Posts Tagged ‘Cincinnati’

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She’s crafty, in a good way.

August 23, 2010

Most of you probably don’t know but this blog is actually posted to by two people: Me (Nathan), the one whose picture resides at the top of the page and Jessica, Fyrefly’s resident expert in finding, compiling and posting all things that are good on the internets (pictured left).

Jessica and Nick (you’ve seen his work as a second shooter on almost all of our weddings!) are insanely close friends of ours. Actually they’re the kind of friends that we refer to as family…yeah, that close. Although we may need to stop referring to them as family because their son Hendrix and my daughter Lily are betrothed to each other (they’re both 1.5 y/o) so that might make things a little weird:)

So anyways, Jessica works hard to bring you posts like “Etsy your Wedding”, “Photography Art Spotlight” and other fun creative things that are housed in cyber space somewhere.

What you also may not know is that Jessica is a BRILLIANTLY talented creator/seamstress/Etsy-ier/blogger of her own over at ALittleGray.com. A part from this blog being an amazing source of creativity and inspiration this is also where Fyrefly gets lots of the custom products we use to make our client experience unique. We LOVE her Louise Bags and her Fabric Envelopes. Both are great ways for us to show clients we love them!

If you are like me and like to click, click, click on the internet then you should spend some time on her blog. It’s the kind of blog that you stick in your RSS feed and hope that there is a new post when you wake up in the morning. Really great stuff on there!

And if you are interested in whatever crafty goodness she has going on right now you can check out here Etsy store here…skip shopping at Target for your next baby/bridal shower/birthday gift and get someone some truly unique!

Here is some of her craftiness on display:

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Posted in General info | 6 Comments »

Graffiti, Trains, & Grandma’s Dress. | Ianthē and Nick

July 20, 2010

Oakley | Cincinnati, OH I have been dying to do an engagement session in Oakley and I finally got my chance.  I live among all these wonderful picture spots but I have never had the chance to take anyone’s picture here.  When Ian and Nick said they were open to suggestions I quickly said “OAKLEY!”

I met Ian and Nick when they won a free engagement session in a contest I sponsored by Aviva Events.  We sat down to talk about their wedding and we immediately knew we were a great fit for each other and they decided to book Fyrefly for their wedding too:)  I have so much to say about how great they are but I want to leave room for an incredible story that Ian told me while on our walk.  If you can, take a minute to read her story below the pictures.

First, some of my favorites from our time together:

And here is the story about Ian’s grandmother:

“My grandmother was Hungarian.  When she was 8 or 9, her family fled Budapest and headed towards a smaller town where they owned a farm.  A few years after that, as the war situation got worse, they fled the small town and lived in a cave in the woods and a barn’s hay loft for about 3 years.  My grandma told me that she remembers wearing out the soles of her shoes on her walk out of the small town and that the German planes bombed the people as they were leaving.   She laughed when she told me about how her mother threw her into a ditch and opened a red umbrella above them in an attempt to protect them from the bullets and bombs.  It was also during this exodus that her brother was captured by the Germans and forced to join their army.

Along with her family, my grandmother eventually made her way to a displaced persons camp near Austria. Their her family enjoyed many freedoms as her mother and grandmother were nurses and her grandfather was a doctor.  One of the freedoms my grandmother enjoyed most was being able to visit the Austrian library and that is where she met my grandfather, who was a professor and 25 years older than her.  She was about 16 or 17 at that time.

Grandma caught Tuberculosis while in the camp and had to stay for an extra year until she was healthy enough, and cleared to leave.  She and her mother sailed across the ocean to New York where my grandfather met my grandmother with a huge bouquet of roses.

My Great-Grandmother would not let my grandmother marry until she was 21.  So, for 4 years, my grandfather patiently courted my grandma.  According to the stories my grandmother told me, her grandmother had to chaperon her dates!  Grandma would tell me, “She’d make sure to take her time, “smelling the roses” so that we had a little time to neck.”

Finally, in 1952, my grandmother and grandfather were married. They honeymooned in New York, where my grandfather bought my grandmother the skirt I wore for our engagement pictures.  On the way home from their honeymoon, they were in a bad car accident.  The doctors told my grandmother she’d never be able to have children.  Five years later, she had my mom.  A few years after that, my uncle.”

