Ryan & Tiffany

I do shoot the occasional wedding!

This fall I was privileged to take Ryan and Tiffany's wedding photos!

 We decided on some desaturated formals, which fit in 

very well with the rustic, outdoor setting...

 

Kids Cards for 2011

I finally got the kids' school portrait cards done for this year.  The boys went with the postapocalyptic Fallout look complete with Nuka Cola and Sunset Sasparilla caps!  Moira was all girly!  As usual, they took great pictures!

Liam

Jackson

Moira

I really love doing these cards!  If anyone is interested in having this done for their kids, feel free to make an appointment!

 

Fun New Photo Treatments for Portraits!

 I've been playing around recently with some distressed, or grungy, treatments for my photos.  This style seems to be en vogue right now, and I can see why!  

Moira's been my little trooper through all of this.  The boys have just gotten their grades up enough to earn their video games back, so convincing them to go out with Mom has been more difficult!

 

Another photographer friend of mine did some work with high key light a few years back that really struck me, so we had to try some of that, too!

  

I thought the distressed look worked particularly well with action shots...and especially in the case of kids, who wear real dirt just as easily as these photos wear the fake stuff!

A little bit of fudging with brightness and contrast, some creative dodging and burning, and a texture import (heavily modified) turned a simple shot of Moira running through the snow into art!

 

I've done work with frames before (see the kids school pics in an earlier post), and had done similar things in wedding photos, but this is the first time I did distressed framing for children.  Looks pretty good!  I think I'll be looking into this again later this year when we can go ghost towning again!

I've heard of programs out there that do this sort of thing at the touch of a button, but they're expensive, around $150.  A little more time gets me something I can hand tailor to the individual or to the situation or theme of the photo...for a lot less money!  Anyway, I hope you all enjoy these pictures as much as I enjoyed creating them!

 

Marysville, Montana

Marysville is located about 25 miles northwest of the State Capitol of Helena.  At one time its mines, including the famous Drumlummon, were some of the richest producers in the country, yielding gold, silver, copper and lead.  The town is located on the side of a mountain with the mine below and a ski hill above, there are still several residents living there, and the Drumlummon Mine is still in operation under the stewardship of Canadian company RX Exploration, Inc.  In July of 2010 it was announced that a rich vein of gold and silver had been discovered at the Drumlummon, so Marysville may find itself in for another boom period.  But as of now, plenty of this almost ghost is available for visitation.

Missoulian Article on the Drumlummon Mine

 There are several buildings in various states of wonderful disrepair clinging to the side of the mountain.  I wasn't in the best shape for hiking when Moira and I visited, but I'm hoping to get another bash at it sometime this coming summer!

There are a wealth of old vehicles.

Some of the architecture is really lovely.  The roofline on this house, despite the sliding shingles and the holes in the roof, still has an aesthetic beauty.

I didn't take any photos of the Drumlummon while Moira and I were there as we didn't have a great deal of time, but it appeared to be an active place, readily seen from the road.  The town itself I'm sure we didn't see a third of, as we stayed on the road and didn't explore much.  We're hoping to be back soon, though, and with me in much better condition, I should get better images to post.  In the meantime, here are a few more links on the town to whet your appetites!

Marysville - Legends of America 

Ghosttowns.com - Marysville 

Marysvillemontana.com Tourist Site 

February 21 Trip To Beaver Creek And Beyond!

Yesterday I posted about the kids, the dog and I going up to Beaver Creek State Park, but devoted it to the dog...today I'll deal with the rest of the trip!

We actually spent the majority of our trip south of the Park proper...but we found this magnificent slope of untracked powder to play in!  The wind was blowing, but it didn't seem to have the bite it has in the recent past, so we were pretty comfortable.  My main goal was to set up a couple of footprint shots with the kids, but as I walked up I must have gotten off the road and ended up in a huge drift!  So I got very few of the shots I really wanted before the kids and the dog tracked the hillside up!

Since I don't own a pair of snowpants myself, I'd worn a big old pair of sweats, my boots, and long socks.  All of these became soaked in the drift as I struggled in snow up to my thighs!  Below the two inches of fresh powder there was a tough crust that I had to break through...it took a lot of energy just to get back to the road!  When I stopped to rest I took a couple more pictures of the kids.

Liam was my hero, helping break a trail for me out of the drift.  What a guy!

The sun glaring off all of that snow made it hard for anyone to pose without squinting...especially when Mom's mobility was limited by snow drifts!

