Aviva Photography Blog

Hello, everyone! I hope you’ve had a great summer, mine has been fantastic. Today is the first day of school and here I am, hard at work. Not that I’ve been slacking up until now….

Aviva Photography’s pricing has been updated and is now available on the website, and I am booking for the fall. The sitting fee has come way down; I am no longer giving away images on CD with the sitting fee, however I want you to use that money you’re saving on mounted prints, albums or other beautiful keepsakes that you will treasure forever. Here’s the information about booking.

WEEKEND/HOLIDAY SHOOT ($150 sitting fee for up to 4 family members, $25 each additional member): A weekend shoot will happen on Saturday morning or national holiday in the early morning (particularly in September/early October due to the heat). That following Sunday is the rain date. If you wish to book on a holiday (i.e. Columbus Day) we can do that as well, but please have a rain date available just in case. Once you’ve requested your date choice, I will confirm and you will receive a Paypal request for the full amount of the sitting fee. Your session is NOT confirmed nor is the date held until that sitting fee is paid in full!

WEEKDAY SHOOT ($100 sitting fee for up to 4 family members, $25 each additional member): A weekday shoot (a Monday thru Friday date when school is in session) will happen on the morning of your choice, at 8:30am or shortly thereafter. We will plan for a rain date together. Once you’ve requested a date, I will confirm and you will receive a Paypal request for the full amount of the sitting fee. Your session is NOT confirmed nor is the date held until that sitting fee is paid in full!

The available Saturdays and holidays through December are:
SEPTEMBER: 19
OCTOBER: 10, 12, 24
NOVEMBER: 28
DECEMBER: 12, 19

Date requests will be first-come, first served. There is a great deal of flexibility on weekday dates, so if that interests you please let me know (would it kill the hubby to go into work late one day? I think not!). I hope to hear from you very soon – the dates will fill fast! Click here to email me, or visit the website and fill out the contact form.

And you know I won’t post without a photo! Here’s my daughter this morning, her first day of school.

Well this is only fitting.

Kristal’s little M here was born on July 23rd. He is baby number five for Kristal and James (there’s a pair of twins in there, to be fair…) And he is the second BOY! He is also gorgeous – a big smiler and a great baby.

I’ve honestly never seen a newborn smile so much. And he was usually dreaming, so I don’t think it was gas.

Remember James? The one I had to make sit down because he was so tall? I couldn’t get enough photos of his manly hands on his son. (I told him he really could be a hand model. Maybe when he retires from the Marine Corps.)

Kristal – you’re gorgeous. Side note: her mother is visiting to watch the baby and she was out and about VERY quickly after M came home. I know it gets easier by the 5th one, but I’m blown away.

SO MUCH LOVE in this family!!!

How can you not love this little face??

(I still think he looks like K the most, by the way.)

The obligatory “Made in Japan” shirt.

And a request that I think turned out just lovely. Once he sat still with these rings on his toes! He’s a strong one.

Thanks so much, Kristal – he’s just adorable. And he was so lucky to be born into a big beautiful family with loving big sisters and a big brother. All the best!

So I say this is fitting because M here was my “last” baby shoot. Never say never, but at least for the fall I’ll be shooting high school seniors, families, and kids over 6 months old. Maternity and baby sessions are on hold indefinitely. (Don’t worry, Kelli – I have you down – ONE person previously requested me and I’ll honor it! Promise!)

Don’t get me wrong. I LOVE babies. And I love the way the photos look and making the plentiful amount of new moms here happy with their maternity and baby photos.

However, I really can’t schedule baby shoots. They’re just born when they’re born, right? And due to feedings and changings and swaying and rocking – it takes a good 2-4 hours to take newborn photos. I can do two shoots in that amount of time. So you’ll understand when I say – I had to let something go. I need enough time to do the types of shoots that really speak to me, and to give that photography class once and for all! Darnit! I WILL DO THIS. So- if you’re pregnant and were thinking of hiring me, I’d be happy to recommend a colleague or two that I’m confident you’ll be pleased with. So do not fret. And, if in the future the time presents itself again, I’ll let you know.

Next post will be the FALL LAUNCH POST… stay tuned! Previous clients, people who have already requested sessions, and my “As They Grow” clients get first dibs on dates, but all others are welcome to start booking very soon. Have I mentioned I love what I do? I LOVE IT! Because of YOU.

Yes. They should look familiar. Melissa and Pete – neighbors, friends – super fun happy people – had a couples shoot! And it was SO much fun. (as usual)

We went out in the evening, it has been MUCH too hot to play during the day. Hello pretty people.

Yes. Sit in the grass. Right there. Thank you. (I’m so lucky my clients trust me. I ask strange things of them….)

This shoot was also after a typhoon had passed us by, the ocean was still choppy and gorgeous. And the light – well, you can see it was cooperative.

You two are awesome. Melissa + Pete = FANTASTIC!!

