dreams, you know what it’s like to live in an empty apartment without much, or any, furniture.

One of the funniest moments in the day was when Cazz and I realized we have mutual friends in a completely different industry – Automotive. Many of you are aware that during 2009 I handled K&N and AEM’s photography for racing and am very active in the import car community.

Cazz was great to work with, as I said. This is one of my favorite shots of him from that afternoon. It needs maybe one or two more tweaks before posting to my portfolio… we’ll see.

So, after the break I’m going to be sharing just under 20 additional images from this shoot. I would LOVE to have any feedback from you guys about which ones you like. I’ll be sharing similar looking images, and want to know what you guys feel fits the theme and story best.
Also because I rarely do shoots that are soley black and white – so I’m anxious to hear your thoughts.

In other news, I will be shooting soon with a stunning model named Caitlin Kelly whose work I have liked for quite a while. I’m also trying to put together another shoot for this week, so we’ll see what happens there.

But please, read after the break, check out the images, and let me know what you think.

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Rosa and I finally shot again a few nights back – after months of trying to time our schedules and put a shoot together.
The inspiration for this shoot came from a portfolio of a photographer in England. That particular gentleman does all black and white work – it’s gorgeous stuff, all studio work, too.

Well, Rosa recently did a fashion show with a designer who makes her own corset line. That particular designer, whose name I need to get, was kind enough to loan Rosa an outfit for us to do some shooting. The original plan was to do all black and white images. But, as usual with me, I’m going with the color versions for the rest of the shots I want to share.

Also, I’m moving this week, so expect my next update to be delayed as well. I should be doing some extreme sports photos here shortly. I also have another shoot with Megan in the works – you’ll remember her from some of my beach work in the past.

But, for now, enjoy this brief update tonight!

Check back later this weekend for another update with another shoot.

Happy May everyone!
Well, it’s nearly a week into this month already and I’m finally posting a new blog. I’ve been swamped editing the last couple weddings I shot. I wanted to get them completed, out to clients, and out of the way. I have some big things coming up that I wanted my plate clear for.
But first, I finished the Niles wedding and sent the images out to the client today. So, that means I pulled a two week turn around on both weddings I shot in April – which is pretty fast for the amount of photos and everything I did. The image above was from the Niles wedding. Jessica was waiting and watching Tara get ready and then turned to watch me just long enough to make two images, this one was my favorite.

This is another image from the Niles wedding that I really liked. There’s just enough uneasy/awkwardness between the two boys, Isaac and Jacob to contrast the uniformity and seriousness of the groomsmen behind them.

Now some of you may remember me mentioning that after I got off the plane from Portland I was called into Hollywood to do some headshots for an actor out there. Michael was a lot of fun to spend the afternoon with doing some new shots for him. The image above was towards the end when he asked to do some fun ones that he can use for comedy events and hosting (if I recall correctly). I really liked this one of him goofing off.

One of the more serious images we created. Michael opted to have all the shots cropped in tighter to better frame his face. I’m sharing this one wide because I like the feeling added by his hand placement.

A lot of you guys remember the night shoot that I did with Crazy Mike and Lyla Dee, right? Well this image was one that I took the next day in Long Beach. The shoot wasn’t really a shoot for me though, it was a mock shoot to get some video footage. So, I didn’t really have time to bother focusing my lights. I like this image, but wish there just a tad more light on Mike. Last I heard, these two started dating… so I could probably recreate this pretty easily if I want, hahaha!

Also, Mike has relaunched his website WePlayCrazy.com and it features a number of images by me! Woo hoo! Haha! So, check out the “About” section. You will find my images of Crazy Mike, Sean Logan (under Action Sports), and even photos of DJ Drizzle (under Production Crew) from our shoots a few months back.

And lastly on a personal note:
This is Paul Flores and his son at the beach. Many of you guys know how active I am in the car community beyond just photographing professional racing. Well, Paul was a friend of mine through the import community I’m involved with. He died in a tragic accident while working on his car last weekend. He leaves behind his son, girlfriend and family.
Paul was a wonderfully caring person who always helped everyone without expectation of anything in return, he was never mean, and never stopped smiling.
We all knew Paul and his Laguna Blue Honda S2000 as “Smirf”, and his death was both a huge shock and very upsetting to all of us. Please keep his family in your thoughts as they deal with the loss of a wonderful person.

Tonight, Friday, I’ll be shooting with Rosa. We haven’t shot anything together in a long time – mostly due to my crazy schedule. But check back soon for images from the shoot!
And it’s becoming more and more solid that I will be leaving overseas for an opportunity abroad to work on a short film in Morocco. More details on that to come… but if anyone wants to sponsor some high capacity CF cards or Lacie drives… I’ll gladly accept ;)

Last weekend I had the pleasure of spending a (surprisingly) sunny weekend in Portland, Oregon for the wedding of Tara Matthews and Michael Niles!
I have indirectly known Tara for a number of years. Seven years ago I lived in Orlando, Florida while doing an internship with Walt Disney World. Tara’s brother Ryan was one of my roommates while I was out there. I actually also shot images at Ryan’s wedding four years ago. So, this is now the second brother-then-sister wedding client family! It’s such a compliment to be able to do photography twice for a family.. especially when those people are in completely different states!

Well, Tara has apparently followed my work for quite a while. And as I heard this weekend, it wasn’t a question in her mind about getting me to shoot her wedding. What an amazing compliment to hear from anyone!
Michael, like many grooms, wasn’t too familiar with my work, but took his fiance’s word about me. Haha! Thanks Michael! Hope I don’t disappoint!

After knowing the Matthew’s for such a long period of time, I’m considered family and was treated as such while in Oregon. I crashed at their home, hung out with everyone, and laughed and joked about old stories and new.
Don’t get me wrong, I had my camera with me pretty much at all times. I won’t be including photos from all the prep, the nails, the hair, and everything else I attended though. I have plenty from the wedding day that I’d like to share.

So, ahead are 70 images or so from the Niles’ wedding. I hope you guys spend the time and check them all out. I really had an amazing time with these families last weekend. I even got to see the Grant family from Ryan and Jenna’s wedding four years ago. I was shocked they remembered me that well!

Enjoy! And please feel free to post or send me a message if you have any thoughts!

I LOVE this shot. How cute is this, seriously?
This is easily one of my new favorite portfolio images. I hope both of these two love it as much as I do(in about 15 years when they can appreciate it).

continue reading below…

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Couples like Amy and Michael Lordon compound my faith in love.
Working in and around this industry you occasionally come across a couple like these two; and it’s fantastic to meet, talk, and spend time with them if you have the opportunity. Amy and Michael were high school sweethearts, dated all through college, and now – after last weekend – are husband and wife! Truly a rare thing.

I captured a lot images that I would like to share in this update. So, I’ll warn you now that you’ll have quite a few images to scroll through if you plan on reading this whole post – which I hope you do.
The ceremony and reception was at Freedom Hall in Santa Clara – the same location as the Machallister wedding that I photographed last time I was in the Bay Area!
The weather cooperated just long enough for Amy to have a beautiful outdoor wedding before everyone was brought indoors for the reception after the temperature became a bit chilly. Both the Lordan and Benson families were in great spirits with everything going on and there was definitely a sense of calm throughout the whole day.

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