Recent session. This sweet 3 month old was very serious for most of the shoot. Look at her beautiful eyes!

Recent session with baby girl. What a little darling! She let us pose her and reposition her all day practically! These are just a few of the shots from that day.

Just the girls! 

Here is more of a "lifestyle" shot of my daughter with one of my oldest and dearest friend's new baby girl. We had a great time this past weekend. You can see this is the start of another great friendship!

A recent session: This little cutie will be turning 1 very soon. He will be having a luau ... hence the hawaiian props!

Things have been busy around here! I know I have been saying this for a while, but my official website will hopefully be up and running by the end of this week! YEAH! Thank you so much to M & J!!!! 

Just wanted to share two photos of my kiddos. These were taken almost a month ago. Enjoy!

How quickly those little feet grow! This month has very busy for us. We are off on vacation on Friday, so I wanted to post before we left. This month has been about organization, whether that be for my business, our household, the hall closet, etc. I am taking some time to go back to the pictures that I took of my daughter when she was a newborn and of my son. These pictures didn't get the full attention they deserved while we were settling into life with two little ones! This particular photo is my daughter's feet with my husband's hands. I think I will do a follow-up of this at 6 months to show the difference. It will be a great set of pictures to have if I ever get back to my scrapbooking!

Portfolio building special: Book a session for your child and receive the following: $0 session fee, 1 free 8x10 and 30% off all prints ordered. A model release must be signed. I am currently booking sessions for February and March. Please contact me at info@lauraannphotography.com to book a session. Official website coming soon.

Here is a recent photo of our sweet 4 month-old.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Here is a picture that I took back in November, but have been wanting to share. I think that this boy looks like the spitting image of his dad in this photo. What a cutie!

It has been a very busy month. Here is one of my latest shots of my son. This was taken with my new Nikon d300. So far, I am loving it. I just wish that my two-year-old would be just a little more cooperative when I take the camera out to play! I am very happy with this shot, though! 

I am getting close to the official launch of my children's photography business. Hopefully, I will be ready to start scheduling sessions after the new year. Check back for more information and to see what special offers I have!

My how she's grown!!! My daughter is now three months old. I had to be quick to get this shot as her head is still heavy for her! She is holding it up pretty well, though!

Here is another image of that sweet newborn in her daddy's hands!

Let me know what you think of the new site. Please leave a comment!! Thanks for looking.

Sweet baby girl! 5 days old. More to come...

I am back from my trip and besides catching up on some sleep, I am trying to go through the hundreds of photos I took! This is one that I really loved. I love the expression on her face and the vintage colors. And I just LOVE the natural lighting!!!

Coming soon ... newborn photos...

I will be out of town for a few days, so I wanted to make sure I put up something new! This may be my new favorite of my husband and daughter... I better get him to start taking some pics of me with her, too!!!

My camera's in the shop! I am using my hubby's Canon. It's a great camera, I am just not used to the buttons, etc. I hope to have mine back soon, but I am very happy with the photos I got with the Canon today. This is just one of them. Can't believe she's already 10 weeks old!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

This was a fun shoot with my son back in September.

One of my first attempts at a storyboard. I wanted to capture all his little parts - hands, feet, eyelashes, etc. Giving a toddler a project always helps to get them to stay still longer for pictures!

GOTCHA!! I finally catch my toddler looking at the camera! I love the blue backdrop!

Here is our sweet girl who will be two months old tomorrow. I took this photo while playing around with my new macro lens. She is constantly trying to get that whole fist into her mouth!

A recent pic of my son. I love the eye contact in this picture. He can be very difficult to photograph because he likes to ignore me when I have my camera in hand, but sometimes he surprises me with a look like this. Priceless!!!

Daddy's Girl

Daddy's Girl, originally uploaded by lmentler.

I just love this picture of my husband and daughter.

This was taken at about 3 weeks. She is growing so quickly. I can't keep up with the photos!!!

Here's my two little cookies!!! Best photo I have of them as of yet. My son is rather quick and will only do something once if you ask him to. Next time, I'll have to have everything else in the shot perfect, then ask him to give his sister a smooch, and SNAP!!

Here she is again!

Another newborn shot of our little girl!

I think that he likes his new sister!! Although it was almost impossible to get a picture of him with her!!!

Here's another of my daughter at 12 days old.

Introducing the newest member of my family...

Well, it is official. I have started my own photography business. I will be portfolio building for a little while, but I have taken care of most of the paperwork to create my business. This image was taken a couple weeks ago at Bond Park in Cary, NC. This little girl was a photography challenge for me because she has such blond, blond hair, fair skin and was wearing white. The shoot also happened to be in full sun. I am very happy with this picture and I think that her parents will be too!!