You know I love it when nobody else is there and the whole world belongs to the couple I’m shooting along with me, my giant black box, and my assistant.

I have no more expletives.

I want this.

To finish on – not just a laugh, but a real hysterical belly laugh – Peter’s attack face.

HA!!

I just love you two – and spending time with you. And I’m crossing my fingers on the you-know-what. Keep me posted. Thanks for your help, Denise, it was so much fun with you there. And Melissa & Pete – as always, it was super fun. I’ll cook again soon!

Have you seen this at the stands? Or perhaps you already have one at home…..

(No, that cover is not my photo. I wish it was…she looks very happy.) But that issue – the August one – is home to something very special to me. In the contents there… LOOK. You may have recognized a photo like this from my personal blog…

And then when you look closely in the contents. There! The PHOTO ESSAY: In the Places Between. It makes me so happy to share this with you!

I somehow, by contacting John R. Burgreen III at Okinawa Living Magazine (published by MCCS), fell into this amazing opportunity to provide a six-page photo essay!

Trust me, I didn’t plan it. But who am I to not jump through a door when it opens, right? I kind of almost choked when I saw that I had to fill six pages; I mean hi there, I’m a portrait photographer. I take a lot of scenic and travel photos for fun, but this wasn’t an assignment. I had to throw it together in one week; before leaving for Hawaii. Before the people at Okinawa Living went on vacation. So there was no time to compile something new – I had to put something together fast! Not only that – but write captions… a story of some sort to tie it all together! I’m not going to lie, I had help. Thanks to Betty, Rena, Meredith, and Jen, I bounced a lot of ideas, brainstormed, and finally felt we had something to relate to the people who are new to Okinawa int he summer time. Get out there and explore! It’s the journey as well as the destination, so definitely slow down to enjoy the wonderful details of Okinawa.

I sent a bunch of photos to John, and some caption ideas to go with them, and he picked the ones he felt impacted him the most… and here it is. My first published photo essay!

As a side note, that photo of the sea wall up there is available on the FINE ART SITE – which, since a few have asked is in that “COOL LINKS” drop down up there at the top of the blog. There’s no password, you can go there and poke around any time you want! I have it as a 24″x36″ canvas gallery wrap in my living room, and let me tell you; that magazine doesn’t even do it justice. Colorful photos like that are meant to hang BIG on your walls!

I picked a few faves and a few new ones.

And all-in-all – I couldn’t be more proud and excited. (I still have a huge pile of issues in my house and feel like I need to grab MORE. A HUGE thank you to everyone. You know who you are. Mere – you brainstormed with me about verbiage during your last moments of pregnancy and I appreciate you endlessly for that. Some of you who were following my Facebook (hi, Denise…Bambi… you know who you are) were looking for it before it even hit the stands! Karen asked the delivery guy to grab one when it wasn’t even out of the plastic wrap yet. Ebeth literally grabbed it out of her friend’s hands. And I happily mailed copies to my amazing friends and clients who have PCSed and can’t just pick one up at the shopette. I got phone calls, emails, kudos – I feel the amazing suport and kindness from ALL of you, and I still pinch myself that my photos ended up in this magazine. The very same one I picked up in June of 2007 at the WestPac Inn and said to my husband, “I could work for this magazine. This is GOOD.” HAPPY DAY! A portrait post coming soon, and this weekend I get my camera on a baby boy! I’ll be back. I’m hard at work. Fall launch is coming…chugga chugga.

Hi again! It has been awhile… I’m working on some back-office type of things (you know, getting ready for the fall and such) which aren’t nearly as exciting as showing photos to you. So I know you keep looking to see what I’ve got; here are some photos from our Hawaii trip.

One morning after having some delicious breakfast, we headed out to Puli Lookout to get a lay of the land. WOW it was windy! But so beautiful. I could’ve stared out at that view all day.

After that stop, we went to the Punchbowl National Cemetery. I had honestly not heard of it before (my hubby is the history freak… just art history for me) and not only is it a big and beautifully landscaped national cemetery, but Kanoe’s father was buried there. So the kids had been before. The flag was flying at half mast (we weren’t sure why) and I love this shot of the sun behind the stars & stripes.

Ernie Pyle was buried there. Obviously there are countless others (Punchbowl is now filled to capacity with 33,230), but he’s famous so I took a photo of his stone.

There’s a monument at the end of the road, and it’s surrounded by walls with the names of service members who died during World War II. The walls are divided up by branch of service.

The statue at the memorial is huge:

and on either side there are walls with mosaic maps of each battle fought in the Pacific during WWII. It’s beautifully done.

Looking out over the cemetery from the memorial steps is just incredible. I put one here with my kid in it for scale.

That was just one afternoon! (Not even the whole afternoon.) More to come – including the luau…

And the north shore.

Sigh. Beautiful!

I’m hard at work – trying to think up a good promotion for the fall launch which is also – get THIS – the one year anniversary of Aviva Photography! WHERE did that year go? Unbelievable.

More soon! Stay tuned…