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welcome, beautiful people...

...my name is Derek and thank's for stopping by my new blogsite.  There’s a saying that goes something like "find something you love to do and you'll never have to work a day in your life." Well that “something” for me is photography.  I have admired different forms of atristry ever since I was old enough to appreciate it but it wasn’t until recently that I discovered my passion for photography.  Since then, I haven't put a camera down and my obsession continues to grow every time I step behind the lens.  I’m just one person doing what he loves in life and I hope to bring you along to enjoy the ride.  Feel free to take a look around and leave a comment if you feel compelled to do so or just send an e-mail and say "HI".  I look forward to meeting each and every one of you and hope to hear from you soon!

jared : stephanie

I’ve know Stephanie since her and my sister met in high school… maybe even before that, I’m not sure exactly but its crazy to see that she is all grown up now and married off.  When I found out that she was getting married, my sister was in the wedding party, and DJ of La Bella Vita Photography was shooting the wedding I was pretty excited.  DJ will actually be shooting my wedding coming up here in September so when he asked if i wanted to tag along for this one it was a no brainer.  We had a blast and it turned out to be a great wedding, very hot but still GREAT!  Steph looked like Barbi straight from the box of Mattel and Jared well, hes just a stud and they look amazing together.  I could go on and on but how about you just check out a few of my favorites from the day!

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Check out those blingin’ shoes!

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This is probably my favorite shot of the day… mmmm, soo buttery :)

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When i was scrolling through the images i noticed these two that seemed to be a striking resemblance of one another.  The top image is a shot of Steph’s dad glancing over at her and the bottom of Jared smiling at his new wife.  I felt they that they both captured the emotion of joy and love of the same woman but one from the love of a father to his daughter and the other from the love of a friend and new husband.   Pretty cool i thought…

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micah : claragrace

WOW… two weekends in a row I got to shoot at an out of town wedding where the weather is 10,000 times better than here in Fresno!  Two weekends ago was Tahoe and last weekend I met up with Jeff of J. Shipley Photography to help assist his wedding in San Francisco.  Woohoo!!  Doug Miranda from Sacramento came up Saturday morning to shoot too.  It was a slew of photographers (…or something like that)!

I’ve been waiting for this one to come around for awhile now and it’s already come and gone :(  It was a blast though!  Between exploring the city on Friday and shooting on Saturday, we probably walked a good 10 miles… and 10 miles in San Fran is no flat track 10 miles either.  My legs were done.  Micah, Claragrace, their families, and friends were some of the coolest and fun people to be around.  Down for anything to get the shot, even the girls did quite a bit of walking up and down those ridiculous steep streets and no complaints!  I also got to catch a Giants game with my Mom, Dad, and Sister on Sunday for Fathers Day.  It doesn’t get much better than that, most awesome weekend to say the least.

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bryan : danielle

Danielle and Bryan’s wedding yesterday was freakin’ awesome and an amazing time to say the least!  The weather couldn’t have been much better for Jasen and I to capture some great shots (…anything is better than the triple digits of Fresno this time of year!).  The wedding was located in the beautiful Truckee, CA near Lake Tahoe.  It was the first time I have ever been in the area and it was absolutely gorgeous.  I most definately didn’t want to leave!  Bryan and I played baseball together since the little league days up through Sierra High School.  Danielle is also a Sierra High Chieftain, woot woot!  It ended up being a small Sierra High reunion get together and I got to catch up with a few friends I don’t think I’ve seen since I graduated… good times for sure!  In fact, such good times I woke up with quite the headache from the GREAT time at the reception, haha ;)  Bry and Danielle, I wish you all the best in love and life and you’ll be seeing me in the near future for a visit to shred the famous Tahoe snow everybody talks about!

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I second shot this wedding with J. Master Photography… check out Jasen’s POST for even more images from the day!

mat : kai… revisited

I was going back through Mat and Kai’s wedding images from last year and I came across this one that I totally forgot we took.  I would have to say it’s not your typical groom and groomsmen picture but I like it!  I’m off to Lake Tahoe this weekend to shoot a wedding with Jasen and catch up with some old friends from high school all at the same time so I wont be posting until maybe next week.  I’ve never been to Tahoe before… I can’t wait!

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warbirds over madera

Last weekend I attended the Warbirds over Madera air show and it was pretty stinkin’ cool!  That was the first time that I have ever attended an air show before.  They had a bunch of restored bombers and fighter planes from World War II, modern jets, and even a few “built it yourself” kit airplanes and helecopters.  If you have never attended an air show before do it if you have any interest in history, aircraft, or flight.  They even had some of those stunt planes that would go straight up, and straight back down… BACKWARDS!!  That has to be one of the craziest rides of a lifetime to have the feeling of going backwards and tumbling through the sky in a airplane.  Anyways, I’ll quit rambling.  Check out a few of my favorite shots from the day.

P.S.  Just a tip… make sure to take sunscreen so you don’t get a gnarly farmers tan burn like I did!

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Now this is something that I probably wouldn’t want to see painted on the side of my airplane!

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Ahh, look… it gave birth to a baby airplane!

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catie : 09

Here is the rest of Catie that I promised!  I absolutely love senior shoots.  I’m pretty sad that they have come to an end but I can’t wait until next year and already have a few new ideas floating around my head.

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attempt 2… light painting

I had the awesome pleasure of hanging out with Catie today for a couple of hours to try and get a few cool pics before she graduates from Clovis West in a few weeks.  As we were driving we passed this pretty cool looking orchard so we stopped to take a few pics… well, actually it was 55 frames just to create this one image below!  There’s a lot more from the day that I will share in a later post but I was stoked that I pulled this one off.  I used a similar technique in this post awhile back when I first attempted to create an image like this.  I hope you all enjoy and let me know what you think!

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time for t-ball

Michele, the puppies and I went to watch another one of Kenton’s (my soon to be nephew) t-ball games last Saturday and I just got around to checking out some of the pictures I got.  I found a few that I thought were pretty cute so I thought I might share with you all.  Check him out rockin’ #7 my old high school number!

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john : aubrey

Well it’s time to get back into the swing of things and start shooting some weddings, woot woot!  The location was amazing, the people were even better, the food was awesome, everything went smooth and overall I’m not sure it could have turned out much better than it did.  I had such a awesome time and it’s not one I’m going to forget anytime soon.  Enjoy the pics!

I second shot this wedding with J. Master Photography so don’t forget to head over to Jasen’s blog for even more pictures from the wedding!

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madi : 09

Madi and I have been planning this one for awhile now and it finally came around to getting an all access pass to the new Performing Arts Center of the Clovis North campus last Monday.  She has been working as a behind the scenes crew member, student director, light board operator, and stage manager (I’m sure I left out a few other titles!) at the various theaters throughout Fresno and Clovis for a few years now and plans to take her ‘mad skillz’ to the Fresno State Theater Arts program.  We spent way to long and took way too many pictures but it was really cool to have an entire theater to ourselves.  Thank you Ben for allowing us to shoot there and to Andrew my lighting assistant for the day.  It wouldn’t have happened without you guys, thanks!

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