Overalls

Overall, originally uploaded by lmentler.

Another Boy in Box

Another Boy in Box, originally uploaded by lmentler.

So here is my try at sizing and sharpening for web . I like the picture, but composition wasn't my goal. I am working on sharp eyes and some basic post-processing on Photoshop CS2.

Boy in backyard

Boy in backyard, originally uploaded by lmentler.

Newport Beach

Newport Beach, originally uploaded by lmentler.

This is an older picture that I took of my son at Newport Beach in December. I just like it and haven't posted in a few days. I am still working on taking new photos, manual, focusing, remembering to set my iso! I am also now shooting in RAW. I have lots to learn!

Smells Good!, originally uploaded by lmentler.

Ok, so today I decided to try to scout out a location and see if I could get any good pictures of my son. I was hoping to see if I could use this place in the future with paying clients (someday ... hopefully!) it was a nice place, but a little bit of a fiasco when you are big and pregnant, you have a toddler and a stroller and you take a path that doesn't lead where you think it does!

Anyway, I was happy with a couple shots that I did get, like this one. He likes to put flowers ritght up to his nose to see how they smell. I did not capture the wrinkle he gets in his nose, but I like this photo anyway!

Party

Party, originally uploaded by lmentler.

This is a photo I took of my niece at my son's birthday party. She is only a few months younger than him. I like the look in her eyes in this photo. She is such a sweetie!

A Different Viewpoint

A Different Viewpoint, originally uploaded by lmentler.

I am going through some online photography lessons and this photo was part of an assignment for that. I was to take pictures of something from all different angles and viewpoints. I like this one of my son on the slide. Not the side of him I usually post, but still cute!!

By the way ... it isn't too easy to catch different viewpoints of a toddler when you are almost 32 weeks prego!

Strange Expression

Strange Expression, originally uploaded by lmentler.

This is another picture from this morning. I was trying to get better clarity on my son's eyes. I used my 50mm lens and was still shooting in manual. I think that he has a sort of strange expression, but I am glad for two things. 1 - He actually looked up at the camera for me and 2. You can see catchlights in his eyes. It was originally in color - I chose to convert to B&W in Photoshop.

Shooting in Manual Mode!

Playing on the Deck, originally uploaded by lmentler.

I have purchased a book called "Understanding Exposure" by Brian Peterson. It is about time that I expand my skills and really figure out how this whole photography thing works. I am going to start shooting in manual mode as much as possible. This is a picture that I took of my son this morning while playing on the deck.
After reading about other photographers (on www.ilovephotography.com) and how they also try to take pics of their two-year-olds without too much success, I feel a bit better. I thought that I was the only one who had trouble getting him to actually look at the camera (or at least look up!!) Today I shot a lot less pictures and still came up with some that I liked.

Wesley, originally uploaded by lmentler.

This is a picture that I took a while back. This little boy was having a blast playing in a cardboard box. I wish that I had better lighting, but I still like the photo. I want to get better at focusing in on the eyes and getting catchlights to show in the subject's eyes. The catchlights here are almost non-existent. As I said, I still like it though!!

Beach Bum

Beach Bum, originally uploaded by lmentler.

Here is a picture of my son playing at the beach. Even though you can't see his eyes - I love the expression on his face! Whenever he is working (or playing) with something his tongue tends to stick out like this!

Green-eyed boy

Green-eyed boy, originally uploaded by lmentler.

This is a picture that I recently took at Ocean Isle Beach. We were visiting with some friends and we took the kids to the fire station. This little boy loved the trucks - especially the wheels. I took this photo while he was exploring the fire rescue boat's propeller. I love his eyes - they are beautiful!

Kids B&W, originally uploaded by lmentler.

This is a picture that I took before leaving Fresno. These are some of my friend's kids. They were nice enough to let me practice some photography on them. It was hard to do this picture on the stairs because I am so short and the natural lighting was not great. Still I was doing my first shoot with my new flash. I enhanced the brightness a bit to give it that white glow. I am happy with the way it turned out.

Baby Boy in B&W, originally uploaded by lmentler.

Well, it has certainy been a while since I have been here to update this blog. My family and I have moved to North Carolina. We are getting settled into our new place and I finally have a minute to add a new photo to my blog. I took this picture of an old co-worker's son back in Fresno before we moved. I believe he was about 3-4 months old at the time. Such a sweet little face!