Sadly, my grandfather died from radiation exposure in 1962.  He was an engineer and was exposed while inspecting a plant up near Sandusky, Ohio.  My grandma later remarried.  By the time she passed, my grandmother had buried both of her husbands and her youngest son.  Of my four grandparents, I was closest to my grandmother.  This past March, with her family surrounding her, she quietly passed away.  My greatest hope for my marriage is that I am able to love Nick as unconditionally as my grandmother loved her first husband before and after he passed.”

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Posted in Engagement Pictures | 4 Comments »

Holgamatic.

May 7, 2010

More Holga pics.  Check out the Holga Category for past shoots.

Shot on Ilford HP5 400 ISO B&W film at 6×6 format:

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Baby sized Radio Flyer! | Olivia’s Sneak Peeks

May 3, 2010

Hamilton, OH | When I started Fyrefly Lindsay, Noah and Grayson were some of the first family portraits I ever shot.  I must have done an ok job because when little Olivia was born Lindsay asked me to come take pictures of her:)

She is so precious!  I love it when newborns sleep anywhere you put them, it makes for some cute pictures.  I recently found a miniature Radio Flyer wagon at a thrift store and this was my first chance to use it.  As you can see, it is the perfect size for a tiny baby.  It was really fun hanging out with the family again…thanks for everything you guys!

Here are some of my favorites from the day:

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They look so good I wanna eat ‘em.

February 22, 2010

I am kind of a stickler for good design.  I am not a great designer but I can fake it with simplicity most of the time.  I knew when I started my business that along the way I would need to have GREAT design in order to stick out amongst the crowd of photographers in this city.  So I started with really terrible logo, then I improved and improved until I had something I was ok with.

Then, by chance, I met Corey at a local coffee shop and we got to talking about life and school and all that good stuff.  Turns out she was a design major at the Art Academy.  I asked her if her class ever took on small businesses as a project and she said yes.  So I gave her my (terribly designed) card and hoped to hear back.  A few months later, she emailed me to say “Our class already has their project set for this year but…” I expected “…maybe next year”.  Instead she said “A friend and I are started a freelance design business and we are looking for projects to build our portfolio and we would like to take you on as one of our projects”.  Best part: “We wanna do this for materials cost only!”  Wow.  Along the way of starting your own business I think you need a couple breaks here and there just to keep you encouraged.  It’s a hard road to say the least.  This was one of my many breaks.

Starting in December I met with Corey and Zach from Yellow Whale Design and ironed out a new logo (which you can see in the header of the blog) and pitched an idea to them for letterpress business cards.  They were stoked!  They have been working their butts off the last few weeks to finish the business cards and I got them today!  I was so excited I spent some time photographing them so you could see the results of their hard work.  If you need some design please contact them through their website…they are just getting started but they are going places so get them while you can afford them:)

Once someone said to me, “Letterpress is so yummy.”  I couldn’t have said it better myself.

No two cards are exactly the same. Pretty nasty (in a good way) if you ask me.

You have to be really special to get one of these...I am getting "replicas" made to pass out to all the people who don't deserve them:)

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Genevieve’s Sneak Peeks!

February 20, 2010

Newborn Pictures | Milford, OH On Friday I was lucky enough to meet little Genevieve on her 8 day “birthday”.    She is a sweet little girl who actually gave me a little smile when I said hi to her the first time…it might have been gas but I’ll take what I can get:)  Her parents, Ann and Dan, were so sweet!  They were super relaxed and made my job really easy.  For a bonus, they some great antique pieces in their house that made for some really great pictures.  I love the love seat with he purple cushion!!!!!

Ann and Dan purchased a 1 year package and that means I will get to see Genevieve at 6 mos. & 1 year as well.  It’s always really fun for me to see their growth and changes over the first year.  Here are some of my favorites from the day:

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Holga in the City.

February 19, 2010

Round #2 of shooting with a Holga, this time in Downtown Cincinnati.  Last round I wanted to make sure I got some shots so I taped everything and used the insert that came with it.  This time I took more risks so I removed the insert to get the random hard vignettes in the corner.  I also untaped most of it to see if I could get some cool light leaks.  And I went for some more dramatic light situations.  The results were better but I did end up losing 5 of the 12 shots in the process.  It’s kind of weird because it seems I might have one of the few well-made Holgas out there because there weren’t too many crazy things that happened.

Ilford HP5 PLus, ISO 400, B&W, 120 film, shot @ 6×6:

I love the juxtaposition of of old and new here.

Went for a portrait of a parking lot attendant but as you can see the light inside the booth was not good. The sun flare is pretty cool looking though:)

Held the shutter open a few moments here to get the ice skaters’ motion. Not sure if it translates but the washed out look is super hip.


