I did a pregnancy photo session for a couple recently. We started on the hills above the ocean somewhere south of Pacifica CA. We got some great shots of the two of them but the award winner is posted below. The long back hair, round pregnant belly, dark Indian skin, the dark cliff walls, the cold white-capped ocean, this shot just works in my opinion.

It’s on the blog twice. I was just going to post the color version you see first. This shot is a bit intimate, and I know for a fact the husband has some conservative family members, I thought I’d check before I put it out there on the interweb for all to see. I emailed a proof of the shot with my request, and when I got the email saying “yes” back it also said “aren’t you going to use the black and white version?”

Which one do you like better?

I took this black and white shot in Plitvica National Park in Croatia some number of years back.

The color there were gorgeous. I grabbed a roll of slide film out of the bag (remember that stuff?) and was shooting mainly for the colors I saw.

Only when I got back to the USA and had the roll processed that I realized that it was black and white slide film, which is really rare. Most of the roll was just not very interesting. Images that had been framed and composed with color in mind and as one of the main focal points just looked dull in black and white. This shot though, I’ve always loved.

Now, shooting digitally, I don’t have to worry about this mistake any more.

Copyright Alex Schoenfeldt 2001. All rights reserved.

Wednesday night 11:30 PM I got an emergency text from a client, Jeanne Henzel Swartz, proprietor of Joona She was having a photographic emergency. She had just finished a hat for a competition, and photos were due at 10:00 AM tomorrow. She had been planning to shoot it herself, but her model flaked. She needed me to come over and get some shots of this hat.

I said “what the heck.”

I roll into her studio in an industrial part of town just before midnight. We scope around for a while, and decide to try a few things. We have one well lit room with blank walls, a funky handmade shelter by the waterfront (we are basically in the port of Oakland) and a congregated metal building that looks interesting. We shot for about an hour, came back to my studio, picked our favorite made some quick adjustments in Photoshop, popped it on a thumb drive, done. I was in bed by 2:00 AM.

I say we nailed it.

Here is the one in front of the blank wall. This is the one that got submitted to the contest (which is why the aspect ratio is weird) . We felt like it showed off the hat the best.

Here is the one in front of the funky handmade structure on the edge of the San Francisco Bay in the port of Oakland. This one is my favorite. It is a little busy, but man there is a lot going on here.

And lastly, the one in front of the metal building. The photo we went with was the first shot we took, and this was the last. Funny how that worked.

All photos © Alex Schoenfeldt 2011
San Francisco Photographer

Every year to commemorate the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. children participate in an Oratorical.

Montclair Elementary in Oakland California asked me to take portraits of the participants with their certificates.

The full gallery of all of the shots can be seen here:

http://schoenfeldt.com/2011_Oratorical/

Here are some of my favorites.

All photos © Alex Schoenfeldt 2011. All rights reserved.
San Francisco Event Photography

This photo speaks for itself.

For this photo, in the early evening I pulled over on the very quiet Highway 69 between Mariposa and Oakhurst. I mounted the camera on a tripod, and waited for some cars to appear at the edge of the image.

I then exposed the image for 30 seconds, (f8, ISO 200) so the lights from the cars would streak across the image.

Photo © Alex Schoenfeldt 2005. All rights reserved.
Alex Schoenfeldt is an official Yosemite National Park wedding photographer.

Infrared wedding photos from the Oakland Mormon Temple

When people get married at the Mormon Temple (or LDS Temple. Feel free to tell me in comments which is better) the temple itself is an important feature in the photographs. I love shooting there. As a photographer, I appreciate the scale, the lines, and the tones.

I’ve shot there many times, (here is another LDS wedding that made it to my blog) but this past week was my first time there with my infrared converted digital camera. It was a nice sunny day, which enhanced the effect.

All Photos copyright 2010, Alex Schoenfeldt Photography. All Rights Reserved.

While shooting a bridal portrait session today, I saw this spiderweb in the morning fog.

Photo © Alex Schoenfeldt 2010. All rights reserved.
San Francisco Bay Area Photographer

I recently bought a digital canon, a D60, that has been converted to shoot infrared. Now, you can’t quote me on this, but here is to the best of my knowledge how this thing works. All digital cameras have a filter in them that blocks infrared and allows visible light to pass. In my new IR camera, someone has taken out that filter and placed instead a filter that does the opposite, blocks visible light and allows IR to pass.

If I’ve got that wrong, let me know in comments.

I first took the camera out to the Berkeley hills, and I loved it right away. I could tell immediately that I had to learn to see in a new way to get the most out of this camera, which as a photographer was an exciting prospect.

Then, I took the camera to the Big Sur River with some friends, and here are the results:

All Photos © Alex Schoenfeldt 2010. All rights reserved.
Alex Schoenfeldt Photography.

First graders from Montclair Elementary School in Oakland California are putting together an act for the talent show.

To raise money, the program of the show is selling ads. The parents of these children are buying an ad, and they wanted a photo of the kids.

The act is the kids singing and dancing to “It’s a Small World.” The children are in costumes and outfits from cultures all over the world.

All photos © Alex Schoenfeldt 2010. All rights reserved.
San Francisco Bay Area photographer