The boys brought their Nerf guns...but no ammo, so at least we didn't have to hunt through the snow for little, orange, squishy bullets!

It seems like these frowny-faced pictures happen more and more with Liam, though this time it was definitely due to the glare off of the snow.  I think he's reaching the age where he's trying to be tough and serious!

The smiles do come, though!

Its pretty funny when the kids start to critique shots as I take them.  When I was pointing the camera at Jackson here Liam pointed out "You can't see his eyes, Mom!"  He was right, of course!

Moira seems to know exactly how to pose...but she's grown up with it!  I wonder if her being a girl has anything to do with it, or is it just that she's the youngest in the family and a natural attention seeker?

 I love finding these little gems out in the middle of nowhere!  We've been up to Beaver Creek State Park before, but never went far beyond it.  This old cabin was a few miles beyond the little reservoir between the Park and the ski hill.  It was a perfect day to take its portrait!

 

 

 And placing the cabin inside its environment, with the sun shining off that bare knob in the background perfectly framed by trees....Wow!  It was a wonderful day!

 

Back inside the Park we stopped at one of the many campgrounds and had another run.  The creek runs through here and the spot really was lovely! 

Our family is not from the 'flat land' here in the central and eastern portion of Montana, so its been difficult to equate the Bear's Paw Mountains with the Rockies we're so much more used to.  But being in those mountains with the snow deep and brilliant around us, the creek flowing down through the coulees, and the sun shining down around us made for an incredible afternoon, and reminded me how blessed we've been to live in this area of the state!

Beaver Creek State Park 

Doggon Fun!

The kids and I took our one year old dog Lucy up to the Bears Paw Mountains here in north central Montana for an afternoon playing in the fresh snow we got over the weekend.  Now I took a lot of pictures, and they'll be added in a separate blog post, but when I processed the shots of Lucy I just had to giggle!

For those of you who don't know her, this is what Lucy looked like shortly after we got her.  Cute little puffball, wasn't she?  We had no idea what she was, what her parentage was, or what she would grow into.  She had that plushy, ticked coat, folded ears, and black spots on her tongue.  She really could be any mix you could imagine.

This is the portrait shot I did of Lucy today!  What a change!  You can kind of see that puffball puppy hiding in there somewhere, but she has really grown up into something beautiful!

She definitely does have her goofy side, though, and she loves plowing through the untracked powder just as fast as she can!  Look at those hind legs waaaayyy out in front of her front ones!  Snow flying, tail flying...

...and she just keeps going!  She's either inside the house or in the back yard at home, so all of this freedom...well we'll just say she knows exactly what to do with it!

 The endless exploring!  She doesn't ever venture too far, but it takes a lot of persuasion to get her to focus on us and what we want her to do...

Because she always finds something new and interesting and lasers right in on it...

But it really is great to watch her go!  I wish we could do this more often!

 I finally got her attention here, though she doesn't look like she really wants to be diverted...

But she always has an enthusiastic smile for her people, even when its time to go home!

  

I think we all had a great time together!  I didn't get any of the shots I really wanted (another subject for another post!), but I am pleasantly sore and have a whole new dedication to my own fitness!  After all, if I'm going to keep Lucy trekking, I have to be able to keep up!

 

Galata, Montana

Galata is a little farming community on the Montana Hi-Line that one could consider to be a "Class D" ghost town according to Ghost Town USA, CT classification criteria. Most of the buildings are abandoned and slowly moldering.

Main street has some really great buildings that are for the most part still standing, but are definitely sagging a bit and that High Plains winter surely blows through the cracks in the walls!  The road is good, though, and the people in the area are friendly!

Galata is easily seen from the highway, but by the time we realized that it was the beautiful piece of history it is, we had passed it numerous times without giving it a second glance.  It was just one more small farming town on the Hi-Line.  The evening we actually made the turn onto the road and saw it for what it was, there was a gorgeous sunset brewing.  It was a fitting introduction, 

I think.

Most of the houses in town are in various degrees of disrepair, but like this one, still look relatively sturdy and are extremely photogenic.

Behind the main street is a large lot full of old wagons, farm equipment, and various other old relics.  This wagon is just one of the many interesting pieces of history the town has to offer!

The last time the kids and I were through Galata it was terribly cold, the wind had blown everything away but the ice, and the town definitely had a very different character than it did on any other time we'd visited.  But the charm was definitely still there, and thinking of the pioneers who built this place at the turn of the century, with minimal amenities and very basic equipment, facing this same sort of weather, really makes it all the more intriguing and well worth making that turn off the highway!