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The “Fyrefly Wedding” and Why? | Wedding Photographers in Cincinnati

February 14, 2010

We get tons of inquiries from brides-to-be on a regular basis.  Once a bride contacts us, usually through email, it goes one of a few ways:

  1. They book us over email or a phone call – YAY!  (Rarely happens, but YAY! nonetheless)
  2. They set-up a meeting with us to talk more about their wedding and how we might fit into their plans. – YAY!, maybe even more YAY! than #1 because it means we get to hang out with them over coffee or food.
  3. We get a response saying “I love your work but you are outside of our budget” or we never hear from them again. – not quite YAY! but we understand that we aren’t for everyone.

However, the most popular response by far is: “What can we take out of the package to make it cheaper?” My answer is almost always: “Nothing.  Every aspect of a Fyrefly Wedding is there to make your wedding photography experience AMAZING!  We have options that add to, but we don’t have any that take away from our experience.”

Sometimes we hear back, most of the time we don’t.   I understand…I really do.  Weddings are expensive, budgets are tighter now than they were two years ago and everyone is looking to save money wherever they can.  Even knowing all that, we really do have reasons why our collections are structured the way they are.  Email is a terrible way to tell people why we do what we do.  Sometimes it can feel like I’m lecturing, and the last thing I want to be is a lecturer.  So I thought, maybe a blog post would help…so here goes:

Here are the “anchors” of a Fyrefly Wedding and why they are so important to us…

UNLIMITED COVERAGE. Every wedding is a story.  You hire us to tell your story in pictures, not just take your picture.  The story starts with the bride getting ready in the morning and ends with the couple driving away pulling those annoying aluminum cans.  We want to tell your complete story and if we aren’t there for the whole day your story will be incomplete.

At one of my very first weddings I got a picture of a groom whose pants fell down on the way to his car because he had lost some weight before the wedding day. Earlier the couple told us they didn't care about the "running out" pictures and that we could leave whenever we wanted. We decided to stay for the whole story and ended up with the most memorable shot of the wedding.

DIGITAL COPIES. We see the pictures we take of your wedding as yours, not ours.  Remember, this is your story and we want you to have the whole story, not just the highlights.  So we give you a couple DVD’s with all your images on them to keep and look at forever and ever…and ever.

ENGAGEMENT SESSION. In order to tell your complete story it’s important for us to know you.  We’ve found that the engagement session is the absolute best way to get to know you as a couple.  We’ll talk, laugh, make fun of each other, tell stories and I will learn how you best react to the camera.  It makes the wedding day pictures soooooo much better.  It also makes it less awkward when I walk into the room to take pictures of the bride putting on makeup on the wedding day.  We even wrote an entire blog post on why we LOVE engagement sessions, which you can read here.

A GORGEOUS ALBUM. I love steak.  Especially a medium rare filet.  I’ll only order a filet at a decent restaurant because I know it’s going to be prepared and served the right way.  If I was ever at J. Alexander’s and they brought me a filet on a clean trash can lid I would be grossed out and furious.  The funny thing is that the steak would still have been prepared at the same restaurant, by the same chef with the same oils and spices but it just wouldn’t be appetizing.

Steak and wedding pictures?  What?  We believe your pictures should be prepared well and served well.  The wedding album is the presentation of all the hard work and preparation you put into making your wedding unique.  It is the coupe de gras.   We want it to be something that a couple is proud to show their grandkids 30 years from now.  In addition, we want to be extremely proud of the way our work is presented.  So our wedding albums are GORGEOUS, the perfect presentation of your once-in-a-lifetime day.  For a more in depth look into why we love our albums click here.

We know that a Fyrefly Wedding is not right for every couple.  Whether its the budget or our style we probably won’t even be the right wedding photographer for most.  We’re comfortable with that.  Our clients structure their budget in such a way to make sure that their story is told in the most romantic, fun and engaging way…through amazing pictures!  We love them for it.

So hopefully this helps you get an idea of where we’re coming from.  At the end of it all we want you to have documented proof that your wedding was romantic, stylish, beautiful and fun.  We want people to cry, giggle, oooh and ahhhh every time you pull out your album.  We want you to have the fondest memories of your day.  We truly believe the best way to tell your story is with a Fyrefly Wedding Collection.

*Our pricing starts at $2600 and includes everything discussed in this article.  If you think we might be right for your wedding feel free to contact us for complete pricing including some of the most popular collections.

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I’m in love with a Holga and I feel fine.

