Creative Indulgence

2009 Portuguese Water Dog National Specialty

Jerry & Lois — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 02:44:33 +0000

OK – it’s been a little while (!!!) since we’ve posted here. Been a bit busy, and more exciting things happening than we’ve had time to even talk about.

But to ease back into things for just a brief moment… Just got back from last week’s National. What a great time, and what fantastic dogs. A friend once told me that I was a reincarnated PWD. I’ll take that as a very high compliment indeed (thank you Dixie!).

This was our 3rd time to have been invited to shoot for the National organization, and we don’t take those lightly!

So, for those of you who’ve wandered over to our rather forsaken page here, have some fun with the photos we’ve now posted (with lots more to come)…

We’ll add in some pix in a while, but like I said – just easing back into this blogging stuff…

Bo

Jerry & Lois — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 08:27:04 +0000

All the news wires are abuzz with the arrival of the First Dog, Bo – the Portuguese Water Dog.

And what a cutie he is!

We are very well aware of what our PWD friends are concerned about: uncontrolled popularity of a beloved breed into the hands of people who simply want the dog of the moment (and all that entails).

We are also very concerned about this issue (the PWD is one of our breeds of choice), and are watching out for the “101 Dalmatian” fad.

Hopefully, people will heed the “this breed isn’t for everyone” warning and will research as carefully as Malia Obama has before considering this or any other breed.

We are very proud to be associated with the Portuguese Water Dog Club of America as their 2009 National Specialty photographers! This will be our third PWD specialty and we look forward to seeing familiar faces and meeting new ones in Illinois this year.

On another note:

A big thanks to Terry and Susan for putting our image on the cover of The Courier magazine (for those of you who are unfamiliar with this publication, it’s the highly awarded PWD national breed magazine). Wow! Especially with it being one of the most popular issues of the year – “Water”.

http://www.pwdca.org/resources/courier/

Thanks to Susan for selecting and sending in one of our images, and Terry for choosing it. As always, a beautiful magazine!

We also want to thank Browntrout Publishing for choosing us as their exclusive photographers for the 2009 Portuguese Water Dog photo calendar.

An Evening of John Lennon: Tribute concert and benefit

Jerry & Lois — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 07:09:17 +0000

Hi, all!

So much has been happening since our last blog entry!

First, we want to let you know that an amazing rock concert is coming to our part of the world.

It’s going to be held at the new Snoqualmie Casino in Snoqualmie, WA on April 18th. Benefiting the Susan G. Komen for the Cure foundation, this concert called “An Evening with the Music of John Lennon” is attracting world renowned rock musicians from around the world.

As of this writing, there are 25 artists scheduled, with more adding their names as the date nears. Many of rock and roll’s historic talent will be at this concert, and event coordinator and drummer extraordinaire Alan White (drummer for Yes, John Lennon , George Harrison among other historical greats) has his hands full.

Seating is limited to 900, and will sell out fast. People are coming in from all around the world for this. More info and ticket information can be found on Alan’s website: http://alanwhite.net/news.html

VIP option (from Alan’s website):

“Concert goers will have the option of purchasing a special VIP Experience, which includes a private reception where guests will enjoy hors d’oeuvres, an open bar, and meet and greet opportunities. VIP Experience guests will also receive a signed and numbered limited edition poster featuring the artwork of Klaus Voorman.”

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We had the incredible opportunity to spend time with Alan and his wife Gigi yesterday. They are an extraordinary team and above all of that, they remain positive, grounded and excited. Alan has performed this concert several times around the world so his experience is invaluable to its success.

To make a long story short, we will be the exclusive photographers for this concert!

We are still reeling from the news.

Alan and Gigi didn’t want any video cameras, or intrusive “paparazzi” around the musicians or the event ballroom. Their goal is to let the artists have fun and enjoy the evening with very little need to be on stage at all times. On top of that, we found that they really appreciate our work!

Yes, we are blown away, and we are well aware of the responsibility. But, we also know what Gigi and Alan want, and we can deliver what they are asking for.

We are so excited! As the date nears, we will be bubbling with sheer anticipation of shooting a “photographer’s dream” concert honoring one of rock’s greatest artists, John Lennon.

Can you “Imagine”?

SKC update #2

Jerry & Lois — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 19:35:33 +0000

UPDATE (2009-03-25)

The first 31 by-request galleries are in place, with one more in the works to bring us current. After that, a smattering of shots (agility and otherwise) from Sunday…
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The by-request galleries are starting to get posted, in the order that requests have come in.

These can be located here.

Also – we will be purging older galleries in the next 2 weeks (by end of March). If you’re still thinking of ordering from some of the older performance trials, now is the time…

SKC agility update

Jerry & Lois — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 21:21:37 +0000

Hi all.

