Parties Archives

Lauren’s Cotillion

At first when I was contacted to capture the images for Lauren’s cotillion/quinceanera, I was a bit unsure of how the entire process works. Then after just a bit of reading, it turns out that it’s sort of like a wedding…at least in terms of the flow of the day. The days starts off with hair and makeup, moves on the a ceremony, and ends with a reception. Lauren was a bit quiet and shy at first but was happy to strike a pose. Overall we had a great time and I even got mom to model a bit!

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

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Chicago Cotillion Quinceanera

David and Liana Engagement Dinner

One thing is for sure…there was not a shortage of toasts given at this dinner. It almost seemed like just about every single person who attended the dinner gave a toast, which was quite impressive! David and Liana haven’t done a lot of posing before so we would have a 30 second mini posing lesson before doing each shot. But they were great to work with. The one thing that I had to do was quickly set each shot up so that the lights were in place so that we could get the image and then get them back to their dinner and guests. Overall it was a great time with fantastic food too!

Click ***HERE*** for David and Liana’s full gallery!

The Darkroom

My friend Shannon somehow uprooted herself from the wonderful city of San Francisco and graced us lowly folks in Chicago! 🙂 While in town, I met up with her at The Darkroom where her friend Kathy was performing with her band…The Diplomats of Solid Sound.

So I grabbed my camera, my lenses, and of course…Snezhana and set off to take some photos in a dark dark environment.

I had never really shot a band before with the intention of coming up with quality images. Usually when I go out for an evening and there’s a local band playing I don’t bring a camera, and when I do go to a concert with a more popular band, I’ll often take a casual shot of the band or performer from far away as a memory and call it a day. Here was a chance to get nice and close to the band and snap away!

Now the band didn’t have the best lighting. Lot of red light which meant that in my post processing I had to be a bit more creative to not let it dominate the shots. Combine it with it being more on the dark-side and that made for a tough shoot! Some shots of other friends…

You can see the rest of the shots here: http://public.fotki.com/biggy/the-dark-room/

Gabby’s Bat Mitzvah

This was a first for me…not that I haven’t attended Bar or Bat Mitzvahs before, but this was my first time attending as a photographer. This was a two day shoot. Friday we would meet up to get some outdoor family shots along with the Bat Mitzvah service and then the party on Sunday. When I first met Gabby she seemed just a bit nervous and shy, but seeing as how she’d been preparing for this day for quite some time, it was quite understandable. And now the pressure was on. I had one hour to get all of my outdoor shots before we headed off to the service, so I had to work quickly. Before the shoot I decided to go with a more casual attire of cargo shorts and a t-shirt, which ended up being the right choice instead of slacks and a dress shirt since after getting down low on the ground I came up nice and muddy. “Shabbat shalom everyone, don’t mind me, I decided to take my mud bath in my clothes today!”

On Sunday I found out that, yes, I can keep up with a bunch of preteens on the dance floor! 🙂 Overall it was a great and challenging experience and a lot of fun as well. There were some technical issues to battle such as two different light sources. The natural light through the ceiling and the incandescent bulbs which conflict with each other in the cameras white balance settings. But aside from that all else went very smoothly. Congrats to Gabby, Stan, Liliya, and the rest of the family!

Want to see more? Do ya? Huh? Do ya? Well then you can see all of Gabby’s images here!
http://public.fotki.com/biggy/gabbys-bat-mitzvah/