Yes, I meant to do it......and it's okay.....

Okay. I am putting this post up just to explain something. A pose that I do quite often (mostly because it is one of our most popular and biggest selling) occasionally generates this conversation.

customer: I just looked at our proofs and there is one image where my daughters head is cut off. Is there more in the photo than the proof shows?

Us: No...what you see in the proof can be cropped in further, but if her head is cropped then we meant to do it.

customer: Why would you do that?

Us: The image in question is what we call an "extreme close-up" of just the face. If we get the top of her head then the eyes will be in the lower half of the photo and it will look really dumb. It is okay to cut off the forehead if you do it properly and intentionally.

Here is a photo that always generates this conversation.
As you can see the eyes are the focus of this image and you are not missing anything by cutting off the top of the head. Compositionally...it just looks better this way. It is one of our most popular poses. Usually when I do this pose I also shoot a vertical image where the entire head shows, as in this image.
I assume by doing this I am giving the customer the option. If you do not like the super close-up then you have the full headshot to fall back on. The funny thing is that most say that they like the super close-up more. I think it is just so ingrained into us that cutting the top of someones head off is a bad thing that we can't look at the image with an open mind. JUST remember....if you like the way a photo looks.....don't worry about that stuff. It is okay to do that as long as it looks good. If you don't like it...then order the one with all of the head. Here are a few other examples of PROPERLY cropped images.

13 years of Ailor Photography

Okay....that is actually 13 years in business and 12 years having a studio as of September 17th! Sometimes it really seems like it has been a lot less time and others it feels like this is all I have ever done.
I remember the first year when I was lucky to have 1 or 2 sittings a week. I spent a lot of time that year sitting at my desk, reading a book and hoping the phone would ring. I must have read 12 - 14 novels that year. Anyway it has been a long road but totally worth it. I am so happy to have a nice studio and a large group of wonderful customers. I look forward to many more anniversaries.

Final sport of the season

Well, between Neil and I we have managed to photograph all of Jeff High Schools fall sports. We did them all in about 3 weeks. We know that we still have to photograph some events this season, but the action sports are done. I let Neil photograph women's golf and men's tennis and most of football, but I went to football for a little while to see what I could do. Neil was using my best lens so once it started to get dark, I had to stop. Anyway, here are a couple of mine that came out pretty good. Unfortunately it wasn't a very good game for Jeff so we had a lot of photos of the quarterback dropping back, but that was about it for offense.
Remember you can view and order action photos from all of the fall sports at www.ailorphotography.com. Follow the link for online proofing, choose the event you want to view and enter the password: jeffphotos.

Lady's soccer this time!

Yes...it is true...I do pick my favorite sports to photograph myself. I love soccer so of course, I assigned myself to photograph the girls soccer match vs. Kokomo. Here are two good ones. I shot over 380 photos so it is too much trouble to go through them and look for the "best"
It is always good to catch a header sometime during the game. I love this one because the ball is still in the photo and her feet are still off the ground. Pretty cool.

I'm pretty sure I photographed this girls senior portraits also. Who do you think comes away with the ball in this photo?

Well Neil is shooting girls golf and boys tennis yesterday and today. I will be joining him on Friday night for FOOTBALL. This will be a good chance to see how it is photographing under the lights at the new Jeff stadium. Should be fun.

No....I don't do weddings....BUT...that being said....

I hope that all the people from the past couple of years who have heard me say "I don't do weddings" don't start calling me and yelling. I really don't photograph weddings under normal circumstances. In this case it was the wedding of my assistant "Ashley".
We were worried all week about the weather since Ashley planned an outdoor wedding (against my better judgment). As it turned out it was a beautiful day on Saturday for an outdoor wedding even though they had been calling for rain all week. I had fun photographing her wedding since it was at Riehle Plaza which has tons of great locations for photos. It is also quite liberating to do a wedding when you are not being paid.....takes the pressure off.

Anyway...here are a few of my favorite photos from the wedding. You might notice a theme with the sepia toning.

Anyway.....Ashley if you by any chance check the blog while on your honeymoon. I hope you like the photos.