Good morning! Shannon and I were on or way back home on Friday night after dinner at my parents and i noticed that the sunset was promising to be spectacular with clouds to the west and a bright yellow-orange sun. As we drove by the wheat fields on the way home I remembered some portraits that I saw on a website that were taken in a wheat field. Although I liked the concept, I didn't care much for the color renditions there. So, let's make my own! I have a ready model, Shannon. And a sunset coming!

The images below are the result. Some work better than others but Shannon and I had a lot of fun making them! What do you think?!?!? Comment back!!!

The loss of Callie left our other cat, Maxie (after Max Afinogenov of the Buffalo Sabres), without a playmate. So, we went to Lollypop Farm last night and, after much debate (not really that much), we brought home a new kitty! Her name is Fiona and she is two years old and just a doll! She needs a little help with conjunctivitis and needs to gain some weight but she is a very calm cat who loves to have her belly rubbed!

On another note - we will be making family portraits for Stacey Munechika's clan on Saturday so look for some images to show up here soon!

This past Memorial Weekend I had the pleasure of spending some time in Washington D.C. at a buddies house. Chris Usher and I met a couple years ago and became friends through working on his "One of Us" book project ( it's a great photo essay on the destruction and impact that Hurricane Katrina had on the people of New Orleans and other areas devastated by the storm ). We hooked up with another friend, Kyle Murphy, a brilliant and upcoming photographer out of Ann Arbor, Michigan to do some shooting in the Capital over the long weekend.

When I arrived at Chris's house Friday morning, the first thing he mentions is that we're meeting up with a group of his friends, fellow photographers from the D.C. area, for some conversation and "Faux Soup". Being an out of towner, I shook my head in agreement ( inside my head I'm thinking "Great, these people are into performance art and I get to sit through some esoteric blather while pretending to eat fake soup" ). So, we pick up Kyle at the airport and soon head off to lunch. I've still got this "fake soup" thing running through my head and after driving 6+ hours to get to D.C., I'm pretty hungry.

Arriving for lunch at this little Vietnamese restaurant, about 12-16 people are gathered around a big table talking shop, Chris had mentioned some names, all high end professionals like David Hobby "Strobist", John Harrington a photographer and the author of "Best business practices for photographers" and Ralph Alswang, White House Press photographer and all around ballbuster ( very good at it too ), just to mention a few.

Immediately, I'm struck by how personable everyone is. Susana Raab was showing me her latest catalog "Rank Strangers", a very nicely done book with clean colorful images. I could say "her images showed the struggle of existentialism in a conformist society" type thing, but, in the end it was the crisp clean images that stuck in my head. Besides, that goes back to the performance art / faux soup thing. John Harrington had me captivated, it's no wonder that his book is doing as well as it is. Scott and I had started this venture about a year ago and I'm thinking that we are clearly in need of this book. I get home and find out Scott already owns it ( no surprise there, he's always up on the latest and greatest ). The most exciting part of the day for me, other than realizing the soup was real ( more on this... ), was talking with The Strobist. David Hobby has been writing a killer blog about flash photography especially the use of SB800's which are the units Scott and I primarily use, there's a link to his sight on the right. My friend and business partner Scott Slattery turned me onto the Strobist about a year ago, I hit strobist.com as much as possible and here I am talking with the founder in person. The class act that he is, David Hobby credits Chris Usher with the concept of "Strobist".

So, Now I need to have a photo taken with David just to show Scott ( cuz, I know he'd freak ) and I ask Kyle to take a photo of the two of us. We're about 15 seconds into the shoot when the "Strobist" kicks into gear. David moves us over closer to the window for better lighting then switches place with me to reduce the reflection in his glasses. I'm not even in town 3 hours and already I'm getting tutored by some of the best in the industry.

Anywho, as Kyle, David and I are walking to the front of the restaurant, leaving behind my soup that was excellent but had to be left for cold ( it's a cruel world when your hungry and order soup only to be given a pair of chop sticks to eat it with. I was making such a mess, I had to abandon lunch. ), I look up at the window in the restaurant and see the name "Pho75". A light goes on in my head... Pho soup, not Faux soup! This explained a lot, since I had expected to walk into a bunch of mime's holding cameras doing the fake "oh, the back of my camera opened and all my film is exposed!" in a slow motion manner that only performance artists would do. And instead, ended up meeting some truly great people. Which makes more sense, because every successful photographer that I've ever met had fantastic personalities ( but, that's a subject for a different day ).

