My puppy misses us!!

Rob and I have been gone pretty consistently the last two weeks to give seminars at The MARS School and Pilot Imaging's "Bringing Back the Value to Photography". We've had to hand over Tico, our little Pekingese doggie, to the grandparents (my mom and dad) to watch him about 8 of the past 12 days. Now I know Tico misses us, he just gets so excited when we finally come to pick him up, but yesterday, my mom sent us this email and picture and I just melted all over!!

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Couldn't find Tico...Calling him....finally go and look around the house and this is what I see....

He is soooo ready for you guys to come home now....I guess he figured this [under Rob's van] was the best spot to be to ensure that he wouldn't be left behind again.. hahaha

Love,

the babysitter.....I mean, dogsitter :)

My Last Day and Yoli and Rich's E-Session

This is going to go down in history as one of my most monumental engagement sessions, and not for the reasons that you might think! This engagement session took place on April 30, 2010, my very last day as a Spanish Teacher.

So many people were asking me how I would spend my "free time" and what a relief it must be to not have two careers, but what I felt like was that this day was the gun firing at the start of a race. Some other friends asked how I would celebrate my new found freedom that night...and at the time I said, "I'm not, I'm going to work!", but now that I think about it, what better way to celebrate my big change in life than doing what I love with people I love?! So thanks so much Yolanda and Rich for being the first "job" of my new life and celebrating with me!!

The original plan was to go to Allaire State Park for this session, but apparently it closes at 6pm (when our session started)! So with some quick thinking I remembered that Holmdel Park is one of my favorite parks in the area and I haven't taken pictures there since college. So we pulled a quick GPS change and were on our way.

Check out some of my favs of the day and, of course, the slideshow. :-)


Sadie had to have her fun for the day!

PPANJ/PPSNYS 1st Annual Joint Convention

Back in March Rob and I were able to speak up in Albany, NY at the PPANJ/PPSNYS 1st Annual Joint Convention. It was a great time and Rob even had an encore "performance" the next day! Can't get much better than that. :-)


We also debued our PhVusion Effects Software at the convention and opened it for pre-orders. We received such amazing feedback from it and we're really pumped for the next two seminars that Rob and I are giving in May!


Thanks to Brody Wheeler for providing the images below and to Gary Lloyd and Alex Wolff for providing the images in the Animoto slideshow!

Carolyn and Mark E-Session

This past Friday, I got to shoot Carolyn and Mark's Engagement Session. Rob and I are both doing their wedding come August, so, I had Rob come along to hold my reflector. :-)

One of the reasons that I love doing engagement sessions is because I get to know the couple more and build a relationship with them that not only helps them be more comfortable around me, but helps me see the couple for who they really are and what they're personalities are together on a day that's not the "most important day of their lives" (thus far). Carolyn and Mark were definitely not at home in front of the camera at first, but by the end of the session, we had their true personalities out and on camera! They are quite the fun and playful couple! Made for some great shots!

Check out some of the images and the slideshow below :-)

MARS School Seminar

Some more great seminar news! Rob and I are speaking at the MARS School 5-day workshop in Cape May. We'll be speaking on Monday night, the 3rd, and then participating in the Marketplace on Tuesday night where we'll be demonstrating our new PhVusion Effects Software.

If you don't know about the MARS School, it's a non-profit organization that offers photographers week long programs with amazing speakers and workshops that are usually held out of the Grand Hotel in Cape May, NJ. This year they're celebrating their 14th Annual Conference and have invited Rob and I to take part in it.

We're particularly excited about this speaking gig - yea, we're calling them gig's now :-) -because on the first night of the conference, Canon will be speaking on PhVusion as relating to their VDSLRs, which will be the perfect scene-setter for what Rob and I will be doing the next night. We're really hoping to share as much knowledge as we can with everyone who's going and feel that with Canon opening the floor to photographers using the video function in the cameras they already have, we'll have a great group of people with open minds and eagerness to learn how they can apply it to their businesses.

Other speakers that are going to be at the MARS School are:

• Dennis Craft - From Photographer to Portrait Artist (beginner to intermediate)
• Tom Munoz - The Complete Package (all levels)
• Fran Reisner - Focus On The Passion (all levels)
• Michael and Tina Timmons - The Fine Art Side of Photography (intermediate to advanced)
• Joyce Wilson and Emily Connolly - Imagine (all levels)

If you were thinking of checking out one of the MARS School conference, this is definitely the year to do it! Hopefully, we'll see some of you there!

~Vj