February 9, 2010

It’s no secret among photographers and photography enthusiasts that film photography looks better (if done right) than digital photography. The depth and feel of film as compared to a digital file is so much more visually interesting. Most decent photographers started out by taking a photography class where film was the standard medium they learned on. They may use digital now but they at least have a working knowledge of film and how photographs are made without the use of a computer.

As I have said before on this blog, I am completely self-taught.  I loved what I was able to do with a point and shoot and decided to invest lots of time reading books and practicing to learn how to be a better photographer.  My first real SLR camera was digital.  I learned how to shoot using digital terms and a bunch of automatic settings inside my fancy digital SLR.  I have since switched to all manual and have learned much of what I need to know in order to be a “real” photographer…except that film thing.

One of my favorite wedding photographers is a guy by the name of Jose Villa.  Jose is a brilliant photographer for so many reasons but one of them is because he shoots mostly film.  Recently he wrote an article about why he shoots film.  It was intriguing.  I found myself challenged by it and wondering if I could learn to shoot film myself.  The problem is that I didn’t want to invest a bunch of money into equipment if I had no chance of ever being a great film photographer.  So I decided to figure out what my cheapest option was…and I found Holga.  To learn more about a Holga visit the link but basically it’s a cheap plastic camera that shoots medium format film, which is a step up from 35mm film.  Cameras that shoot medium format are usually hundreds, maybe even thousands of dollars so it is rare that a $15 camera used it.  The  beautiful (and the reason why it so inexpensive) thing about a Holga is that they aren’t made very well.  They only have 1 shutter speed, 3 focal lengths and 1 aperture setting.  Basically it’s a toy camera.  But because you are able to shoot medium format film and because of it’s imperfections, you can get some amazing shots out of it.

All that to say, I bought my first Holga last week.  I took one roll of B&W film to see what the thing could do and now I have it back and ready to let you see.  Before you are too critical, let me say it’s my first roll of film on it, I don’t really know how to use it yet, but I am excited about what it can possibly do.

My first roll of Ilford Delta 120, 400 ASA, B&W film shot at 6x6cm:

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Engagement sessions are for more than just pictures.

February 2, 2010

"Nathan is insanely talented and has a natural ability that makes the engagement photo experience comfortable and fun! Our confidence in him grew within the first few clicks of the camera, as it was so clear that he knew what he was doing. We were very impressed with his professionalism and the care he took to make our photos fit our personalities. We are so pleased!" Alison & Will

Last week we took a look at the albums we include with all of our wedding collections. Today, I thought we would look at another detail included in every one of our wedding collections: Engagement sessions or “e-sessions” for short.

Let me just say: {yelling} WE LOVE E-SESSIONS! {coughing from yelling}

Here’s why:

An e-session is relaxed. There is no pressure to get any specific shots during an e-session. We will just try out a bunch of different locations and types of shots and see what sticks.

An e-session is romantic. An e-session is a date you don’t have to plan. We will decide on a location and time but then spontaneity takes over. We just walk around, find cool places to take pictures and the rest is up to you . You guys get to spend a few hours as a couple just enjoying each other’s company while I take pictures.

An e-session is great practice for you. We all have little quirks in front of the camera. Whether it’s a weird eye thing or not knowing what to do with your hands, we all have them. An e-session is perfect for learning what they are and correcting them.

An e-session allows us to be creative. On your wedding day you may only have 20 minutes to get shots of you and your fiance…it’s the nature of a very busy day. An e-session is a great chance for us to take some chances and see what looks best. It will pay off in a big way when your wedding day rolls around and we are crunched for time.

An e-session trains me. This is a big one! Even if you hired the most famous photographer in the world you still hired them to take your wedding pictures. I know that my style will be infused into the pictures, I can’t help that. But I can learn what types of pictures you like the most. Once the session is over you will tell me what pictures you love (and which ones you didn’t) and I will know to focus more on those types of shots for your wedding. Kinda cool, huh?

An e-session forms a bond between you and me. There is no greater way for people to get to know each other than to share an experience together. I need to have a real relationship with you in order for my style of photography to work best. As we walk around we’ll talk, laugh, share stories and just generally get to know each other.  By the end of it we’ll feel like college roomies…okay maybe that’s a bit much but you get the point.

So to answer the question, “Why is a complementary engagement session included in every package?”  Well, we have found that wedding pictures of couples with e-sessions are almost always truer to who that couple is than the pictures of a couple who did not have an e-session.

*Call or email us today to talk about how we can give you an AMAZING engagement and wedding photography experience.

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