Thank you everyone at "Pho75" for a great experience and thank you John for picking up the tab.

• Scott Crist

After a long bout with cancer one of our family cats, Callie, passed away on Saturday. She was our first cat and our first stray adoption. Anne and Shannon rescued her and brought her home - a one pound kitten about to walk out onto Route 19 in front of an 18 wheeler. Someone had obviously dumped her there and we fell in love with her. She had a good life and loved to tease the dogs and smack them on their noses. We will all miss her terribly.

On Sunday we made the trip to Brown's Berry Patch for the Patterson twins, Megan and Ellen, were having a birthday party! We met with Ken and Bonnie in the strawberry patch and picked a couple quarts. They had already done their picking and were hauling all the kids back to where the party was being held.

Enjoy the images below and Happy Birthday Megan and Ellen!

Well, while I was trying to decide which lens I might want to pick up next, Scott went out and bought my first choice - the 85mm f1.4! He took it to Washington with him and has some absolutely great shots which he needs to share with everyone. In the meantime he let me borrow it for a few days to try out. I think I'm in love! What a terrific lens! It takes a little getting used to since the depth of field is soooo shallow when your subject is close. See the image of my daughter, Shannon, below. This was taken at the closest focusing distance and you can see that only her eyes are in focus.

The image of Carey, on the other hand, is taken from farther back. He is in focus but the background is gone! His sister, Princess, is hard at work on her GameBoy.

The image of Courtney with Coach Doug's hand on her head says everything you need to know about our team.

So, I'm not sure that I'll be able to return the lens to Scott now. It's too great! Jeez, hope he isn't reading this... :-)

Have a great weekend!

Last night my family took me out to dinner for Father's Day and my birthday to the Hillside Inn in Wyoming, NY. It was a bit of a haul getting there but not too bad. What made the trip worth it was the food and the atmosphere! Each of us had the duck except my son-in-law Jeff, who had the NY strip. It was arguably the best entree I have had in a long time!

The Hillside Inn is a great location for weddings and other special events and I hope that we get an opportunity to shoot there. The owner, J.D. Hade, is a great character who added to the whole experience with his sense of humor and history as he explained the history behind the dining room we were in. The Inn was on the Underground Railroad and J.D. showed us how the wall panels opened to reveal a hidden space where slaves were hidden from the authorities.

All in all dinner was wonderful and I hope to be going back soon. Thanks, J.D.!

Good morning! Scott and I had the pleasure of meeting with Jay and Uma yesterday and agreeing to photograph their daughter Veena's wedding reception. It's to be held at Steamboat Landing in Canandaigua in August.

(Veena and Gopal's wedding is going to be in India! No, we aren't going... :-( Maybe next time!)

It is such a pleasure to meet such wonderful people all the time! I count this as one of the cool perks of this business.

Anyway, the real reason I wanted to put this note up on the blog is to give everyone a link to Veena and Gopal's Wedding Website. This site is terrific! Everyone should get one!

Tomorrow's my birthday and I'm going to play golf with my Dad! So have a great weekend and we'll catch up more next week!

Hi! The weather here is going to be unbearable today - they are calling for 85-90 and humid. So, I got out early to shoot some new backgrounds for my G5. Here's a couple that I liked. The lupine is going crazy near our stone wall. It really loves the soil there. My mother says it's because I put so much sawdust on the gardens over the years! Whatever it is they look terrific and are really spreading!

The blue flowers are actually quite small, only about an inch across. They are called flax and are really gorgeous. We have a small field of them down in front of the house along with daisies, hollyhock, flox, and assorted other wildflowers. The problem with the flax is the blooms don't last long. This whole patch was completely gone by about 2 this afternoon! The good thing is they re-flower every other day or so and after each rain!

Enjoy the images and as soon as I figure out how to put downloadable images on our website I'll make some available! Let me know what your favorites are and have a great weekend!