Krista + Brett - Angel's Gate Park, California

From their ceremony at the breathtaking (albeit windy) Angel's Gate Park with its interesting pagoda to their reception at Hesse Park filled with people who can only be described as riotous, Krista and Brett planned a memorable and downright enjoyable wedding.

The wind made for some very fun moments!
The wind mayhem:

 

 The kite attack was probably my favorite moment of all!

 

On a side note, the above basketball court was the location of a TV commercial with Kobe Bryant.

{PHOTO IQ: My setup for the above shot (tossing the bouquet) was the key to its clarity and timing. I usually set up two or three speedlites around the room, one on the bride, one on the catchers, and one to give a general lift to the room. With so many light sources around, you can set the power lower, giving you shorter recycle times and faster bursts to stop action. Hit me up with any questions, either with comments here or on my facebook page! }

For those of you on smart phones who can't see the slideshow below, click here to be whisked electronically to the facebook album.

See more at www.jonwoodbury.com

Jon Woodbury Photography Fine Art Prints and Canvases!

I am so excited to finally announce my Online Photography Gallery!
After literally years of work, I have collected many of my favorite and most popular images into an online gallery where you can browse, share, and purchase your favorite images.
You'll notice many images from my trips to Europe as well as many locations from around the United States.
You can share your favorites on Twitter and Facebook or comment right there on the site. I'd really love to hear your feedback!
Enjoy it, it's been years in the making.

PS. If you follow my photography page on Facebook or Twitter you can get a code for a discount on purchases through the end of September!

{Photo IQ: I'm going to talk about the image of the leaves for the instructional part of the post. Sometimes the most important aspect of photography is simply being in the right place at the right time. I went out for a walk with my camera on an autumn day after a frost and saw these leaves trapped in ice on the pond near my house. It's a rare and beautiful phenomenon and only lasted about 30 min before the pond melted again and the leaves sunk to the bottom. The tip for today day is simply to SHOOT! Get out there with your camera and make images. Take photo walks, either by yourself or with a friend. If you're in Utah you can go to http://www.photowalkingutah.com/ or organize your own. I'd LOVE to go shoot }

For those of you on smart phones who can't see the video below, click here to be whisked directly to the album.

See more at www.jonwoodburyphoto.com

Sunbrook Country Club - St. George - John + Maree, Part 2

I know how often I say that I work with awesome people, but I really do!...and I can certainly prove it when it comes to John and Maree. When we first met to talk about the photos they dreamt about, we all thought that we could combine forces and create some great images. We all had some inspiration and some innovative ideas to add to the collective pot, and we were proven right. Their engagement session on the Salt Flats has been a portfolio piece I adore, and Maree's bridal session at the Union Station in Ogden was some of my best work, and both shoots make up some of my favorite memories as a photographer. Add in a fantastic wedding day in Manti with a follow up reception in Riverton, and how could we go wrong? With such wonderful photos and so much time spent together we all grew to like each other and trust each other implicitly.

The final reception for these amazing kids was at a fantastic golf club in St. George, Utah. The course looked out at the red rocks in the background, and as the sun started to set it was too beautiful for me to pass up. I knew that I only had about ten minutes tops to capture the light, but I was able to run inside, pull John and Maree out of their receiving line, and take some of the most amazing photos in my portfolio. I trusted that they knew it was important. They trusted that I was going to give them something awesome in return for those ten minutes away from their guests, and they followed me out onto the green without hesitation. Through our entire relationship, in the choices we made, I think we've been proven right at every turn...but I'll leave it to you to decide.

For those of you on smart phones who can't see the slideshow below, click here to be whisked electronically to the facebook album.

See more at www.jonwoodbury.com

Random Image

On our recent jaunt back east to shoot a wedding in Maryland (Shout out to Chris and Kristen!) We dropped in on the National Natural History Museum in Washington DC.
Can you really go wrong with a prehistoric elephant butt? I think not.

Like a Kid in a Candy Store

"To be like a kid in a candy store" (American & Australian)
To be very happy and excited about the things around you, and often to react to them in a way which is silly and not controlled.
In case you didn't know what that looks like, a photo of kids in a candy store.
We were not just in a candy store, we were in THE candy store, Hershey World in Hershey, PA. We were in Virginia for a wedding last summer and took a jaunt up to PA to visit Tom and Britta. This is my daughter, Hannah, and Ella, their daughter.

Vegasography

A look back at our week in Las Vegas. There will be more to come from the shoots I did down there but these are the touristy-type shots.
I wanted to take some real Vegalicious photos while I'm down here in Vegas. So what fits the city of Las Vegas better than a lens that totally distorts everything in it's path? So I broke out the fisheye lens and took a drive down the Strip. I actually solved my issue with purchasing a fisheye just recently. I've always wanted one but could never really justify the cost for a specialty lens that I don't really need. So I bought a Lens Baby. You can get the Lens Baby and the fisheye optic for about half of a normal fisheye and have the option for all of their other interchangeable optics as well! I like the solution and thank you to Berkley at Pictureline for playing around with me long enough to verify it would work for me. (If you don't shop for your gear at Pictureline you really should.)

See more at www.jonwoodbury.com

Prague, Before and After -- Europe Fine Art/Travel Photography

I've been enjoying the wedding off-season by doing a little of the work I've been piling up for years. Lori and I went to Europe in 2006 for the World Cup and I came home with about 4500 images. It was the next year that I started my photography studio and haven't taken a breath since. So for years I've longed for the time when I could do some editing and perhaps even launch a web store on which to sell my travel and fine art prints. Well, I'm still a ways away from it but I HAVE begun editing some of my favorite images from Europe and my other travels since. For fun I thought I'd show both the original file as well as the finished product. For those of you who are not used to the editing process for fine art photography, it is a LONG, tedious process. It takes hours and hours and I'm still rarely satisfied. It's a long journey from the limited data the camera can capture to the dynamic image that shows the viewer the scene as it was in my head at the time.
Anyway, this is one of my favorite places on the planet, the view from Prague castle.

Shane & Amanda - Ceremony - Stanley, Idaho

The sun had just slipped behind the Sawtooth Mountains and the light was a cool blue. I saw Amanda over on the swings just sitting there watching. I went over. She remarked at how cool it was that all their friends and family had come from so far away and they were playing games and having fun together in this amazingly beautiful place. It was exactly how she'd always envisioned it. Shane came over and we enjoyed the silence for a minute before I jumped back into photographer mode. We took some fun shots on the swings before I left them, just the two of them, to sit there in the waning light and just bask in a really cool party.
Shane and Amanda, we love you guys.

See their engagement session. (It was a cool one!)
See their pre-wedding session in Glacier National Park, Montana.

If you can't see the slide show below, click here for the facebook album.

See more of my work at www.jonwoodbury.com

Do You LOVE Pixels? Say Hello to My Little German Friend!

Okay, this is cool. The Dresden Project is a HUGE photo shot on the roof of the building "Haus der Presse" in Dresden, Germany. It is made up of 26 billion pixels! It was shot by a robot with a Canon 5d mark II in 172 minutes. It took 16 processors 94 hours to stitch everything together.
You can use your scroll wheel to zoom in and out and hold your mouse button and move the mouse to scroll. It is just really amazing.
Click here to link to the site.