We wanted take a moment to discuss photos from the March Seattle Kennel Club agility trials.

Posting galleries on a per-request basis was OK’d by the chair for the entire SKC show before we ever announced this approach.

As we stated in our earlier blog as well as on the “landing page”, those folks that are interested in photos only need to let us know, and to give us a rough description of themselves, along with info on their dog(s).

For all of you who have already contacted us, we’ve located you and your dogs 100%. We will have all your galleries up this week.

The reason this is working? We took photos of every handler for every run… Makes life easier for all involved.

Because of the very challenging lighting that an indoor event involves, we shot a LOT. This means that we can’t reasonably post every shot that’s viable; the sheer volume of work required would be vast.

Offering galleries only to those people that express interest serves the community’s needs as well as balancing our own time for production. And really, there’s no point in processing and posting images that people don’t want to purchase (especially true since we weren’t offering next-day sales).

A comment on another forum questioned our abilities to meet your needs; expressing doubt on whether we could find your dog. As mentioned, we took shots of every handler…

Thanks to those of you who separately forwarded that on to us (with your own very positive comments to offset that).

Our response to anyone that has something negative to say: Take the time to check your sources first; you might be surprised at what you discover…

You may still disagree (and that’s great), but please get the facts first. We can’t please everyone out there, but we do make a very deliberate effort to raise the bar when it comes to being and acting positive – it’s way too small a community.

Best wishes,

Jerry and Lois

Seattle Kennel Club, Geoffrey Castle Concert and a bit more…

Jerry & Lois — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 11:16:00 +0000

Hello all! We have been amiss in our blogging ways for several weeks, but that’s not to say that we haven’t been busy! Our “Simply Black” photo shoots surprised us with great positive feedback and as always, being the official agility and event photographers for the annual Seattle Kennel Club dog show was great.

At SKC, it was wonderful seeing so many of our friends, both human and canine, after our usual winter break from the agility trials. On Saturday, we shot agility exclusively, but on Sunday – we did the event shooting for the club. They use these images for their advertising and publicity for the year, and it certainly helps that we are well versed in canine performance and breed!

What we LOVE about our work is that we can shoot dogs on the weekend and three days later, we are photographing high school seniors. We had a pair of lovely ladies (both cheerleaders, no less!) who smiled non-stop for THREE HOURS! Awesome!

This weekend (Mar 14/15), we are photographing the incredible Geoffrey Castle Celtic Concert at the Kirkland Performing Arts Center. This is one of the BEST concerts performed by local favorite, electric violinist – Geoffrey Castle. The lineup of musicians includes: Heart drummer Ben Smith, Grammy award winning bassist Garey Shelton and special guest Alan White, drummer for Yes and John Lennon!

For more info on Geoffrey Castle:

Tickets are still available: http://www.kpcenter.org with shows at 8:00 Saturday evening, and 2:00 Sunday afternoon.

Finally, for all you agility people… the SKC trial will be posted in about a week or so. This is a hard one to estimate given the enormous amount of images we have to plow through! With the inquiries we’re receiving, we know you’re excited about seeing them.

A few more for you…

Jerry & Lois — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 23:00:42 +0000

Simply Black has proven to be a bit popular! Here are a few more from another session we just shot with our friends at Civilized Nature:

Simply Black, continued

Jerry & Lois — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 08:52:59 +0000

Had our first shoot with the new look yesterday. This took place courtesy of Wonder-friend Helen (Firerose Papillons) and Paws-Abilities, and thought we’d share a few shots…

We have a 2nd photo session scheduled this coming Friday and Saturday (13th and 14th) at Civilized Nature, open to the public. Call 425.868.9978 for an appointment and more info, this is booking up quickly.

E-Store Announcement!

Jerry & Lois — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 05:53:45 +0000

We have now officially opened our first e-store!

You will find us selling our prints through the “Etsy” mall, which came out on the top of our list as an outlet for our work. Visit the store here!

We will be adding in the first set of images to our gallery over the course of the next few weeks. A slow roll-out was recommended, as it keeps our store “fresh” and visible. Be sure to stop by often and see what’s new!

Here’s a sample of what you can find:

J & L

Alaska: Whales, Wildlife, and Water

Jerry & Lois — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 01:50:12 +0000

As many of you know, we’ve had the chance to travel twice in Alaska, courtesy of NW Explorations. And not just travel, but to do so in an amazing first class way, through both the B.C. Inside Passage from Bellingham WA to Ketchikan, and then from Ketchikan to Juneau via the Alaska I.P.

Daily encounters with incredible wildlife and scenery produced images that we’ve been very pleased to share with folks. These eventually turned into a 6 week exhibition, a first for us, last fall.

As such we have had many inquiries about how to see some of the shots from our fabulous trips.

Here’s a video we just completed and published to YouTube. Enjoy: